Bebe Buell

which is after my grandmother, who is Florence. But my mother didn't like the name Florence, so she dropped the F, so I'm Lawrence is my middle name. And then Buell. This is my father's name.

my little five year old hands. I didn't want him to leave, and I never saw him again until I was about seven or eight months pregnant with live.

of knew that and I felt it. But he sort of felt that I had a lot of unfinished stuff with my dad, and he felt that it would be very healthy for me to see my father again before I had a child, even though I was all of twenty three years old, and so Todd had a show in Tallahassee, where my father was living, and I went to that show, uber pregnant, saw my father again for the first time since I was five, and it was interesting, to say the least. I didn't feel unattached to him,

and I felt very much like his daughter. We both had the steel blue eyes, and he's tall, and I saw myself, but I didn't really bond with him. And then I didn't see him again until two thousand and eight. I think it was there's a lot of years. My daughters met him once.

and he was an incredibly great man. I there's a lot about him that I don't identify with, but there's a a lot about him that I do identify with. And he was a heroic pilot. You can read about my father. He wrote a book called Dauntless Hell Divers about being a hell diver pilot in World War Two. He did unbelievable things. And the only pictures I ever saw of him, he was all dressed up in his regalia.

And people wonder why I'm drawn to people that are sort of regal in their stance or spiffy in their dress, you know.

my destiny to have this kind of dynamic. I was, you know, obviously there's a lesson for me in this life, and it has a lot to do with men and father and the importance of acceptance and and wanting to be loved.

all just revolve around the other person. I was very much a product of the sixties and the seventies because as much as women were burning their bras and people were burning their draft cards, there was still a suppression. There was still a stigma that went with burning that bra or having more than one boyfriend, or having a child out of wedlock that was still not one hundred

percent accepted as it is today. And the choices I made when I was young, I think were based on parental some kind of parental baggage I was carrying from my childhood. I'm really not sure, because I didn't really ponder it. I wasn't a self destructive person, and I wasn't an angry person. I was just a person that was sort of like swirling around like Alice in Wonderland, jumping from mushroom to mushroom. It like sort of like

Forrest Gump, but with a higher IQ. I just sort of fell into situations that I think I was obviously meant to experience. And whatever notoriety or recognition I got from relationships, I also got a lot on my own and my input in those relationships, if that means much. I wasn't Sharon Osborne, and I wasn't, you know, a Mamager type person. But I was a very artistic young girl, and I think I craved that around me. It was sort of my fuel, as well as the men that I enjoyed being around.

very infatuated with art period. I just would sit for hours and look at art books. And that's how I fell in love with Oscar Wilde and just through books, you know, just through looking at lots of pictures and deciding what I identified with.

There was music in the house a lot. And my mother liked the radio. So when we were in the car, when we had cars with radios, she would let me listen to whatever station I wanted. And I enjoyed listening to a little bit of everything. I sort of had a Shmorgas board. I loved the Everly Brothers and that you know that and that song by Roy Orbison crying that just crat you know. I would just go around the house like a maniac singing that song. And I

was very affected by Gypsy rose Lee. Let me entertain, you know. I would get in the shower and sing at the top of my lungs. And so what kind of child was I? I was sort of an entertainer from a very young age, but I didn't there was something missing. I think that's because of the situation with my dad. I never felt like I was enough. I never felt as pretty as the other girls or but of course it was not like that. It's just it's how I felt. So And did I get good grades, No,

because I had attention deficit. But there was one subject I was good in, and that was English literature. So any story telling, anything I could read about the Renaissance period, or anything that attracted me in that arena, Greek mythology, romany, astrology, metaphysics, Madame Blovowski, you know, things like that. It really resonated with me. So my mother kind of knew that I didn't have that headspace for wanting to go and go to college, that I was going to sort of learn.

I was going to get my education the old fashioned way, kick them in the deep end and see if they swim. And she sent my high school graduation picture to the biggest agent in the world. My mother always fought big and she still does, and I never thought I would get a response, But within three days we were on an airplane to New York City because Eileen Ford had summoned me and that was it.

he was not in the band. He was the one brother besides his other brother Richard, that weren't in the band because the dad just decided they weren't in the band. So, I mean, Paul was kind of a jock, you know. He hung out with my friend Charlie and they liked basketball. So that was my first big fourteen going on fifteen, when I met Paul, and I remember my first slow

dance with him. It was the last dance of the Night and Paul Castle comes to me and he asked me if I wanted to dance, and of course I said yes. He was so handsome. They were the most beautiful children. They were just all gorgeous. And so he was about seventeen at the time, and his family was becoming huge. The band was getting big, big, big big. But see I didn't know any of this at the time because I was a rock I listened to rock music. I wasn't really familiar with the Cowciles until hair and

then I really knew who they were. And of course the rained to park and other things, so that sort of started the dynamic of my first kiss. My first crush was somebody that went off to the circus. Suddenly Paul's dad decided he was going to be in the band, so Paul was in the Castiles. He was the keyboard players. So no more school dances. Oh. The slow song was blue Velvet, my first Blue Velve. You know, it's incredible.

