143
by Colonel Panic_Archive
When I was a senior in high school I had a friend who worked at the Crow's Nest, the only record store in Joliet at the time that carried a decent selection of independent-label records.
She was into the "Brit-punk" look, which means she wore a leather jacket and ripped clothing, had spiky multicolored hair, etc. Her favorite band was The Cramps. She wasn't particularly stupid but one of her co-workers was a dim-witted metalhead burnout of maybe 22 years of age, who worked in the "smoke shop" department (surprise, surprise) at the back of the store. We used to have fun messing with him because he always took everything we said so seriously. When he was around we'd discuss punk rock shows we'd attended, and we'd always sensationalize and hyperbolize everything into shocking and grim "war stories," just to freak him out. He'd tell us we were crazy to run around in a crowd like that. "If one of those punks ever tried to slam-dance into me, I'd kick his faggot ass!" was a typical response we'd get. Oh yeah, he was also rather homophobic.
One day I was hanging around chatting with my friend while she stocked some records. Judas Priest came on the store PA system and the metalhead guy (let's call him "Lenny") immediately began singing along as he priced the bongs and dugouts. She grinned at me then turned to him and said, "You know the lead singer of Judas Priest is gay, don't you Lenny?" Lenny replied, "Yeah, I know. I didn't believe it at first, but I guess it is true." I asked him if he liked WASP and he said "Hell yeah, man." Then of course I brought out the old "We Are Sex Perverts" myth. My friend nodded in agreement. "Yep. They're all gay. Every single one of them. They're known for trashing their dressing rooms and hotels with these big gay orgies after their shows." Lenny grimaced and said "That's disgusting! But you know, I think I heard that somewhere too... And they do wear a lot of makeup. That's too bad though. They rock pretty hard for a bunch of queers."
Of course, my friend then took the game to the next level. She asked him, "Hey, you know who else is gay?" Then she looked me right in the eye while she said, "David Lee Roth." I had to hold my breath to keep from laughing. A few seconds passed as we stood there waiting to see if he'd bite. He turned to us with a confused look and replied, "No fucking way," and went back to his work. But then after a few minutes he suddenly looked up and added, "Yeah you know, David Lee Roth really does try pretty hard to overcompensate with all that macho stuff. He's really gay, huh? Wow."
From then on, that became one of our favorite things to do at the store. We'd break the grim news to Lenny about another macho heavy metal musician who was in reality a poncey, pole-smoking, butt-ramming homo. Strangely, he never argued with us or tried to defend his heroes. I don't know if he realized we were just fucking with him, but if he did he never called us on it. I'm pretty sure he believed it because he'd act all disappointed and mopey afterward. Then again, maybe he was just stoned.