My boyfriend in ’77 played lead guitar in The Rousers; an original rockabilly band that was extremely popular on the NYC club circuit. They played everywhere including CBGB’s, The Ritz, and Peppermint Lounge and stayed together for an unheard of forty years, but I digress.

Peter Crawley, booking agent for Max’s Kansas City and lover of all things rockabilly, gave pretty-boy Rousers choice gigs. Anything to please them and bring them into the club even as audience members. Naturally, when said girlfriend (moi) formed her own band, Comateens, there was immediate interest and opportunity to perform not only at Max’s but in all the leading venues. And yet, we had to start at the bottom.

Our first gig was at Irving Plaza in December 1978 and as I stated in last week’s column, Comateens did not rate the stage. Instead, we had to play in the lobby on a cold, slushy day. Every time the door opened it brought in a wintery gush determined to dampen the blaze of rock stardom. But now it was almost a whole year later and the rock star inferno burned hotter than ever. Comateens had gone from a duo to a trio with our newest member, Lyn, and we were gigging non-stop. We wisely dropped the all-white clothing and our stage attire now consisted of only two colors; black and light black. Three, if you count my dyed blue-black hair.

It was early autumn when Peter Crawley asked Comateens to warm-up for some better-known band whose name I cannot recall. I still had a good deal of stage fright that sometimes had me shaking and sweating uncontrollably. My go-to strategy was to turn my back on the audience (a la Jim Morrison of The Doors) surreptitiously convincing myself that no one was looking…at me. I was identified with being invisible before identifying was even a thing.

After our set, I retired to the dressing room to ruminate over my performance, a mathematical process that entailed mentally recapturing every mistake in each and every miniscule moment. The truth is, I didn’t make many mistakes. In fact, I played like a machine and yet was rarely satisfied with my performance. Suddenly, I heard some husky-voiced babe yelling, “Where is he? Where is he?”

“He” was none other than John Simon Ritchie a/k/a Sid Vicious by then former bassist for the punk rock band Sex Pistols, and he had just slipped into my dressing room. Without a word, Vicious grabbed Nick’s bass out of its case and sat down facing me. There he was, high and drunk, with a reputation for sudden violence. “Let’s jam,” he ordered. I immediately launched into Sex Pistol-styled chords. Sid joined me in an entirely different key and time signature. I nodded and grinned.

Meanwhile, in the hallway, Nancy Spungen (the girl with the husky voice) punched our keyboard player, Lyn, in the gut as they passed on the stairwell. She was either venting or just needed Lyn to get out of the way in her search for Sid.  As Spungen’s voice grew near, I panicked. I had to either leave the room or get Vicious to vamoose. Luckily, as soon as Sid heard her voice he ran but not before tossing Nick’s bass my way.

Spungen, age 20, died that month of a stab wound to the stomach in room 100 at the Chelsea Hotel. Vicious was arrested for suspicion of murder and while out on bail in February overdosed on heroin. The proprietor of the Chelsea, Stan Bard, subsequently had their room divided and incorporated into two other rooms thus eliminating room 100 forever and all the fans who came to worship.