Here Today... Gone To Hell!

LITTLE DRUMMER BOY LOST
by Erik Himmelsbach

Las Vegas isn?t the worst place for a rock star to die, so long as you?re not laying stiff in a pine box. For Steven Adler, a Hollywood boy by way of Canoga Park, Sin City?s a comfy exile, all things being equal. Mom?s only a few condos away, L.A.?s just an hour by air and the bartenders at the Hilton take good care of him.

Only 38, Adler is a shadow, a feather-haired reminder of a moment when everything was big and bad and loud. And now his golden years have approached too soon. He is a rock pariah, booted from the world?s most popular band ? Guns N? Roses ? at the top of their game, for the most absurd of reasons (at least officially). Get this: The drummer was fired in 1990 for drug abuse. Yet drug abuse was the secret handshake that bonded the band; during roughly the same period in which Adler got hooked on junk, guitarists Slash and Izzy Stradlin were also immersed in heroin, and bassist Duff McKagan was soaking in booze. So pardon the raised eyebrow if the explanation sounds absurd.

I recently worked on a television documentary about Guns N? Roses and I learned many things about the band that I couldn?t reveal on the small screen, for both time and legal reasons. But there is strong evidence that Adler?s ouster was connected to the overdose of a member of the band?s inner circle at the drummer?s home. Unfortunately, I can?t further elaborate upon this without incurring the wrath of Axl Rose?s lawsuit-happy attorneys.

Adler?s drug problem essentially incapacitated him after his firing. He was just a drummer ? a kid who liked to party and to rock. For him, it wasn?t about pain or art or rage. Adler was having a great time. He lived the dream. Then it was yanked away. Like that. Despondent, he was fucked up on the hard stuff for much of the ?90s. In 1995, he was shooting cocaine when he suffered a stroke and went into a coma. He later suffered a second stroke and a heart attack.

He doesn?t speak so well these days, but at least he?s lightened up on the heavy shit. His chops are back and he has a new band, Adler?s Appetite, essentially a Guns N? Roses cover band with an original band member providing the backbeat. And though he had to sue for it, Adler recovered the royalties to which he was entitled and lives modestly in the heart of Vegas. His young girlfriend was once the president of the Argentinean Guns N? Roses fan club.

I visited Adler in Vegas, taking along a 25-year-old colleague, for whom Guns N? Roses was the soundtrack of his teenage life. He was thrilled by the prospect of hanging with one of his heroes.

For me, it was a gut-wrenching trip. Adler is a warm, sweet man. In spite of his drug and health problems, he is aging remarkably well, a slim-waisted, shaggy- maned golden god at the gate of middle age. But he is trapped. A dead drummer walking. Guns N? Roses platinum records and magazine covers dominate his living room. Cued up in the VCR is a loop of Guns performances. VH1 Classic was on his big-screen television and I endured bad ?80s videos from bands like Winger and Lita Ford. Yet I couldn?t make fun of them because my host would be offended. He was seriously into this shit. He played the Grease soundtrack on his stereo.

And with a television crew in his midst, he lit up like the stage at Madison Square Garden. For a day, at least, he could be Steven Adler, the badass drummer from Guns N? Roses. There was no junk shooting, no dragon chasing. But we partied deep into the a.m. and all the pain came rushing back.

When we finally scraped ourselves off of Adler?s floor at 3 a.m., he was sad to see us leave. I was sad to have exploited this man?s misfortune. This was a person at the top of the world whose identity had been stripped away in an instant, yet a dozen years later he was still what he was; and, like any addict, he was still chasing to get it back. Steven Adler is a casualty and I was there to puncture his wounds. I hated my job that day.
Contact Valley Boy at oblio64@adelphia.

Erin?  He cant mention the name Erin Everly or else Axl will get sue-happy?  Well, that "I, Axl" article from 1992 mentions her anyway...


 ;D


I wonder if she posts here or checks this board at all.

Thanks Jizzo.  I hope we get to hear the songs he worked on with Izzy.

Just out of curiousity how did Todd Crews???? die?

Poor Steven, there's something very bittersweet about that.

People have no right to pity Steven - he was drummer on the finest album ever released, made millions and now lives life however he wants to - and people pity him? We can only dream of that kind of life.

Great reading, thanks for posting that.


Actually that's an excellent way to look at it.  I only hope Steven is that positive and thinks of it that way too.


Dancing a little too hard with "Mr. Brownstone".

--Axl, Ritz 1988

Hence 'we can only dream' ???