CHAPTER 10
Las Vegas

     Gwen was making fantastic money on the strip.  To her, it was like plucking feathers off a duck.  We were able to afford a lot of nice things and were living quite comfortably.
     Gwen's son, Deno, and I became very close. Deno was a hip-looking blond and blue-eyed young man.  He looked just like his mother.  I would stay with him at night while Gwen was working the strip.  We had many good times together and he came to regard me as a big brother figure in his life.
     Gwen had found a screwy doctor, whom I will call Dr "K." This yardbird would write scripts for any female that would ask.  I didn't know what went on in his office, and I didn't really care.  All I wanted was the script.  It was so easy to get legal drugs, that I got more addicted than I already was.  I had a serious drug problem at that time. My drug of choice was Tuinal and I was taking up to six pills a day, a very dangerous dosage.  The more self-esteem I lost, the more drugs I would take.  My memories of this time period are kind of fuzzy.
     Bobby Ramirez called us from Port Arthur and asked if he could stay with us for a while, in order to find some work.  We both loved Bobby and offered him the extra bedroom.  . Bobby (deceased) was the greatest drummer that I ever knew. He played in the "What's Happening" band for a while and later went on to play with Edgar Winter's White Trash.  Bobby and I got very close during those months.  I got a chance to know him really well.  He was a good natured soul and always had a smile on his face. While Bobby was living with us, Gwen got pregnant, and had a miscarriage. I regret her losing the baby, but we really did not need a child.   I guess it was for the best.  I was losing touch with music, and also reality, as I slid deeper into my addiction.
     Bobby eventually got a gig with Dick Jensen, a popular Vegas entertainer. The International Hotel (now the Hilton) was being built, and the talk of the town was that Elvis, Tom Jones and Barbra Striesand were the stars that would open in this huge casino.        
     Kenny Yetman, who was the drummer with the Boogie Kings in the mid Sixties, moved in with Gwen and me after Bobby left.   Kenny was drinking very heavily and was looking for work. We helped him as much as we could.  Kenny was a hell of a nice guy, even when he was drinking.  
We were beginning to have landlord problems.  We lived in the apartment on top of his and my new stereo was driving him crazy.  The bass would thump on his ceiling so hard, it would constantly piss him off.   We decided to move out of the apartment and into a house in order to have a little more privacy.  We found a nice little house on Bourbon Way.  It was a roomy three bedroom house and it suited our needs perfectly.
         Shortly after we moved in, I flew my two sons, Thad and Marty, into Vegas for a visit.  I was so lonesome for them, and I wanted to show off in Las Vegas.   It was a joyous and memorable day for me when I picked my kids up at the airport in my red Cadillac convertible, and with the top down, I drove them down Freemont Street where all the bright lights were.  The kids were mesmerized and I felt like a king.  It was important for me to look good in front of my kids. I felt at the time that they would never see me in my glory, on a Boogie King's stage. But, you know, your kids will love you, no matter what. We had a great two weeks together and I was really proud of how my sons were turning out.  They seemed to be very well adjusted.  
        Some of my friends were living with a musician who was growing some illegal plants in his yard.  They got paranoid and ended up at my house.  They should not have told me where the plants were because those plants all ended up at my house.  You'd be surprised at the people you meet climbing a fence at three a.m. in Las Vegas.
     Our house got real crowded after that.   We were helping Jon Smith, Ken Herpin, Cal Arnold and Gary Walker.  They were all broke, and it was getting tough to support all of these guys.  We needed our privacy back, and it was a burden on Gwen, so I concocted a story that the cops were watching my house. Since we always had drugs of some sort, that cleared everyone out immediately!
        Shortly after that we managed to get a gig at the Palomino Club in North Vegas. It was a topless-bottomless club, so needless to say, we didn't care much what the job paid.  A lot of scuzzy people used to hang around this club.  Naked women can draw a crowd anywhere!  I don't know that I ever saw a straight or sober person in that place. One night on a break, a friend of mine offered me a snort of white powder which I assumed to be coke or speed.  Like a dumbass, I snorted it.  When we got back on stage, the whole room started turning around on me.  I had never felt this way before. I didn't want to get sick on stage in Las Vegas.  It would be too humiliating.  All of a sudden, I fell to my knees with everyone watching.  Try as I may, I could not get off my knees.  I was on the far left of the stage, but the dressing room door was on the right and it looked a thousand miles away.  With everyone watching, I crawled across the stage to the dressing room and rolled down the steps into the dressing room.  The crowd was hysterical and that white powder turned out to be my first and last taste of heroin.
        The Palomino band was called "White Trash," a name suggested by Jon Smith and later used by Edgar Winter. The band was seven pieces and some of the players were Gary Walker, Ken Herpin, Ken Yetman, Cal Arnold, Nick Farkas, Jon Smith and myself.  It wasn't much of a band.  With all of the boobs and beavers, we couldn't concentrate much on the music.
