Most Talkative: Stories From the Front Lines of Pop Culture

one month later. I was so excited—or relieved and/or possibly still discomposed from the letdown—that I got on the bed and jumped up and down like a six-year-old. The rented silver sequined shoes I was still wearing were so slippery that I fell off the bed, which would have been bad enough. But in the cramped hotel room, on a night that was already steeped in terrible luck, I fell violently and landed on the sharp corner of the bedside table. Taint first. I injured myself so badly that I could barely move for the rest of the evening, and poor Graciela spent the remainder of her milestone birthday fetching ice. For my taint. (For those of you who don’t know what a taint is, it’s the area between one’s butt and one’s balls. As in: “’Tain’t your balls and ’tain’t your butt.” Now you can say you learned something from this otherwise breezy tome.)

Moments before I fell on my taint!

By the time the date for the LA B-52s concert rolled around, we were almost over the whole thing because we’d exhausted ourselves—and everyone we knew—obsessing over it all summer. We checked in to the Mondrian and dragged out our stage costumes, and Graciela reimagined her hair into a classic bouffant, a real B-52.

Meanwhile, I’d had another setback. My newest undoing came in the form of watching a video of myself practicing dancing in Chicago. Based on the footage, I’d deemed myself not only unfit for the stage but also possibly neurologically unsound. Did my body move like that because Lyme disease had affected my brain function?

Before the concert, diseased and newly insecure, I calmed my nerves backstage with Jack Daniel’s and Pop Rocks (which, if you think about it, should be the official snack combo for the B-52s) when the Pretenders walked right past us to get onstage. And just like that, all my sorrows and self-pity were erased by a nod from Chrissie Hynde.

Before we went on, I was told that Kate (Pierson, the divine) would at some point be joining me on my pedestal and that whatever happened, I should just do my own dance and not imitate Kate’s moves. I assured him that this would not be a problem for a versatile dancer like me. Apparently, I’d suffered acute temporary amnesia about the dreaded practice video.

Graciela and I hit the spotlight—we were on pedestals on either side of the stage—for the third song, “Dance This Mess Around.” From behind the band, without a monitor in my ear, the music sounded like a mashup of nothing I could recognize, and I had a hard time finding the beat. To complicate matters, I’d done one too many shots of Jack Daniel’s before the show to calm my nerves. The Jack had calmed them so effectively that I felt like I was swimming in a pool of molasses. I was also, within seconds of going onstage, sweating like a pig. My silky green shirt was not breathing with me. Was it the alcohol/candy combo—or was I totally Lyming out with fever?

I looked across the stage, and Graciela … was a beautiful gazelle. She looked so perfect, she could’ve been in the band. This did not help my flailing, drowning feeling.

To further rattle me, within a minute or two of our first song, I saw Kate approaching my ramp. “Do NOT imitate Kate,” I repeated to myself like a mantra, as I attempted some kind of a lame, modified, Jewish-boy Swim. Sure enough, Kate was on my ramp and I was dancing with her in what felt like slow motion. Imagine my shock when she started doing MY lame, modified, Jewish-boy Swim! I was horrified! Also confused, upset, and drunk. I tried to come up with a new move on the spot, but to no avail. Kate left the ramp—wondering, I’m sure, how the hell I got onstage with them.

The rest of the show was a blur. I sweated like a whore in church through it all. I’m pretty sure we kicked ass during “Summer of Love,” and I still feel good about my performance in “Strobe Light,” despite losing my way a few times. Surely the “bang bang” during “Love Shack” was a highlight? And my aborted somersault during “Rock Lobster” might’ve, frankly, saved the show. But it was all over so quickly. And thus arriveth the lesson: No matter what happened that night, it could never have borne the hype we piled upon it. But I’m still glad I did it.

A few years later, Graciela was working at VH-1, and the show Rock and Roll Fantasy approached us about dancing with the B-52s again. We said yes. Duh. This time we were sober, and disease- and injury-free. Total pros. I had a number of moves prepped and ready should Kate Pierson subconsciously feel the need to bite my style again. And clearly, my dancing had improved, because the Go-Gos, who were on tour with the B’s at the time, saw us and asked us to join them onstage during their set. They made Grac dance in a bra and me shirtless, because we had no change of costume. And while I’m sure that seeing myself doing a lame modified topless Pony to “Vacation” would be totally cringe-inducing, I’m kind of sad that there’s no videotape of that performance, for it was my last one. After that, I hung up my blue sparkle pants and my sweaty silky green shirt and those slippery silver sequined shoes for the last time. But all this reminiscing has got me thinking—if you’re in a band and you find yourself in need of a go-go dancer, I still know where I can rent them. Call me!

THE NINE COSTUMES THAT GUARANTEED I’D NEVER GET LAID ON HALLOWEEN

A Hobo/Bum—This was my go-to costume as a kid. In retrospect, dressing as a homeless person seems a bit crass. PC hadn’t been invented then.

Greg Brady after raiding Carol’s closet—I accomplished this by wearing a