The Lockwood Echo

Crush

Black and white photo of the Hollywood Vampires on stage with giant Hollywood Vampire logo backdrop.
© The Lockwood Echo

The following post carries a Image result for pg symbol warning: (Polygamous Gyrations).

Some sentences may not be suitable for anyone who’s unfamiliar with ‘The Rum Diary’ or ‘Edward Scissorhands’.

Halloween 2004. As previously mentioned on these pages, it is on this date, after 6 months of a nauseatingly happy joined-at-the-hips friendship, me and my boyfriend both confessed our undying love for Johnny Depp. And then for each other.

Little did we know, nearly 14 years later, we would find ourselves in the same room as the great man himself, (that’s Johnny Depp for anyone who skipped the first paragraph, expect to see his name throughout).

Some of you may know that alongside his acting career, Mr Depp is an accomplished guitarist and flirts with a rock’n’roll lifestyle that belies his squeaky clean image (irony people, come on, keep up).

I say flirt (mostly as it’s at the forefront of my mind right now), but he does more than flirt. He’s in a band. And they’re bloody good. And they came to lil ol’ England last week.

The ‘Hollywood Vampires’ are fronted by;

Joe Perry – from Aerosmith

Alice Cooper – from 1748

and

Johnny Depp – from the Caribbean.

It was to be an intimate gig. Well, it would’ve been had the organisers not let in 15,000 other people. We paid full price for our tickets (not wanting to take advantage of our special relationship with Johnny), pumiced our feet and put on our best Rock Chick clothes, ready to drive to our destiny.

Our seats at the venue were quite far back which, knowing the strength of our pheromones, was probably for the best.

The support bands warmed the crowd up nicely. Me and my partner took in the atmosphere, soaked up the music, occasionally exchanging a grin, incredulous that fate had brought us to share this room with THE Johnny Depp. Unable to be-still our beating hearts, we sat holding hands in mutual understanding.

The support acts departed. A hoard of burly band tees with itchy looking hair changed the set and the mics were checked; One Two One Two.

The lights dimmed. This was actually going to happen.

We let go our affectionate grip.

Because as soon as those cheekbones chiselled their way onto the stage, we instinctively knew from that point on it was every closet gay and adulterer for themselves.

I wondered how many minutes it would take before me and Johnny had breathed in the same air. I wondered if asking for the venue’s air-conditioning to be turned off would speed up that process. I wondered if Johnny had found time to shower between their soundcheck and the gig proper. A glance over to my other half’s distant gaze suggested he was wondering the same.

My boyfriend was wearing Johnny’s fragrance. (You know, the expensive one that makes you drive your cool car to the desert to bury all your jewellery). He was hoping to create an olfactory bond across the auditorium, a silent siren to lure in this long-awaited bromance. Unfortunately, 8000 other men, 74 women and 2 Assistance Dogs had also splashed on Johnny’s aftershave with similar intentions. Instead of an invisible bond, we all found ourselves choking on a very visible ‘Fog de Dior’.

For my part, I was wearing my lucky knickers. A black thong. Resembling an eyepatch and about the size of one, I thought the Pirate in Johnny would appreciate the sauciness, the tribute and the metaphorical splicing of the mainbrace.

I know Johnny was there to do a job and it would be wrong for him to be distracted, but we did make eye contact several times via the giant screens. And even if he couldn’t feast upon my pheromones from all the way back in the cheat cheap seats, I could certainly taste his. He played his guitar like a Demon. He sang like an Angel. And he pouted like a Whore. It was everything we’d dreamt it would be. But all too soon it was over.

He’d belted, we’d buckled. His studded strut exited stage right. We left.

The drive back was subdued. Both lost in our lust for our Rock God, a foundation stone of our relationship, laid nearly 14 years before. We were in awe of the fact we’d just sung along with him to some of the greatest rock songs ever written.

And as the motorway lights guided us home, we reached out and held hands again. A squeeze told each other how much in love we were. But it was a squeeze that also said;

‘If Johnny ever comes knocking, you can bet I’d take a shovel to your head and spit on your grave before I’d let you answer that door first’.

Update 2023; You must all be on a knife edge, wondering how this story developed. Well, I’m delighted to announce I procured a second date with Mr Depp. You can read about that here.

And now, for your viewing pleasure (not my video), Mr Johnny Depp, doing what he was born to do, and along with the Hollywood Vampires, paying tribute to one of the greatest artists that ever lived…….

20 comments

  1. You are HILARIOUS! And I am seriously jealous, even if there’s a good chance I would have passed out unconscious from all those Sauvage fumes. Great post!

    Liked by 1 person

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  4. HA! YOU are so effing funny!! I knew that Johnny was in a band but had no clue it was with those two! What the hell?! I am trying to think of who I would wear an eye patch down there for (amazing!), and I think it would be Charlize Theron. Yup, if she were up there strumming a guitar like that, I would melt as I completely lost my mind. Thanks for the laugh, this was awesome! So unbelievably happy that​ you write this blog!! xo

    Liked by 2 people

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    • Aww, you just put the biggest smile on my face! Johnny breaks the mould for me, I’m usually drawn to blue-eyed guys, but he just has that inexplicable ‘it’ factor 😊 I totally get Charlize. She’d be on what me and my other half call our ‘latent gene list’! And I’ve never been in any doubt Johnny is top of his list. It’s just something else we felt we had in common 😉 Thankyou for your awesome comment. ❤️

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    • My other half saw that video within an article about them, via Planet Rock (radio station). He shared it on Facebook. But it was only a couple of days later I got round to reading the actual article, realised clearly my other half hadn’t because it mentioned their UK tour which was only 2 weeks away. So it was incredible that we got tickets. We could have so easily missed the chance. For 70, that Alice Cooper can sure still rock! And Ian Hunter from Mott The Hoople guested and sang All The Young Dudes 😉 We’ve always known Johnny played in bands, but this was quite the find 😊

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    • No, please don’t introduce them to your wife. The queue to Johnny’s heart is long enough thankyouverymuch. I’ve struggled to find much other than fan footage on YouTube, which doesn’t necessarily do them justice. I need to big up the rest of the band too. They played no small part. Each stepped up to the plate, truly seasoned musicians, their experience and talent was out of this world.

      Liked by 1 person

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  8. Oh man! I’ve always wanted to see Johnny Depp perform as well. That’s awesome that you and your boyfriend are equally infatuated, both with Johnny Depp and each other. I think the only person my boyfriend and I agree on is Beyonce. Not because of her music. Because of her butt. That thing deserves its own zip code!

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    • Ha! That’s hilarious. I can’t watch Beyonce without the image of Lenny Henry’s parody of Crazy In Love. If you’ve not seen it, maybe don’t, it may ruin her for you and your boyfriend 😉 JD (who really is too cool for his own jawline) was another box ticked that confirmed me and my partner were kindred spirits. The rest is history as they say 🙂

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