login | Register

My First Molly Hatchet Concert, February, 1980

This morning I heard "Flirtin' with Disaster" on Rock 101 and it prompted me to recall a pivitol Southern Rock moment in my life. I remember the first time I heard the song. It was on my friend's Pioneer stereo. She had the LP. That song rattled the walls and I could feel it in my gut and in my groin, like a sonic bombast and nuclear blast simultaniously hitting me.

A few weeks after that, that I ended up at Greenville Memorial Auditorium for my first Molly  Hatchet show. I always had this ability to b.s.  my way backstage. As an aspiring journalist, I claimed to be writing an article for The Greenville News, although I had never yet written for that fine newspaper, and the backstage curtain opened up. Danny Joe Brown was looking at me like a deer caught in the headlights, hunched over a roadcase, snorting a line of coke, a wicked smile on his face. I walked right up to him.

“Danny, I’m Michael Smith with the local paper.”

“Well don’t #%$&! write about this,” he snapped.”And close that damned curtain!”

 “Don’t worry Danny, I won’t,” I said, calmly. Sheesh, Danny Joe Brown and many of the members of Molly Hatchet do drugs. What a surprise.

Over the next thirty minutes, I met all of the band members except for the drummer, Bruce Crump. I don’t know where he was. In fact, the band didn’t know either.

 “Where the #%$&! is Bruce?” yelled Danny Joe. “We go on in a few minutes!”

 I really wanted to meet Dave Hlubek, whom I’d just seen ov television, just ripping on lead guitar. He looked like a bad biker, and as it turns out, he also acted like one. I walked up to him, he was sitting in a straight back chair, nursing a bottle of some sort of adult beverage and reading a Circus magazine.

 “Excuse me,” I said. “I am with the Greenville News, and I just wanted to say hello.”

Hlubek looked up over the magazine, and without batting an eye, said “Ff#%$&! off, man.” Then he returned to his article.

Flash forward some 24 years. I am sitting around backstage at a Southern Rock Allstars show, somewhere in Virginia. Dave is once again thumbing through a magazine, only this time, it is my magazine, GRITZ. We are all shooting the bull, and all of the sudden I feel compelled to comment on the strange parallel of my past experience and what is happening at this time.

“Hey Dave, remember the first time we met?” I asked, sarcastically.

“You mean last year, Michael?”

“No, the first time. It was 1980 in Greenville. We were backstage and I attempted to meet you and you told me to go  away.”
Dave’s face went berry red. “Michael...he stuttered...Michael...I am sorry...I never...I would have never...”

Jakson Spires cut him off, mid-sentence.
   “You would have never treated Michael mean if you’d known he would one day own a Southern Rock magazine and be writing a book that would have you in it!”

Everyone laughed. Dave of the 21st century is a really fun and funny guy.

Back to 1980, Greenville Memorial Auditorium. The band had received their two-minute warning. Time to hit the stage.

“Where in the living hell is Bruce?” Danny was fuming. The announcer was introducing them. “And now, from Jacksonville, Florida...”

“Bruce is already behind the drum kit,” yelled Steve Holland.

I learned many years later that of all the band members, Bruce Crump was probably the most dependable. He’d been onstage preparing for the show, but because he didn’t hit a single lick on the drum, nobody had noticed.

I walked back out onto the Auditorium floor and bulldozed my way to the second or third row. There was a perky little blond girl standing in the dark, smoking a joint. She offered it to me, and I waved it on to the next guy.  She asked if she could sit on my shoulders. Seems to be my lot in life, being used as a vantage point for chicks who want to see the stars. It happened many times. The only difference was, tonight my back was hurting. I had pulled a muscle or something lifting something at work. She stayed up there through the opening song, and then I brought her down, and stood her in front of me.

There are a lot more details which I will go into in my memoirs book in the future. For now, let's just say that "Filirtin' with Disaster" always brings to mind the little blonde haired girl with the Hatchet t-shirt, and it always brings a smile to my face. Hell yeah!

Keep it Real. Keep it Southern!
Buffalo

PS: Oh yes, the Legends of Southern Rock feature on Molly Hatchet is still on the way. I promise it will be worth the wait!

Photo of Danny is from the same show, taken by Dan Armonotis.

related tags

Gritz,

Related Dispatches