So yeah, so of course we had to sneak off to kiss each other in the backseat of a car. It was all very innocent. There was nothing advanced. There was no third base or fourth base, back then, it was first base and second base, at least in my world. I'm sure other worlds were different, but in my world, and Paul always had the fear of his father looming over him. He had this incredibly strict father. He wasn't allowed to date, he wasn't allowed to go in cars,

he wasn't allowed to do any of that stuff. He might as well have been Mormon. I mean, it was crazy, but anyway, they moved to California, and I finished my soft more year in new Portwood Island, and then my family got transferred to Campla June, North Carolina, and that's where I did my junior and my senior year. So finally I was going to normal, a normal public school. I went to campblu June High School. I graduated from there,

and was I popular. I was always described I'm going to go buy my yearbook as an individualist and artistic, artistic girl was the so I guess, I guess it. Just it followed me. Was I effervescent, the entertainer, and me had not come out yet as far as being able to stand in front of people and actually own it, you know, that had not happened yet. I was still, I'm not going to use the word shy. I just didn't know yet how to present myself as a confident

human that hadn't really hadn't really eluded me yet. So I always had a sense of wonderment. But was I popular? I guess was some kids, the cool kids, kids that liked rock and roll, kids that knew who Blue Cheer were, you know, I I.

my life. You know. I was the kid that got into the newspaper for walking up to the stage with my instematic camera to take some pictures, and I got pushed by the stage was lined with cops. And that was my first taste at twelve going on thirteen. In ten days I would turn thirteen. What a baptism of Keith Richards actually coming to the edge of the stage and telling the cop to leave me alone. He sort

of took his foot and nudged him. He didn't do a full on Keith, but he did a little nudge, not a kick, but a nudge, you know, to let the police officer know that I could take my picture. And boy did I never forget that, you know. So I was the kid that after I started clicking, I got a picture of Brian Jones playing Harmonica in his print pinstripe suit. Once I did that, the rest of the kids were able to push up a little bit

more and it became a lot more fun. But so at that moment, I felt very connected to the spirit of what I was indulging. I felt very confident when I went up there to take my picture, and I wasn't going to let anybody stop me. And so after that, I think I went to a couple of those kind of gigs where they would have multiple people on the gig, you know, like Hermit's Hermit's and Sonny and Cher and Gary and the Pacemakers or something like that, and everybody

would play like ten or fifteen minutes. And I know that Jamie Hendricks opened for the Monkeys when I lived in Newport and which was a strange tour for Hendrix to be on, But I didn't go to that. But in high school, I mean I would always go to the school dances and you know, we would always go to the canteen and we would always dance and all the you know, local bands and stuff. So when I was a senior in high school, that's when I met my first became friends with a local band that was

big enough to open for Johnny Winter. So so my big, my first big concert where I got to be backstage and and s see a band like Johnny Winter, and which was so amazing when Rick Darringer was in the band, and I'm talking about the lineup after Zanga, after Rick's brother Randy had left, when it was just the trio, Oh my god, and you know, you know, I got it just it was a chain reaction. It just sort of started after that, but most of the concerts I

went to that all started. I think I saw the James Gang when I was in and they were great. It's funny that Ted Nugent the and boy Duke's played with the James Gang, and I never liked Isn't it funny? Never liked Ted NuGen There was just something about that guy that creeped me out from the very beginning. I don't know if it was my Catholic schoolgirl radar or

what it was, but he just creeped me out. I remember telling Dale Peters from the James Gang, he was the bass player, that that guy, that guy is so weird. You know. I was young, so I didn't know what other names to call him. I didn't know it was going to be like, you know, all the things I could say. But it's interesting I had even a little bit of a radar even then. I was blessed with

some kind of protective thing. God only knows how I made it out alive some of the situations I got myself into in life, and I just feel, whatever it is, you roll with it.

rent oed. But he I wasn't surprised at all with the way my life went because I told him that, you know, I was going to get to New York. I thought I was going to be a singer. I thought I was going to be like Nico or something. I thought I was going to or Marianne Faithful. I sort of wanted to be a chantoose. But I was a little too rocking. There was like that my body language, my aura, everything about me was not as delicate, you know.

I just I guess the term rock chick. I guess it's just in my pedigree and my DNA or whatever it is. But I just wanted to get to New York. And I'll be honest, I didn't even know what would happen when my mom sent those pictures and when Eileen's responded, my mother tried to explain to me, look, if you're not going to go to college, you really have to have a good job to work. And I thought, Okay,

I get it. Maybe this will be fun. And you know, I loved fashion magazines and I loved all the great supermodels, and I loved Twiggy and Jean Shrimpton and Patty Boyd and Jane Asher and it was all on my radar. So I wanted to be more like that, like Jane Barkin. I wanted to be more so. Of course, Eileen she signed me immediately. I was signed him for it in ten minutes. It happened very fast, and they put me

in Saint Mary's Woman's Residence. I was very used to being around nuns, but I wasn't able to keep my curfew. You had to be in by midnight when you were in Saint Mary's and I was starting to meet friends, and we used to go dancing at this place called hip hopon him. And then when I met Todd, I met Todd, and then the whole.

didn't have any boyfriends until I met Todd. He was my first boyfriend.

you know, Let's go see man. I had gone to see Man of La Mancha with my mother when I was a little girl in New York, and I wanted to go relive that moment, so I said, let's go see Man of La Mancha. So he took me to see Man of La Mancha. But on the way, Richard says to me, we have to make a stop on East thirteenth Street. I have to drop these tapes off to Todd Runggren. And he said, do you know who that is? And I was like, no, who's that? And he said, have you ever heard the song Hello? It's me?

And I was like, uh, yeah, yeah, And he goes that guy he's going, he's gone solo. And he started to tell me about this famous manager named Albert Grossman was managing him and he's going to be a big star, and that he had these tapes that he had done over at this place called Secret Sound with Moogie Klingman or something, and that he needed to drop them off

to Todd. So we pull up in front of two oh six East thirteenth Street, the same block that that scene in Taxi Driver where Jody leans up against the building when she's out to get a hooker or two or whatever. So he pulls the car up, but it was really a scary neighborhood in those days. He told me to stay in the car, and I was like, I'm not staying in the car, you know. So he had to throw a penny up to Todd's window because Todd didn't have a doorbell, and so he threw a

coin up to Todd's window. And this guy looked out the window, this guy, this multi colored hair. He looked like, you know that toy, my little pony. He sort of looked like my little pony. He was like a horse with rainbow hair, but a beautiful, a good looking horse, you know, a stallion. So but he so he came running down the stairs to get the tapes, and the exchange was made, and that's when I met him. Todd said, oh, who's your friend, Richard? And you know, Richie said, oh,

that's my friend baby. She's moved here from Virginia. You know, she's she's a model, she's with the four modeling agency, blah blah blah. And it's just you know, like he goes, oh great. You know, he was just wanting the tapes and he was going to go up and do his thing. So I met him, and I, you know, I of course was immediately drawn to him. I think we were drawn to each other. I think it was just some

kind of written in the heavens. I don't know how healthy the whole thing was, but I think we had to go through it, whatever it was.

had an edge that really enjoyed working with me. So I started to really make I started to get momentum. But then when I met Todd, that moved very quickly and I moved in with Todd and before I Oh.

