The Worst Human Being I Ever Met

Published by Rick on Tagged Uncategorized

Bear in mind, I never met Donald Trump, nor would I ever care to, but let’s just say the person I’m about to describe is what Trump would be if he ran a nightclub. The man was a thug, a bully, a wannabe gangster, involved in any activity, legal or not, that could squeeze that extra dollar from somebody, or keep that same dollar in his own possession.  And while it’s only vaguely relevant to what’s going on now, I’m reminded of this man whenever I think of that embarrassment of a head of state.

Our story begins in Santa Rosa, California, around March of 1975. Our music/comedy act Rick & Ruby was booked on a Sunday, most likely with a backup band. I don’t believe we ever played that room again, and it wouldn’t surprise me if this horrible man intimidated the club into not booking us so he could lay some kind of claim to us. The only reason I think that is the owner of the Santa Rosa club was very nice to us from our arrival right up until we got paid and left.

This man, we’ll call “Fred,” just in case he’s still alive (though it’s easy to imagine he tried to screw the wrong person and his body may well be in pieces up and down the California coast), came up to us as we were packing up. He introduced himself, told us he had a club in the neighbouring town of Cotati where he’d like to have us. It would be Wednesday thru Saturday, 9:30 to 1:30, and he’d like us for two three-week runs. We said we could do that, and asked how much he paid. It should have been a big ole red flag when his response was, “As little as possible!” Instead we asked how much in dollars that actually was. It was $150 per person per week. We had done more for less in our checkered past, so we didn’t say no.

His club was dance oriented, and since we had a backup band at the time, we could have them play a few tunes to open each set so we could save wear and tear. What Fred also didn’t tell us until we officially said yes and had completed the first week of work was that he had to take taxes out of our pay checks, so our net was about $123 each. Not a great wage for us 24-year-olds living in San Francisco and commuting about 50 miles each way, but we didn’t have anything else going on, so we stuck it out.

What was so repulsive about this man? Aside from his look, short in stature, late 30’s, Brylcreem enhanced ducktail hairdo, and a massive beer gut, there was this Godfather-like voice, which not only had the hoarse tone, but could be loud and menacing. Usually, at about 9:29, his voice would be booming through the club, “You guys ready??” Back then, clubs would usually raise the price of drinks once the entertainment started, and god forbid we miss one glorious minute of those inflated prices. The one time we finished our final song at around 1:28, his flunky manager came up to the stage and said, “Fred would really like to hear one more song.” If he had friends in, we might have just finished a song, and he’d call out “Brian!” (which probably made it more confusing to anyone else, i.e. “I thought he said his name was Rick”) After getting my attention, he would then yell out a song in our repertoire, regardless of whether or not we had already done it, as if to say “Play it now or else!” I’m sure he revelled in his ability to control people.

We always tried to inject a bit of comedy in our act, even back then, and even in a venue where dancing was the main focus. No one seemed to mind, or at least no one complained. Except Fred, who said at the end of one night, “When you do your skits, try and speed em up, cause the people can’t dance so good to em.” Skits? Those were what we usually performed in Cub Scout jamborees. Obviously, he didn’t get what we were doing, and didn’t care, so long as the people were dancing and drinking.

And eating the slop they called food! Our “dressing room” was the kitchen area, where in the nearby fridge was a big container of chilli con carne. Except that there was a layer of mould on the top, which we were told in confidence (not by Fred) that they would just scrape it off and serve what was below it. Another night after a gig, he offered to feed us all a steak dinner. We should have known there was a catch. At least he didn’t charge us for them, but they were the toughest, most inedible steaks one could ever ingest. He ate one too, to his minimal credit, but kept laughing about how tough they were, though he was probably planning to do a number on whatever distributor had supplied them.

One Saturday before we were to start, he had a proposal for us: “Hey, one of my horses came in today at the track, so I can pay you $135 each in cash, and skip the tax.”  Something didn’t seem right about that, so we rejected his offer. We probably should have taken it, as the following year, when we were doing our taxes, we needed W-2 forms from him. I called him, and he said, “Oh yeah, I’ll send you the forms,” which he never did. The bastard taxed our income and pocketed the difference! Did he really think he could pull a fast one? Maybe so. It felt good, in the course of our conversation, when he asked if we were available in the coming months, I was able to honestly tell him no, as we were working steadily in Lake Tahoe by then.

So let’s look at the overall picture: Drinks heavily, gambles heavily, married, but cheats on his wife at every opportunity, bullies and robs people. Yeah, a real Man of Principle! I heard one story about him where a band was playing the club on the Saturday when the switch would go back from Daylight to Standard time. That meant the clocks went back an hour, so in his eyes, 1:30 became 12:30, and he “persuaded” the band to do another set. When they complained that they weren’t being paid for the extra time, he said, “Don’t worry, if you’re working here next spring during the changeover, I’ll let you guys knock off an hour early.” What a guy!

 

August 31st, 2018



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