foot up and down, the fan moves so your hair
can blow in specific directions. True or false?
Wow. I gotta remember that one. I have it
set up to the level out of the amplifier, so the
louder I play… it triggers the fan. If I’m playing soft, the hair isn’t blowing so much. Once
we rock out, I’m just flailing in the wind.
I bought a fan after seeing you at the
end of the Real Illusions tour, but my
hair wouldn’t move.
[Laughing] You have to grow your hair longer.
The fan is really fabulous on many fronts. First
of all, it gets really hot onstage, and when my
fingers get really sweaty, it’s a whole different
feel. So the fan helps keep my fingers relatively dry. It also keeps my hair out of my face,
because I hate when I’m trying to play and my
hair is in my face. Plus it looks cool when your
hair is blowing back. You have to be careful
because if it’s cold, man, you freeze your ass
off. I’ve been experimenting with various fans
through the years, just like amplifiers…
Do you have a fan endorsement?
No, but sometimes I’ll use two little ones…. It
has to be at the right setting because sometimes the voltage at a particular place is different. I have to put pieces of tape on the fan
so it’s not so full sometimes. When I use two
fans, it blows the hair in two different directions at the same time. There’s an art to getting the right blowjob on stage. [Laughing]
I’m sure when you’re rehearsing your
stage show, getting the fan to blow just
right is just as important as getting Tony
MacApline to get his parts right.
[Laughing] That’s right. You can ask Thomas
Nordegg what I put him through with my fans.
You married Pia Maiocco, the bass player
from the ‘80s all-girl metal band Vixen.
Wow, I’m very impressed.
Congratulations.
Thank you. I’ve been with her for thirty years.
She’s amazing. She’s a woman that I see living life to the fullest. She loved music, so she
went to Berklee College of Music where she
met me. She got to tour with a female rock
band, and she looked incredible. She had
gotten enough out of that, she really got into
cooking and became a great cook. Then she
decided she wanted to make clothes and
made all my stage clothes. Then she decided
she wanted to do Tae Kwon Do so she
became a second-degree black belt.
Then she decided she wanted to play tennis, so she became a tennis player. I bought
her a harp, and she learned how to play
the harp. Each one of these extravaganzas
would take about four or five years, but
she’d get the most out of it. She loves traveling, so she became a travel agent and
creates all these incredible trips around the
world. The fact that she was a bass player in
Vixen when she was a young girl is just part
of one little chapter in her life. Me, I just
play guitar and make music the whole time.
She’s living life to the fullest.