I really want this client, you know. So I was being very disciplined. And then the photographer, ironically, when you hear his last name, it's kind of funny. The photographer that really legitimized me and got me on the pages of Vogue was named Clive Arrowsmith and this was in seventy six. And it was in the fall of seventy six that Stephen Tyler from Aerosmith became the father of my child. Well, he didn't become. He impregnated me, as

I we impregnated each other. So it's funny. I look at some of the synchronicities and some of the abstract occurrences, and no, I from seventy two to like seventy I did Playboy in seventy four, and you know, I made some money for that, but I would do a gig now and then, just to make some money so that I could just be whatever. I didn't even know who I was. I didn't know what I wanted to be.

All I knew was that music was my passion, and I kept my little notebooks with all my lyrics, and I just didn't know how to I didn't know how to get there. I didn't know how to do it.

hats that I love. And she is a little by little, the picture started getting less and less clothed, and before I knew it, Lynn Goldsmith was photographing me nude with feathers around my neck. So I was eighteen years old, nineteen years old, and no wait when this happened, I was nineteen and going on twenty. And so she took the first nude photos of me, and they were really good and in classic Lynn style, she wanted you know, them to be published somewhere. I mean, they were good enough.

She was really good photographer. So she showed them to Playboy. She showed them to Penthouse, which I objected to. I did not like that magazine at all. But Playboy was something that, as my friend Patty Smith called it at the time, very American pie, very American, very uh pepsi cola, very you know, Mickey Mouse, part of the culture. And there were some iconic people like Bridget Bardoux and even Linda Evans, and you know a lot of very beautiful women of the times, Betty Paye, you know, a lot

of girls had done it. The Barde bread I remember seeing there were these pictures of she and Jane Barkin. But anyway, Todd had a girlfriend before me. Let's see, I think Patty Smith. He was dating Patty Smith and he had this another girlfriend, and but she broke his heart. She was like the girl that broke his heart. But he sort of always carried a torch for her, or at least I thought he did. And there was talk that she she was going to be a Playboy centerfold.

And when I heard that, I said to Lynn, what did played? You know, Let's show those pictures the Playboy. So Lynn showed the pictures the Playboy, and yeah, they bit right away, and they me to Chicago. That's when everything happened in Chicago. That's when Hefner lived in the

Chicago mansion. And I went and I did a test test shoots for two days, and my test shots ended up being the pictorial ended up being the whole thing, except for the centerfold that was shot in New York City on one of those cameras as I forget what they're called, but they're prehistoric now. But it's the one you have to slide the thing in and out of, and the plate and the whole bit and you can't move, You like, have to stay in the position you're in

until they say and you can't breathe. You can't do anything. People. If anybody thinks it's sexy, it's it's not. It's it's it's hard work. It's it's not glamorous shooting these pictorials. I know people think it is, but it's not. And it's just like doing a modeling job, except you're just not promoting clothes. You're promoting something else. I'm not even sure what, because I didn't really have much on my mind, if you want to know the truth, except that I

wanted the pictures to be good. I wanted them to be okay. That was, you know, basically the way I was thinking. But I also wanted when I found out okay. So then I found out this girlfriend was going to be Miss April, so I thought Miss April. So I actually went out and bought myself a shamrock necklace because I thought if I wore a shamrock that I might be Miss March, so that I would maybe beat her to the punch. I mean, you used to make su your brain do crazy things. But it turns out I

became Miss November. So she came out before I did.

I liked her. But she was madly in love with Don Arden's son, one of the Arden boys. I think I can't remember which one. But she wasn't interested in Todd. And this was what was so sad about it, because here I was thinking that his heart belonged to her, but she didn't love him, you know, it was just it was just she wanted a businessman. She wanted a successful man with lots of money. Little did she know Todd became very, very wealthy after that. But I don't know,

it's just so I never became Miss Marched. So here I am this Miss November with a shamrock around my neck. So everybody thought, for sure, I must be irish, But it just it was just a moment. It was a whim but it changed my life drastically in the sense that there was no more fashion career for me. In America, it was very taboo for a fashion model of my status to become a Playboy centerfold, let alone pose in

the magazine. And as you know, in the eighties, John Costablanca turned that around and every supermodel and their dog wanted to be in Playboy, and so the mystique was still very heavy when I did it. So I carried the weight of that around and it was very hard for me. I got booked with Cosmopolitan or Viva, you know, the women's magazines that were kind of sexy. But it wasn't until I went to Europe in seventy five seventy six that I did all my most beautiful, legitimate work.

They just didn't care about nudity. In Europe. It was like, okay, so what you've been in Playboy who Cares?

