Welcome to My Jungle (7 page)

Doug Goldstein and me. Yes, we’re really close friends
.

Me on a yacht in the Greek Islands. MTV paid for this excursion.

Duff and Matt doing an interview for MTV on the yacht off the Greek Islands.

Tour Manager John Reese about to throw me into the waters just off the Greek Islands. Tour accountant Jerry Gemdron looks on.

Sitting in the cockpit of our plane, the MGM Grand. You get all sorts of perks when touring with Guns N’ Roses.

August Jakobsson, me, and Kirt Klingerman (management team) standing outside our MGM plane. Notice the bumper stickers. We shared the plane with Bruce Springsteen and U2, and every time the plane would come back from traveling with them, our bumper stickers would be gone.

Duff and Slash (hair) enjoying the spread of food on the MGM Grand.

This is what was always waiting for us when Guns N’ Roses arrived at an airport. The limos would drive right onto the tarmac and take us either directly to the hotel or to the venue
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HOTELS

3

LIFE
MAGAZINE ARTICLE

When I first started dating Natasha I had been on the road with Guns N’ Roses for about a year. We had met on a blind date set up by my sister, Pamela, on August 14, 1991. I found out Natasha only went out on that date with me because my sister was her friend. It was definitely a sympathy date.

Women!

Anyway, we had a great time on the date, but I was still seeing Kim, and Natasha was being stalked by a guy living in a Dumpster outside her Beverly Hills apartment. I personally didn’t want to get involved in that situation, so we parted ways until fate brought us back together exactly one year later to the date. And we owe all that to James Hetfield, lead singer of Metallica, which I will explain later in this book.

So I’m dating Natasha, and I am really in love. It’s the beginning of our relationship and I’m head over heels. I wanted nothing to do with strip clubs and other women. I knew that this was it—that I would marry Natasha Kozmovsky. I was sure of it. In fact I was so sure of it that after only six weeks I asked her to marry me on October 6, 1992.

She said yes.

It was perfect timing because I was able to stay in Los Angeles for a while because we were on a break. But our next leg of the tour was in South America and we would be gone for a while.

I decided it would be a great idea to bring her out on the road for a few weeks while we were touring South America. Since we had our own plane the flights from city to city wouldn’t cost me anything, and there was room on the plane, so I figured this would be a great opportunity to really bond and get to know each other.

I had Natasha meet me in Caracas, Venezuela. I still remember her getting off the plane and me thinking to myself,
I’m the luckiest guy in the world
. I still think so. Natasha is beautiful both inside and out.

We walked hand in hand to the baggage claim, but I got the feeling that something was wrong. She was happy to see me, but I just felt something wasn’t right. Even though the entire time we were just waiting for her bags I felt the hundreds of people around us, staring at us, thinking to themselves get a room, please.

Her bags never arrived. I kept thinking this wasn’t a good start to this trip.

Little did I know it was about to get much worse.

We took the limo and headed back to the hotel, sans luggage. I figured the limo would be a nice touch, trying to impress a woman whom I found out later couldn’t care less about materialistic crap. But I was with Guns N’ Roses, so I was set to impress my fiancée.

Still, something seemed “off.”

And then it happened.

About five minutes into the ride Natasha pulled out a
Life
magazine article and showed it to me.

“Did you read this?”

Immediately it all made sense—why she was acting so cold.

About a month prior, a writer from
Life
came out and toured with Guns N’ Roses for a week to see and write about what really goes on during a world tour with a hugely successful rock n’ roll band. The article shared what “they thought” really went on behind the scenes in a very long and very detailed article along with a few “interesting” pictures. The article was pretty revealing: backstage parties, sex, drugs (not really), and rock n’ roll. You know, the typical article about “bad boys” on the road. But here’s the deal—we were all on our best behavior that week, at least most of us were, so it was not really an accurate account. Thank goodness the writer never saw what really happened on the road.

But unfortunately, Natasha did.

Prior to that article, I had told Natasha that although touring with Guns N’ Roses was an incredible experience, and that there were some wild things that happened, it still was a business first, and the band and the management took their responsibilities very seriously. And for the most part that was true. But there were some nights that were wilder than a fraternity party on the most raging campuses across America. But I didn’t want to lose Natasha, and I personally was done with all that “other stuff” because I was truly in love.

“Oh you read that, huh?” I said.

“Oh yeah, I read it.”

And Elaine, her best friend, had read it, too. Elaine had tried to persuade Natasha not to come to meet me, and to seriously reconsider marrying me, because who would want to be married to a guy who toured with Guns N’ Roses?

Ouch.

Elaine is also married to Ray Parker Jr., of “Ghostbusters” fame. Ray and Elaine are great friends of ours to this day. But I had to dispel Elaine’s and
Life
magazine’s theory of touring in one limousine ride, otherwise this was going to be a very uncomfortable three weeks.

And to make matters worse, Elaine had “experience” in the field of backstage parties because Ray Parker Jr. toured for a living.

This was not going to be easy.

“Honey, you know not to believe everything you read. The story was embellished.”

“Well, we’ll see. I have three weeks out here, so I will see for myself,” she reminded me.

So there I was, praying that the next three weeks would be the calmest weeks Guns N’ Roses ever spent on the road. No naked women, no raging parties, nothing but good old rock music.

Yeah, that was going to happen.

We arrived at the hotel and I introduced everyone to Natasha, and everyone got along beautifully. All the band members are truly respectful to wives, girlfriends, and family. The first time my mom met Slash was in New York City. Slash was in the hotel lobby, and I walked in with my mom. Without any prompting, Slash walked over to my mom with open arms, and said, “Mom.” Then, he gave her a big hug.

She fell in love with Slash from that moment on.

And Natasha did as well—with everyone in the band and the crew. They were very welcoming. Especially Axl. Axl loved when Natasha would come out to visit to get a woman’s perspective on life, probably because he was sick of my perspective all the time.