Nashville Knucklehead

Playboy, Ratt, Kevin Bacon and Me

I am going to tell you a story. It is a long story. It doesn't have to be, but I am going to make it a long story. It is going to contain sexual references. It is going to have some coarse language. There is going to be a picture of a naked ex-girlfriend of mine at the end. And, most importantly, it is going to contain a crass, vulgar and juvenile reference to a certain wonderful part of the female anatomy. If you feel you may be offended by any of this, I'll tell you the short version, and you are dismissed:

I wrote a novel.
I named the main characters the Bacon Brothers.
Kevin Bacon came out with a band called the Bacon Brothers.
I was sad.

That's it. Go away.

Now, for those of you brave enough to continue, the reason I am telling you the long version is because of the first sentence.

I fucked a Playboy centerfold.

I like that sentence so much, I'm going to start over.

I fucked a Playboy centerfold.

Of course, that isn't technically true. I fucked a bartender who became a centerfold. That's still a fairly elite club for those not named Hefner. I was in a band. That helps. The girl, I’ll call her "Laurie" (because that’s her name) was a bartender in a club that we played in. I knew her casually, but never really thought about asking her out. Then one night, in a different club across town, we were finished playing, I was packing up my stuff, and I turned around and Laurie was standing there.

I said, "What’s new with you?"

She replied, "Well, I just found out today that I’m going to be a Playboy centerfold."

Let me tell you, that is a very powerful sentence to hear come out of a woman's mouth. So I did what any red-blooded college-aged American man with dreams of rock-stardom would do in that situation – I took her home with me.

So we dated for a few months, she eventually moved to L.A. and traded up for a real rock star, the guitar player in Ratt. (His name was Robbin Something-or-Other. He later died a tragic rock star death involving heroin a dirty needle and AIDS.) So I did what any red-blooded American man would do, I started dating her roommate.

Laurie had two roommates. First was Julie, who was really hot. Those hot chicks stick together, you know. The other was Kurt, a very flamboyant homosexual. He tinted his hair. He drove a red Fiero. He talked like a stereotypical flamboyant homosexual. It was Julie I started dating. Not Kurt. Very funny.

Around the middle of the next year, the Playmate of the Year issue arrived in Kurt and Julie’s mailbox. This is where they have a review of all twelve centerfolds from the year before, and you get to look at them all naked again and wonder who is going to be Playmate of the Year. Obviously, Kurt and Julie wanted to see Laurie win, she was their friend, and it was also worth $100,000 to her if she won. I wanted her to win too, because I knew that years later, Al Gore would have invented the internet, I would have a weblog and I would be able to tell a bunch of strangers that I fucked a Playmate of the Year. Alas, that was not to be.

So Kurt and Julie started going through each girl, criticizing. They were just brutal. "Her nose is too big." Turn the page. "Her butt is too big." Turn the page, "I don't like the shape of her nipples." I swear to God, Julie said that.

Then Julie turned the page and there was a shot of one of the girls, taken from behind and below her, with her legs apart, looking back to the camera. This was way before the Brazilian waxing that they all have now. Kurt squeals, like only a flamboyant homosexual can do, points between the girl’s legs and says, "Eeeeeewwwwwwwwww!!! I don’t like all that old . . . hairy . . . bacon sticking out!!!"

Fast forward several years. I decided to try my hand at writing a novel. But I couldn’t come up with any memorable characters. I wanted to write a mystery, but I didn’t want the main character to be a typical grizzled beat cop or a retired spy. I wanted a couple of regular guys that I could relate to, but I was stumped. My best friend at the time was the Idiot Drummer. One day, we were in my truck on the way to go camping, and he was thumbing through a magazine with naked women in it. He turned the page, and there was a woman in the same pose. I had a flashback from that afternoon with Julie and Kurt. I pointed, and in my best flamboyant homosexual voice, squealed, "Eeeeeewwwwwwwwww!!! I don’t like all that old . . . hairy . . . bacon sticking out!!!" He laughed so hard he nearly fell out of the truck. When he finally caught his breath, he said, "Dude, that’s going to be my new stage name, Harry Bacon!" (The stage name he had been using was Guy Lotromin.)

A couple weeks later, as I was trying to write again, it hit me -- a crime solving rhythm section, the Bacon Brothers. They would be Harry, a drummer, and I came up with an equally juvenile and crass name for the bass-playing twin brother, Barry David Bacon. But, of course, everyone called him Barry D. (Bury de bacon. Get it? Ha, ha ha ha ha)

Juvenile and crass as it may be, it was the inspiration I needed to start writing. Murder, mayhem and mystery began to flow from my fingers onto my keyboard. The Bacon Brothers were going to be my ticket to literary immortality. Then about a year into my writing of the next great American novel, Kevin Fucking Bacon put a band together with his brother, and they were on a high-profile publicity tour. And what does he call his band? The Bacon Brothers. I was pissed.

You see, I had a dream of creating these characters, getting a book deal, getting a movie deal and having the citizens of the world read the books or go see the movies, and stand around the water cooler discussing my characters, who were inspired by a homosexual’s horrified term for a vagina. Kevin Bacon crushed that dream.


I Love the 80s

posted by Nashville Knucklehead @ 10:21 AM