And I still have some of it. I kept some of it because it was They would make drawings, maybe beautiful letters, and it was very sweet, you know. Yeah, so yeah, you do get recognized a little bit. But in the world that I was living in, it was all about the rock star, you know. I you know, maybe maybe I was looked upon as an embellishment, who knows, but I do know that it changed the way people

reacted to me. I think men especially thought that I must be this wild beast in bed, or that I must be a sexual, you know, an inphomaniac or something. I don't know. Posing nude conjures up a lot of stuff, and and and people treat you differently, they really do. They sort of take for granted that you're you're a sexual being and that you're there for the sexual aspect. So it's it's, yeah, you know you are. We're all

sexual beings. But at the time, I was so confused about everything in my life that sex was really not the most important thing on my mind, and I was just trying to find my way.

you need to go lose one hundred pounds. I mean one time I did one booking when I was three months pregnant with my daughter, where they asked me, you know, if I wanted to do some paternity dresses for their you know, for the paternity catalog.

did give birth to Furberger, who became my dog. But yes, but anyway, I just thought that was all very sweet and interesting. And then Richard calls me at the woman's residence and says, oh, I got a call from Todd and he's invited us over, invited me over, and he told me I could bring that friend of mine again if I wanted. So I remember that Richard at the last minute didn't want to go. He goes, I'm not gonna go. You go ahead and go, though they're you know,

they're expecting you. So I got there and I did the thing where you throw the penny, and Todd didn't look out the window. Paul Fishkin did and I had not met Paul yet, so he looked out the window and he goes, oh, babe, I'll come right down, and you know, lets me in. And I walk in and it's just Paul and two girls that seemed very very nice, you know. They were one of them looked like she

might work at a record company. That was. They were just hanging out rolling joints, doing the stuff we did back then, and Todd had just gotten a new Sony trena Tron colored TV, so everybody was having fun with the rabbit ears and the whole bit, and then about five minutes after that, Todd comes in and that was that. I don't we didn't spend a day apart after that. That was that? Was it? Hot?

go sees, and I was being naughty. Let's face it, I was being a rebel, and so he said, why don't you just come stay here? And that's how it sort of happened. I got to the apartment and it obviously needed to be cleaned, it obviously needed to be organized, and Paul was never there. His room and his cat was in the back and Todd's whole world was in the front, and then there was a kitchen and a bathroom. It was a typical dog bone a New York City apartment,

but with beautiful high ceilings and gilded gold. It was really beautiful, a pre war building, but it was, you know, it was small, and it was old, and the rent was something like three hundred dollars a month. And so Todd went on the road. I stayed Ferberger was born.

and he went to play me. He said he wanted to play me a song off his new album, and it was Black Mariah. He wanted to play me Black Mariah, and his stereo blew up some kind it was really weird. Some kind of weird technical thing happened. But of course he got back there and he tinkered and he fiddled and he did all of his genius stuff that he always did. I don't know if it was real, if he was just trying to impress me, because I was very impressed. I thought, boy, my friend is Albert Einstein.

You know, he he knew exactly what to do and what tubes and what things to press. And before I knew it, the music is coming out of the speakers, and you know, he plays me the album. And I remember when I heard the song Marlene. I wanted to know all about it, I said, And I said, who's Marlene? He said, Oh, she's a girl that I, you know, really loved and and but we're not together and blah blah blah. And and his best friend at the time was Patti Smith, and it was important to him that

I met her. He wanted her opinion of me, and then I became Then I became fast friends with Patty. I just hit it off with her, like a house on fire because she got it that I wrote in my poetry books, and she got my stupid poems. She liked them. I wrote this poem, this poem one time that it goes you needle, you pen, you prick, And she loved that. She said, that's three lines. That's real poetry, Beatie,

that's real. Keep going, keep going. And she was very encouraging, you know, to that side of me, whereas Todd would listen and he would say, oh, that's good, Yeah, that's really good or something like that, but he would never say like, oh, keep it up, or you know, he was never like, I don't know. I don't know how to explain what it's like to live with somebody of that magnitude of genius, because basically all they think about all day is the next genius move. They're like chess players,

which way are we going to move the rourk? You know, which way are we going to move the king? It's like their brains are always looking at the next challenge.

would hang out, he would get dressed up. I was this social director. I called it. It was funny because I would say, Todd, You've got to get up for a minute. You've got to go out. You've got to say hi to people. Alice keeps asking about you and wondering when we're gonna all hang out again. You know. It was stuff like that. You know, we would go

see really great shows. We would go see Alice Cooper at Madison Square Garden or Peter Gabriel Gabriel at the Felt Forum, or my favorite show still to this day, this is the best lineup ever. Was First, we start with lou Reed and this is during the period where he had the white bleached terre and he simulated simulated shooting up on stage. Then Hall and Oates came on after that. You can imagine that, Dinas right, and then Al Green closed out the night. That was like one

of the best triples I ever. You know, got got to and and Todd. Todd was at that and we went backstage, and I remember Mick was there too, and it was quite a night. But yeah, you meet everybody through that whole social circle. So everybody I met was somebody that I met socially at a party, at a gathering, but most of us gathered and met at Max's. That

was sort of our living room, Max's, Kansas City. But Todd, I'll be honest, he loved women, and women loved him, and he was a bit of a womanizer when he was on the road. But that was not his image. That was not what people thought of him at all. People thought of the Todd that was always buried with his face in a computer or in some kind of musical environment.

put together who Leonard Cohen was yet. I was too young, but Todd got it, and I just remember Leonard came over one night and he was super drunk, but he was super charming. And Todd went off to go fiddle with some electronic device because he and I was left sitting there with Leonard Cohen, and I remember he picked up one of Todd's guitars and he said, I'm not a very good guitar player, he goes, but I'm a great writer. And so I said okay, and he started

singing and I almost fainted. It was like it was bordered on a religious experience. It was very profound. But he was such a handful, oh, such a handful, and I sort of felt sorry for him. I didn't realize, you know, the degree of his Leonard cohenness, if that makes any sense. He was just crazy Leonard to me, because that's what Todd called him. But I, you know, I liked him. I thought he was a little kookie. So I would let He would call and he'd say,

where are you going tonight? And I was, I'm going to go to the plaza, or I'm going to go to I'm going to go to the tiki bar at the plaza, or I'm going to go here or there. Can I come, you know? And I would say sure, and he would come along, and usually he would get so drunk that, you know, somebody would have to end up taking him home in a cab or something. You know, we never we never dated, you know, we were just buds. I know that sounds weird. And I remember one of

the it left such an impact on me. One of the sweetest things anybody that's ever said to me was was Leonard Cohen. And you know, I just said to him, I said, I don't know what you're expecting from our friendship, you know, I I don't know if you I know you have plenty of girlfriends, because he did. He was always talking about the women in his life and about Greece, and you know, he was always talking about all kinds of dilemmas and drama and and and he said, you know,

