LA Adjacent
REM Tour ’99
Our last morning in Los Angeles I meet my friend Victor for breakfast. We walk around West Hollywood until we settle on a place.
Victor is a playwright who’s living here, I imagine temporarily, because he’s writing for television.
“Victor, when are you moving back to New York?” I ask him in all earnestness.
“Adam, we live here now,” he says softly, as if breaking it to me gently that the memo’s been out for a few years now.
In addition to being a playwright, Victor had a memorable part in a quintessentially downtown New York film. How can he possibly have moved to Los Angeles permanently?
“Of any place in America, it actually reminds me most of being in Italy,” he says. He extends his arm about the patio. “Look, we have almost every meal outside.”
Victor has travelled extensively. He’s got exquisite taste, is generally more worldly than I am, and has been my friend and mentor for many years.
Still, I’m not sure I’m buying it…
# # #
We check out of Le Parc. Goodbye fluffy white bathrobe.
Anxiety levels from last night have come down a few decibels, but I’m still ready to get out of here.
Tour bus. I always like sitting up front, see where we’re going.
“So, why do you like driving a Prevost better than an Eagle?” I ask Dominic, our new driver.
“Superior turning radius,” he says.
As if to prove his point, he cuts a sharp right, deftly swinging us from a tiny side street onto Melrose.
If there were Angelenos among us, there might be a hot debate as to whether to turn south on San Vicente next, or take Santa Monica to the 405. But we’re all New Yorkers here. So long as Dominic gets us to Orange County in time for soundcheck, we’re good.
Actually, the distance to Irvine Meadows Amphitheater is maybe 50 miles, not even a puddle hop. Tonight is basically an extra LA area show for fans who didn’t make it to either of the first two.
At 16,000 capacity, Irvine Meadows is nearly three times the size of the Greek Theatre where we just played, and about 3k shy of Madison Square Garden. This is a pretty big show.
After REM’s soundcheck, we get just a short one tonight, but that’s fine. Afterwards, both bands are standing around in a circle gabbing. Michael is telling us about his recent trip to Morocco.
In the age before iPhones, there’s a fraction of photographic evidence because everyone doesn’t have a camera at all times. But a crew member happens by with a digital camera and snaps us all together, so the one photo of both bands that I know of is of this moment.
Come dinnertime, a local kid working catering describes what’s available.
“We have anti pasta,” he says, pronouncing the prefix Ann Tie, as if the dish has something against linguine.
“You mean ante pasto?” I ask, like, before the meal.
“Ann Tie Pasta,” he repeats, doubling down on his pronunciation.
Maybe it has to do with SoCal’s ongoing war on carbs. I go with the roasted zucchini option, to be safe.
# # #
REM has three additional musicians fleshing out the band on this tour, drummer Joey, guitarist Scott (of the Young Fresh Fellows) and the feller on the Hammond is, in fact, Ken Stringfellow of the Posies. Didn’t recognize him at first with the dyed red hair.
Everyone thinks Seattle was all grunge in the late 80s, but I was there, and there was all sorts of stuff. The Posies were pop geniuses, I saw them several times. Met Ken once back then and am happy to meet him again tonight. He’s genuinely astonished to find an actual Posies fan in these circumstances.
Soon it’s time for us to go on. As with the first two shows, it’s pretty empty at first, but this time the crowd is plenty big by the time we finish and they’re actually really enthusiastic.
During changeover, Jon, Hopper and I are standing by the side of the stage. Hopper looks over and sees a familiar-looking girl standing not too far away from us, looking in our direction.
“That’s Parker Posey,” he says.
We try not to stare. Like I said, this is still basically an LA area show, it’s not unimaginable she’d be here.
“Oh shit, she’s coming over,” Hopper says.
When she gets to us, she puts a cigarette between her lips and says, just like in a movie:
“You boys got a light?”
Jon reaches into his pocket first. If this were just a few years earlier, he probably would’ve produced a normal-sized Bic. But this is 1999, and tiny little lighters that fit inside your cigarette pack are in vogue.
The size of this lighter seems, shall we say, inadequate for the situation. To make matters worse, it does not light on the first try. Or the second.
She’s still holding the cigarette between her lips, waiting. Hopper and I are staring at the tiny lighter in Jon’s hand, willing it to function. We are content for Jon to take the lead, but our collective reputations are riding on this. He must deliver.
Luckily, on the third flick, the lighter ignites. The flame is feeble, but Parker Posey’s cigarette is lit. She smiles at us before going her merry way. That was a close one.
REM goes on. I watch the first five songs from the side of the stage then, having seen the last two shows pretty much in their entirety, I retreat to our dressing room to give my ears a rest. I go back to the side of the stage eventually to watch “Man on the Moon,” which turns out to be the last song in their proper set.
The band clears the stage for a few moments. While Michael goes back out first to do his solo thing, Ken stops beside me for a moment and hands me what appears to be a CD case made from sheet metal, bound together like a library book.
“What’s this?” I ask.
“It’s…something,” he says quite modestly, then slips away to ready himself for the encore.
Peter Buck stops to chitchat for a few moments, somehow he’s decided I’m a reasonable person to talk to. He sees the handmade CD I’m holding.
“Oh, he gave you one too,” he says, then adds with almost a hint of jealousy, “mine didn’t have a sticker.”
We talk a bit longer, then he takes the stage and the full encore begins in earnest. I watch until the end.
Back on the bus, I borrow a cd walkman from Jeff, retreat to my bunk, and listen to Ken’s cd. It’s really catchy, of course. The guy’s gifted, he’s got an amazing voice. Beyond this, I reflect on the various twists and turns that led me from seeing the Posies in a small bar in Seattle ten years before, to befriending Ken here tonight.
At last night’s show, my life seemed like it was careening out of balance.
Tonight, not that I can say where any of this is going, it seems like it might be on some curious kind of course after all.
This has been the fourth installment in this series.
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The Ann Tie cookbook features my favorite recipe for Pho Pas.