        After a while. Duane Yates paid me a visit.  He had been doing some shows in L.A. with Robert "Doc" Vernon and a rhythm section that consisted of Terry Dickson, David Holiday, Doc and a bass player.  It seemed like no matter how much shit went down between Duane and Jon and myself, we would always come back together, seeking the security of each other's talent.  Anyway, they came to my house one night before they were to open at the International (Hilton) Hotel and Casino, with a proposition.  They offered me a deal. The job called for three horn players and Duane and Doc had no parts written or arranged. They wanted me to write all of the parts that night so they could have a five o'clock rehearsal the next day.  I looked at Duane and said, "Dream on, mother-fucker. I'd have to have a Desoxin or two to take on a task like that."  Doc looked at me and said, "Open your mouth and grab your pen, we've got a show!" He then shoved two Desos down my throat. The music got written, I got the gig, we rehearsed and we were on stage the very next night.
     Duane and Rose were married now, and members of the now defunct Cosmic Lite Church. They had been living in the desert for a few months, trying to get close to nature. A gang of rattlesnakes had convinced them that nature was a rough deal.
     Duane and Rose were singing wonderfully on the show at the International, even though the band was virtually thrown together.  Jimmy Honeycutt and Pat Anders from Shreveport were in the horn section with me. We had some great times.
      We never did draw much of a crowd at the International. We were competing with Elvis and that was like competing with Jesus.  Everyone who visited that hotel had an Elvis Presley priority!  We got to see Elvis many times, thanks to the light man.  We would go up to the light booth and walk a gangplank that went to the light booth in the main room, where Elvis was appearing.  We would just sit on that gangplank and watch his show.
I felt sorry for Elvis.  They say it takes one to know one.  I could tell that he was stoned to the max.  He would forget his words, his speech was erratic, and he was weighing over 200 pounds.  To be quite frank, Elvis Presley looked terrible.  He would sing a few bars of his hit songs and there would be so much yelling, applause and whistling that he could not finish any of his tunes.  Elvis set attendance records at the hotel that will never be broken.
     I didn't have the Boogie Kings anymore, but I was in Vegas at the largest casino in town, and we were sharing the billing with Elvis.  Pretty damn good, if you ask me.
    After the casino gig, I was contacted by Dan Silas, one of the Boogie Kings, for a gig with Timi Yuro.  Timi was a spaghetti queen who had a 4 chart busting singles, including "I'm So Hurt."  She followed that with two or three more hits and became world-famous.  Dan hired Jon Smith, Johnny Giordana and me and a drummer friend named Mike McGriff.  Mike was the funkiest drummer in the world. He was part of the Stu Gardner Trio with Mel Brown, famous Blues guitarist Stu is now Bill Cosby's music director.
        Timi Yuro was taking a lot of downers, and was subject to faint or pass out at any time, on stage or off.  But she was a great vocalist anyway.  We were playing at the Castaways, one of the smaller casinos, but the showroom rivaled any other in town. Timi and Elvis had come up the rock n' roll ladder at the same time and they were the best of friends.  One Thursday night, Timi's brother came backstage and told us that Elvis was in the audience. This started everyone buzzing and we wondered if it was actually true. Much to our astonishment, when the curtains opened, we could see Elvis and his entourage in the far corner of the showroom.  Word got out that Elvis was in the room, and little by little, the room started filling up. Everyone wanted a glance at Elvis.  Pretty soon, his bodyguards had to remove him from the premises as the audience was turning into a mob. It was an exhilarating experience for us Cajun boys.  We were a long way from the swamps of Louisiana now!
    But the night was young.  After the show, Timi asked Jon and Dan and me if we wanted to go to a party at Elvis' penthouse suite.  We all registered an absolute affirmative on that question.  My heart was pounding like an African tom-tom as we took the elevator to the penthouse.  When the elevator opened, we saw six or eight men by the door.  These were huge men and we could tell that they were packing some heat.  They knew Timi and let us right in.  There were fifteen or twenty people in the room, mostly gathered around Elvis and his guitar.  Elvis loved to get fucked up, and sing spirituals to his friends.  Of course, no matter what condition Elvis was in, he was always admired by everyone.  The kitchen table was a massive array of drugs of all kinds, the likes of which, I have never seen again.  I did not care about the drugs, I wanted to speak to the King.
When Elvis finished singing, a black pianist took over, and Elvis spoke to his guests one by one for a few minutes each.  I thought it was very gracious of him to share his time like this.
     When it was my turn, he shook my hand, and then he blew me away when he said, "Boogie Kings!"   I could not believe that he knew about my band. He said, "Ned, I used to hear you guys play in Monroe when I was a kid. I have all your records. That was a fantastic band. Sorry to hear you guys aren't together anymore."  He shook my hand again and moved on.  I was paralyzed!  I could not move, I couldn't talk and I couldn't think.  I had just had a conversation with the greatest entertainer the world has ever known.
     Gwen and I had enough money now, so we bought a brand new Cadillac.  We were very proud to drive it right off the showroom floor and onto the downtown strip.   At this point in time, I was truly "Living Like a King."  I used my VA loan to buy a two story home, two blocks from the Las Vegas Strip.  It had an Olympic size swimming pool and four bedrooms and four bathrooms.  It was a gorgeous home.  Today, that same house is worth a million bucks.  Wish I could have kept it. No question about it, I was "Living Like a King."
Gwen and I would eventually hit bottom again and lose everything we had.
Ned Theall,  Jon Smith  1995
CHAPTER 11