I just really really really enjoy being around you. He goes, I just enjoy your company. I enjoy our discussions. And he said, my favorite are the alien discussions. And so we would talk about aliens. And so that was my Leonard Cohen. But you know, one day I never never heard from Leonard again, none of us did. He obviously left New York, but he didn't tell anybody where he was going or say goodbye to anybody. Just one day, Leonard wasn't there anymore.

at Albert's house. I remember little intimate dinners. I remember one night it was me, Todd, Albert, and Paul Butterfield and you know, the boys were talking and I sort of felt like, well, why am I here? Because but it was always my go to whenever I wanted to get anybody's attention and get the topic off whatever deal they were talking about. We'd start talking about aliens and that brought Butterfield right in. Oh my god, yeah, Butterfield wanted Oh he was all on it. He was like,

oh yeah, let's talk about it. You know, it was it was my go to, so whenever I wanted to really jab a conversation, I even used that trick when I was at tea with Savador Dolli. You know, they were all talking about a lot of stuff. I remember being in the room with an Ocelot, his wife Gala, Truman Capoti, and a Mendelier And this was just from him inviting me to tea because I met him at

the Saint Regis newsstand. We would go to the foreign news stand there at the Saint Regis to see our modeling pictures from Europe because it was one of the foreign news stands and he was living there. So that's how I met Savador Dolli. So when I say it about the Forrest Gump stuff, I mean it in the sense that, for some weird reason written in the Evans, for some I was meant to cross the paths of certain people whose paths that I crossed.

And it's different worlds. When you were around Peter Grant or around that zeppelin, it was like hanging out with a bunch of gangsters. You know the van were you know De Niro and Pacino and you know they were the it it's hard to put into words. When you hung around with Albert, it was like being at the king's castle. You would go hang out at his world and his compound, at his beautiful house, and beautiful food would be served.

I think the jeep. It had snowed, and I Todd was on the road as usual, and I was driving down mean Collo Road with my friend Jean, and suddenly another car came from the other direction, driving way too fast and to be in the snow. Thank god, I was more in my lane, even though it was a narrow road. But of course we hit and they had their kid in the back of the car with no seat belt. Nothing but that was before anybody wore seat belts anyway, And I just remember getting out of the

car and I was pretty shook up. Everybody was, you know, Jean was especially worried about me because I was pregnant, but I was okay. Everybody was okay, but the cars were really fucked up, and I just remember having my wits about me, and I just went to the first house, which was right there, and I called Albert. Because we didn't have cell phones and stuff, then I had to like get on somebody's landline and call him. And I told him, Albert, I've just had an accident on mean Collo.

He was there so quickly like that, and he had me hustled off and I said, Albert, he goes, just go home. I'll handle everything. And he had a big pile of money and he had somebody take me and my girlfriend off in another car. And that's the last I ever saw of that accident. Wow.

wasn't getting any shit from me. I loved utopia. And when he took me to see that Sphinx and that hangar in Kingston, New York, it was so big it had to be an an airplane hangar. And he used to fly off that thing every night, upside down with a with no harness, just raw. And so I supported it. Even though it people thought I enabled it. Instead of

that I supported it, they thought I enabled it. See that you people that are making money off of you always want to have somebody to blame if the money isn't going to go the way they they they hope it goes because of a change in direction. And with Todd. This was an extreme change in direction from what he had been doing previously, you know, as as the Todd Rungren solo records, and and then suddenly to come back with a Wizard or True Star and then to form Utopia.

It was it was a lot of pressure, a lot of pressure for him. He went through a lot, but he was producing big records, so he was making money. You know, he was producing Grand Funk Railroad, he was producing Hall and Oates, he was producing records. He produced Fanny. I remember that was fun. I remember when he produced Fanny.

But you know, he was really in demand as a producer, so he had the money and the freedom, you know, to have a nice townhouse on Horatio Street, which we had, and a home up in the Woodstock area.

up there. So there were times when he would, you know, have me do that, that would be my duty. Like he would do a track and I would have the headphones on and he would tell me hit the button, hit the button. So yeah, I mean I was definitely around for I saw a lot. Absolutely, I saw a lot. I was around for a lot of conceptual stuff. I was definitely around for a lot of the makeup and the costumes and some of the crazy stuff Nicky Nichols

came up with. Yeah, I was. I was a part of a part of it all.

with was just crazy off the rails. It was to the point where I couldn't handle it. It was too much of the white pro moving and marching powder. It was just too many drugs, too much, too much, too much that lifestyle, that Aerosmith lifestyle at that point in history. I've never seen anything like it. And people say, well, what about the Rolling Stones, And I'll say, you know, it was very different because I always knew. Notice that the boys and the Stones they sort of had their

They knew when to stop. Maybe not Keith, but Mick certainly did. Mick was always very smart about when to make an exit, about when not to do that next line, about when not to do that shot. You know, Mick was very always practical. There was no practicality within the Aerosmith camp at that point. So I was very scared. And at this point, Todd had really become the father, the father figure. That's why I called him the Todd Father. And he took me back. I know he wants to blame me for that, but.

had fallen in love with. It was Bruce Springsteen's former girlfriend, and he had met her in Dallas, and he told me about her, and it just it just became extremely difficult because it felt to me like, well, if you had fallen in love with this woman while I was pregnant, why didn't we pursue any doubts about paternity? There's that word again, before all these grand decisions were made. I gave him the opportunity when I was seven months pregnant.

