The first time I met Al Jourgensen face-to-face was absolutely one of the best experiences of my life. It was before the Anaheim show on the Evil Doer tour and I was to open the show, dressed as George Bush, to taunt the crowd, clown around on stage, and then “get raped by Al”. I had no expectations of hanging with the crew or anything, but Al welcomed me graciously onto his bus, told me to hang with him, and he and Angie were so overwhelmingly hospitable and gracious. I was very conscious to be a good guest, but it was just incredible how swell everyone was. And, more importantly, for me, was that it was when I met my hero and soon-to-be close friend Mike Scaccia. Anyway, that entire night was so sublimely great.
4 years later, I met Al AGAIN after one of the “last shows ever” in Dublin, Ireland. He was a drunken dick this time. Apologies to anyone who’s heard this story 10x, but . . .
Our posse (there was a gang of about 12-15 of us that all knew each other directly or indirectly from the Piss Army board) was back at Bleeding Horse drinking and Bud-the-Chud, who had sort of proclaimed herself defacto president of the Ministry fan club comes up and asks, “Who wants to meet Al?” No one was cheering or anything, and we were having fun drinking with each other, but I stood up, “Sure, why not. I’d like to say ‘hi’ again.” I followed her down, with a small group of our peeps following behind us. They had taken over what was basically a small supply closet to the side of the bar. I come in and Al is completely blotto . . . I go to shake his hand and I think I said something like, “Good to see you again, Al. Great show.” He barked back and motioned to Bud, “Do yew know herrrr?” … “Yes, Al. Of course I do. We’ve been hanging out quite a bit.” … “Well, if yew wanna get to ME, yew gotta go through HERRRR!!!” I just laughed, kind of shocked, but not really caring a whole lot. “Whatever, Dude. Bye.”
Outside was a small group of Irish businessmen who were making fun of my jacket and bandanna, and so I cracked some shitty jokes back at them and soon was drinking with them and talking trash. They asked me who was in the closet and I told them it was a small-time American rock star. They looked him up on their phones (none of them knew who Al or Ministry was, of course). Then one of the drunker ones asked me, “Can I go in there?”
“Who’s country is this? Yours or his?”
“OURS!!!”
“And who’s bar is this? Yours or his?”
“OURS!!!”
“Well, then it seems you got the right to do whatever you want.”
“RIGHT!!!”
And with that, drunken Irish dude stood up and opened the door and shoved his way inside, shouting, “IS THIS OSSY OSBOOOOURNE???” I fell on the floor laughing as Al’s crew clumsily tried to get my new best friend in the world out of the closet and away from Al.
Good times.