Array Slash - Slash

One night I got some and went back to the Hyatt on Sunset and got so high that I nodded out and fell asleep with all of my weight on one leg. When I woke up I couldn’t feel it at all. I couldn’t bend it, I couldn’t stand up, and it didn’t seem to get any better once I stretched it out. Junkies do that all the time; some of them cut off their circulation so badly that gangrene sets in.

I had to call 911 and I was taken to Cedars-Sinai, which was completely full at the time. So they put me in a holding room until they could find me a permanent room. As I lay there smoking cigarettes, which they weren’t too happy about, they got in touch with Perla and she came down and I told her what had happened. The whole episode scared her and she threatened to leave me if I continued down this road. I was in there for a week and it was a great chance to get some peace and quiet… and watch the History Channel.

Seeing her there only confirmed for me that she was the one. I asked her to get married and luckily she agreed. We had a beautiful little ceremony in Maui, and spent a week together, enjoying each other. Things were definitely looking up.

Before the honeymoon, I carried my guitar around and constantly set up sessions, though everything around me remained chaotic. With my black book and cell phone, I tried to keep things going musically. I lacked focus, but I was committed, and sometimes my efforts lead to a lucky break. One was working with the legendary Ray Charles. The day after Perla and I returned from our honeymoon, I went to South Central L.A. to record “God Bless America Again” with him. I used my ’54 Telly and it was one of the more amazing sessions I’ve ever participated in it was, a huge honor and a humbling experience. I didn’t think Ray had even heard of me, but there we were playing together.

Ray was involved with a benefit for underpriviledged kids with an interest in music—he’d let them record in his studio and use his equipment, and sometimes Ray even played with them. They’d work on songs, techniques, and arrangements while he coached them. I’d go down there at times to play some tracks with the kids. Helping them out was an incredible feeling.

I also contributed to certain parts of the Ray movie tracks; I played with guys way out of my league, big-band old-time blues jazz players. I played guitar on “Sorry Is the Hardest Word” on his Ray and Friends album, but after Ray died, the executive producer used a friend of his instead and took my part off, even though Ray thought I was more bluesy.

My period of rootlessness in the musical sense was about to come to an end. I had wandered and I had learned. I was ready to come back to my center and make a new start. It was time. I got together with Pete Angelus, who had managed the Black Crowes and had wanted to manage me. He got me together with Steve Gorman, the Crowes’ drummer, and Alan Niven turned me on to a bass player. We started to write and came up with the music for what became “Fall to Pieces.” All we needed was a singer—again. But then my good friend Randy Castillo passed away and I went to his funeral, and out of his death came a rebirth I could have never imagined.

You can’t wait around for destiny to give you what you think you deserve, you have to earn it, even if you think you’ve paid your dues. You might have achieved what you wanted, but are you sure you learned the lesson?

In 2002, I went to Ireland and hooked up with Ronnie Wood to be part of the tour for his solo record. He called it the Not for Beginners tour. Perla came with me and we hung out with Ronnie and his wife, Jo, and had a great time. We’d rehearse in Ronnie’s bar: he has a building apart from the house that is a proper pub with a snooker table and Guinness on tap. We ran through great stuff: Woodie’s stuff, Stones stuff, Faces songs, a Guns N’ Roses song, and a Snakepit song. We had sixty songs rehearsed and a great band to play them made up of Ronnie’s son Jessie, two of Jessie’s friends on bass and drums, and a couple of other guys; plus Ronnie’s daughter Leah singing background. It was a really cool thing because we toured all of these little clubs all over the U.K. We had the Coors come up and sing and we’d play the Faces’ classic “Ooh La La” every night. There was a lot of fun and a lot of Guinness to be had. As Perla and I would later discover, that is where our son London was conceived.

After that tour we came back and headed to Vegas for New Year’s. Before we’d gone to the U.K., we’d spent a weekend down there at the opening of this resort called the Green Valley Ranch, and while we were there, in the Vegas magazine in our room we noticed an ad for Guns N’ Roses live on New Year’s at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino. We decided that we had to check it out.

I called a promoter I knew and he said he’d get us in no problem. We got to the Hard Rock to check into our room a few hours before the show, and as we walked through the lobby, people were noticing us because Guns fans were everywhere. We’d been in our room for about ten minutes when there was a knock at the door. I opened it up to see hotel security.

“Oh, hi!” I said. “Is there something wrong?”

“Sir, we have come to let you know that you will not be allowed into the Guns N’ Roses show tonight.”

“Oh yeah? Why is that?”

“We have strict orders from Guns N’ Roses management not to allow you admittance under any circumstances. I’m sorry.”

“C’mon, man, that’s ridiculous,” I said. “Just sneak me in. I’m not here to cause trouble, I just want to see the show. I’m sure you can understand why.”

“I’m sorry, sir, there is nothing we can do about it.”

I got in touch with my promoter friend and there was nothing he could do either. He said that the word was that I’d been spotted with my guitar and top hat as if I was going to get onstage. That was preposterous—I didn’t even have a guitar with me! It was no use; the entire staff was instructed to keep me out at all costs. We decided that it wasn’t worth it; I’m not the type to cause a scene.

Perla and I checked out and got a room over at the Green Valley Ranch and went to the grand opening of Whiskey Blue at the resort and had a blast at the huge New Year’s Eve party they were having. That night, I ran into a guy whom I’d met before but didn’t know very well, though he knew me. He took me into the bathroom and laid out a line of what looked like blow for me to snort.

I love to be deviant and do what I’m not supposed to do, which includes doing whatever drugs are given to me without really asking what they are or wondering where they came from. I snorted this stuff up, and within five minutes a very familiar euphoria came over me. I knew that feeling well; it wasn’t coke, it was an opiate… this was some form of heroin. A very good form indeed, because suddenly everything in the world was wonderful as far as I was concerned.

I asked him for more and he gave me a handful of pills. “What is this?” I asked. “This is what I just did?”

“It’s OxyContin,” he said. “It’s basically synthetic heroin. You smash it up and snort it. I’ve got a great connection.” He sure did: he’d just beaten cancer and had a bottomless prescription.