I said, I'm very concerned that this is going to be a decision that you're gonna that's going to become a problem. I was concerned, and he seemed to want to take on this mammoth responsibility. He nobody ever tried to fool him or tell him that Live was his baby. Nobody ever did that that. I don't know how that rumor got started or why people say that, but nobody lied to him and said, Todd, you know it's your child.

That That's not how it happened. He knew where I was for two months, he knew I was with Steven. He knew that. So when I came home scared to death and he took me back, he knew all of that. So chronologically it's really impossible for him to have been the father. Does that make any sense? And what happened was I think whatever reasons he had for wanting to take that step, I don't know if it was for control. I don't know if he was really concerned about Live's

well being. I don't know if he still loved me. There's probably a variety of reasons, and probably a little bit of all of the above. But as soon as Live was born, it it was obvious this wasn't going to work, and it was obvious that he loved somebody else, and it was very very obvious that and he had

He got me an apartment. Patty Smith, of all people, helped him pick it out because he wanted her guidance, what do you think Bobe would like and what would be a good apartment to raise a baby in, you know, and found me an apartment on fifty eighth Street. He certainly wanted to get me out of that downtown, didn't he. So there I was on fifty eighth Street suddenly, and Karen was living with him. I mean, it really did happen that fast, and Live was being raised as his child.

And believe me, Stephen and I made very many feeble attempts at trying to, you know, fix it or just get it all down, you know what I mean, to at least confirm paternity, even a simple blood test anything. You know. He had his blood drawn and I had my blood drawn. But this is way before fancy DNA tests. She has my blood type, so there was you know, we couldn't say, oh, well, this solves the problem. In my eyes, there was no problem. I knew, everybody knew,

and everybody was living in this kind of fantasy. And I'm not judging, and I'm not saying obviously, everything happens for a reason. And whatever happened, look how Live turned out. She's an amazing, self sufficient, beautiful human being. And she is Stephen Tyler's child, but she's also in some ways Todd's child physically. I don't think you could dispute that either one of them could possibly be her daddy. And that's fine. That's her spiritual journey, that's her karmic voyage

with those two people that she loves dearly. They're both her beloved father's that's the way she looks at it.

I didn't have any big expenses at that point. But he always helped, you know, he was never I have to say, he was never stingy. He was never mean about it. You know, he was helpful, he was sweet, He wanted the best for live.

the ball very willingly, as a matter of fact. And then the court of course ordered him to pay a certain amount of child support, but Live started making her own money when she was fifteen, and by the time she was sixteen seventeen, she was extremely wealthy, and I was putting everything away for her and keeping her safe. When she graduated, she was a millionaire. Just nobody could

take advantage of her. That's where I came in. I was her personal pitbull, and I'm very proud of the job I did, and I'm also I'm very very happy with the way she maneuvered the emotional part of all of this.

felt very included in my industry. But I didn't mind buckling under and really getting to work and do it, and I obviously enjoyed it. You know, I enjoy writing. I enjoy writing songs. I enjoy performing live. Grew up with all of that. Some of her greatest memories they're going to rehearsals with me and going to my gigs when she was a little thing.

and I'm proud of it. I've written two books. I was a New York Times bestseller with my first book, and I've written probably close to three hundred songs at this point. I've made tons of records, you know that. And I've made singles. And I do it because I love it. It's a passion and I have fans. As long as I can pack a room, I'm okay. I don't have to see my name at the top of

the charts to feel successful. And you know, when I went to New York for my last book and did the honor at the National Arts Club, just to be touted by the New York Times and to have the people that I've known since I was eighteen in that audience, it made me know that I'm doing good work and that has given me the greatest pleasure. And I don't think this journey is over. I really don't. Who knows what might happen, you know, anything can happen. I am

so open to the possibilities of breaking rules. I mean, speaking of breaking rules, look at Tina Turner. Everybody told her it was over, and look at the comeback she had. And the thing that that's important about the message I'm bringing to the table. It's not the same as like Paulina, who's like, Okay, I'm hot and I'm almost sixty. You know, deal with it. It's exciting to see somebody have that

kind of confidence. I'm trying to give something different. I mean, if I could take my clothes off right now and look as good as Paulina does in a bikini, I might. I might do that for shits and giggles. But right now, what I'm enjoying is continuing the chain of good work. And all the projects are that are coming my way. There's a treatment for a series, there's somebody that wants to make a documentary of my life. There's somebody that

wants to make a movie of my life. There's so many things that are in the works right now that who knows, maybe my music will be reborn a La Sugarman or something in a soundtrack. You know. I just want to be proud of the work I do and if someday it gets acknowledged, the heck.

And I don't really I don't work a nine to five job, but I consider the hours I put in to writing and creating and doing things like this podcast. That's my work. That's what I do. And when I can make money, when I can make good money, I accept the invitation to make good money. I enjoy it.

I do a little bit of consulting. I know that my knowledge about the industry is one of the things that's kept me afloat when young people that are entering this business have parents that might be scared or worried about their futures or how they're going to handle this. I am hired as a creative consultant and I can help. And I don't mind signing in das and having to keep my mouth shut about because a couple of the people I've worked with have gone on to become extremely famous.

So I'm very proud. I get to be secretly proud, and just because everybody doesn't know about all the stuff you do in your life. Doesn't mean you shouldn't be proud. And you know the fact that I can go to Trader Joe's and buy my own groceries, and you know that it's a good feeling.

Relationships always seemed to screw up, and I mean when I started to date Rod Stewart, it screwed up. When we were friends, we had a blast, We would run around together and have the greatest time, and then as soon as we became lovers, it just ruined our relation relationship And I still to this day, I think Rod Stewart is one of the most talented, lovely men I've ever known. But I wasn't the right girl for him, and we weren't right for each other. We were good

as mates. That's what we worked as with Rick. I just to have somebody believe in me like that and not be trying to get in my pants. I wasn't gonna let that change. For one minute. I was in heaven. It was like being taken seriously. It was like working with a director that you admire and he's not interested in you for anything but the role you're gonna play.

you see how brilliant he is all around. But the whole thing with the Tom Petty thing, I'm kidding, I'm losing my train of thought.

about this Tom Petty kid. You know, this this Southern boy with the best hair and with the draw And I just remember Bob turning to me and he goes, what am I doing? Do you want to sit here on my box? And he goes it seems to be the only seat, and I said, nope, I'm going to go in the audience. I said I want to see this from the front, and he said that's the way to do it. But he didn't go to the front. But I just remember the exchange him going, do you want my box? He was gonna give me his seat,

which was very very sweet and very gallant. But that's it. My exchange is with Bob Doll.

actually get a little misty. He goes, okay, we'll record it. So I mean that's how I sell everything because I'm not a real musician. I can play harmonica. I'm a good harmonica player. If you hand me a bass, I can play a little bass. I can tink her on a piano a little bit. But my mic stand is my my my my piece. That is my instrument. And you know, the way I get my songs across is a cappella. I just Okay, the way I get a

riff across. If I want to get a riff across to my husband when we're writing a song, I'll just you know, I'll grunt it, or I'll snap it, or I'll sing it. You know, just do the melody.

musical community. Dust Doman Thurston Moore Sst. Subpop, you know, they they were quite the darlings of that sonic youth smashing pumpkins, you know, that whole crowd, and he was he was in a new band, and we were both playing the Christmas party. Both of our bands were playing the same Christmas party at the Continental, and we sort of got a look at each other that night, and it's and I thought to myself, how come I've never seen him before? I mean, I noticed him, So I

told Hilly Crystal. Hilly Crystal was like my father at the time, and I remember going down to Sebe's and sitting with him at the desk and telling him all about this guy that I had seen across the room and I felt something for him, and it was so weird, And how come I've never met him before. He's known Jesse Mallin since he was fifteen. He went to NYU with Rick Rubin. He grew up in Rutherford, New Jersey. How Come I've not met this guy? And Hilly was like, oh,

I don't know. He's pretty fabulous. He's one of the nicest guys I've ever met. Hilly knew exactly who he was, So I'm home. I lived on Mercer Street at that point. I lived on Mercer and Broadway, three hundred Mercer that building and my phone rang and it was Hilly calling me from CBGB's and Hilly goes, Boebe get down here. I literally had five minutes from Sebe's. I go, why what's going on? He goes, you know that guy, you like,

the one that you talked my head off about. He's here right now and he's gonna be going on in

about forty five minutes. He's in the club as Hilly, and so I think, So, of course, I just I was already in my pajamas, and I threw on some jeans and a T shirt and a pink puffer coat, and I went down there and I just you know, we met and we sort of we sort of clicked, you know, and he went off that night after his gig, and I thought, I'm niable I ever see him again, you know, I didn't know, And and then it was shortly after that that I went. It was really funny.

I wasn't gonna go there, you know, I was going to stop into the Continental because I wanted to talk to Trigger about gig. So I went into the Continental and I look up and they're literally on stage. This boy now my husband man. And so I invited him over to my apartment because I literally lived across the you know Continental, CBS my apartment. I invited him over, and it's like he says, we were never a part a day after that. We didn't consummate our relationship right away.

It wasn't like we jumped into each other's arms. We courted, we did all the old fashioned stuff. We dated, We courted, and we fell in love, and he asked me to marry him on one knee in Atlantic City. We went to Atlantic City to get away for the weekend. He asked me to marry him, and then, you know, it was nine to eleven sort of changed people's headspace about New York. And so we moved to Maine because my family is up there now, including my mother, my mother

who raised me in Virginia in North Carolina. So we spent a few years there, and my book came out in two thousand and one, right before nine to eleven, which was terrible because the whole book tour I was doing and everything got canceled, of course, because understandably it was a horrible situation nine to eleven, as we can all remember. And so we got married in two thousand and two after being engaged for about a year, and we've been together ever since. I've never been happier. I

have never felt more safe. Is that a bad word to use? We said, but I feel feels safe. And my husband has an amazing work ethic. He has a great job. You know, he works hard, and we both we both were both just hard workers. You know, I I everything. I take everything seriously, even cleaning my house. You know, I take that very seriously, my floors. I like cleaning my own house. I like cleaning my floors. I like cleaning my bathroom. I like cooking beautiful meals.

I like being there for my friends. You know. I love doing the creative consultant work because I can do it sort of undercover. Nobody has to even know that I'm doing it.

It might have scared me when I was younger, but I'm not sure for what kind of reasons. Because I feel like whatever changes we go through physically, we're all in the same boat. We're all just walking each other home. Everybody's going to die, and everybody's going to get a droopy face, you know. I mean, it's just going to happen to all of us. So it's what we do with the time that we've got. And right now, with the time that I've got, I want to let not

just women but men. I want all humans, people that identify as both men and women, people that identify as nothing. I want everybody to know that none of that should stop you from doing what you do, none of it whatever brings you happiness. I sound like a meme, I sound like one of those Facebook affirmations or something, but it's true. I feel like I'm much more beneficial to women now at my age because I can actually say, you know, I'm not going to say that was a

bad choice or a good choice. You know, people go, oh, don't you wish you had married this guy? And don't you wish you had done this? And don't you wish you had had more children? And well, of course sometimes I think about stuff like that, but I don't dwell on it. I've learned how to discipline myself. And as Tina would say, not your renguaekio, no, your ranguae kill.

That helps. Chanting really helps you to focus. You know, you don't even understand why, but I have to focus on bringing as much positivity, not just to myself but to others. That's important to me.

of them. So you mention all of these iconic people, did they pursue you or were you constantly putting yourself out there?

she was really plugged into the scene. Ron Delsner was our best friend, and whenever there was a great show, Ron would call and say, you're on the list, meet me backstage at eight fifteen or whatever. You know, we were living the lifestyle, and through living the lifestyle, a lot of relationships were formed and made. It's really it's not something you can plan, because.

We had so much much fun together. We would just drive around, you know, he loved to He would show up when I would be in la He had this white Volkswagen that he had for his entire life. It was and I wouldn't say it was beat up, but it was an old Volkswagen that he would drive around Hollywood when he wanted to be undercover. And one time I was staying in Laurel Canyon with my girlfriend Pam, and his house was over on Mallholland, and he showed up at Pam's in the white Volkswagen. And I'll just

never forget him getting out of the car. With a white Volkswagen with some flowers that he had picked and wild of course, and just being I introduced him to Pam and he was just so polite. He used to call my mother. He used to talk to my mother on the phone. And Warren Beattie, who I never even met. I mean when I say never met, I never met him under the sheets, is what I'm trying. I never dated Warren Beatty, even though he always gets listed as

one of my boyfriends. But I think the reason why is because he and Jack were such good friends, and I hung out with both of them quite a bit and a lot of times over at Warren's house, and Warren was an amazing piano player. I remember the very first time I met Warren Beatty. Jack brought me over there and when we walked into the room, Warren was sitting behind the piano playing unbelievably. I was shocked. Who would have ever known? But he was an exquisite piano player.

But no, I didn't date him, and I just I enjoy the company of like minded people.

let me help you buy a house. He was like, let me give you some stability, and he goes, I'd like to help you, and I was like, no, I'm not going to let you do that. I mean, I look back on it now and thinking was I crazy?

are gone. And and and you know a lot of people. But you know, I see my daughter's father a lot. He brought me up on stage when he played FONTANELLEH gosh, I'll have to send you a little iPhone video of this. I think you'll get a kick.

I you know, I've kept most of my friendships. The only estrangements that I have, which is very strange, are with two of the most important relationships of my life, and I guess those were the guys I hurt the hardest. I are. That's Todd and Elvis and.

what is D five D's two above three. It's a deeper it's a deeper understanding that these are our bodies, but our souls and our consciousness are much bigger, and that I believe we do this many times. I believe that I believe that the soul travels many lifetimes and inhabits many bodies, and goes through many experiences. As far as aliens go, I believe in the multi dimensional aspect of our existence. I believe that people can come in and out. I believe that there's more sophisticated life forms

and consciousness. So I'm just trying to keep myself elevated and open to the metaphysical aspect of the creation of our planet, the creation of the universe. You know, you can drive yourself nuts going where did it start? Where did it the Big bang? Okay, who did the Big bang? Who invented that? And how do you know that the universe is expanding? Okay? We know that? Why? I mean,

you can go crazy asking yourself all these questions. So the way I've decided that I can internalize it and understand it the best is to just think there is no beginning, there is no end, there is no time. There's dimensions, and there's textures, and there's layers, and I believe that we can go in and out.

And I would tell my mother that I loved the lights that would come to see me, that the lights were fun. Thanks, you know, Mommy, I love those lights, you know. And there were and of course you didn't give me any lights maybe a night light. But I've always felt connected to something. I've had some experiences that cannot be explained at all. Like one time I was in a car with my girlfriend, a Volkswagen. We were high out of our brains. I'm not proud of this moment.

I'm not bragging or anything. We were driving, I was seventeen, sixteen or seventeen, and we're driving along. This is in Jacksonville, North Carolina, when my father was stepfather was stationed at Camp La June, and I was getting ready to go into the next lane. I was being frivolous and free, and literally a voice and I am not exaggerating, said

don't go left. Very clearly and very loudly. And when I turned my head like this, there was a giant semitruck coming And if I had gone like that, I would have been pulverized.

sexist in a lot of ways. Because I don't see it used to define men ever, and I I just at this point in my life. I've been married forever, and I consider myself a nurturer and a healer and a person that loves to give. I'm just not in a comfortable place where i can deal with being tagged labeled. I don't want to be like a cow with a tag on my ear. Oh that girl is a groupie, you know. I want to be known for many things.

I'd rather be known as a historian and a storyteller and the original Alice in Wonderland who fell through the looking glass. I'd rather be known as a person that lived an extraordinary life, and I hope that I would love my life. I would love to see a series, because there are too many stories just for one documentary or for one movie. I know that there's ideas that people are having right now to do a documentary or a movie. But I see a series, I see many episodes.

I don't see how you The Aliens, for instance, would take up one episode. Savador Dolly would take up an episode. Tom Petty would take up an episode. Just the experiences with these brilliant human beings that I've brushed with, obviously, you know, I touched their lives too. We've all touched each other's lives, and I want people to realize that I'm not a service dog. If I was a service dog, I would proudly say I'm a service dog. I am here to service these beautiful rock stars. I'm not a

service dog. I am a human being that has had an extraordinary experience and extraordinary experiences and I don't even have the complete formula, nor do I have the complete explanation as to why. And hopefully I'll live long enough that some of these wonderful experiences can be shared, and not just in a little, condensed, tiny thing. I think there's so much to life, you know. I think people we all know each other for a reason, we all connect for a reason. There must have been a reason.

There has to be the other way around. It's not just them being in my life. I was in their life too, and you're in.

See to me, Dick Wingate and my old editor at Saint Martin's like Elizabeth Byer, those are my rock stars. Those are the people that I'm indebted to and that I love. Danny Fields, these are my rock stars. These are the people that I will love and cherish till the day I die, because they're the people that believed in me and gave me chances in life, chances to do things myself. And there's nothing better than taking over a room. I love to be in front of an

audience with a microphone. I don't even need instruments. I don't need anything. I'll sing the whole thing without one drop of an instrument. It brings me so much joy. But anyway, I'm thrilled and honored. It's an honor to be with you, mister Bob.