Pamela Des Barres

The prose style, especially the old diary entries, get a little hard to take after a while, but nevertheless, I couldn't stop reading. I love it that in this book Chris Hillman is on the same level as a target for her lust as was Jimmy Page or MIck Jagger or Don Johnson. We do get some very nice vignettes of the personalities and offstage sides of Mick Jagger, Keith Moon, and many others. IN some cases, they are complementary--such as Jagger--and in others, sad, as in the doomed Mr. Moon. This is a story worth reading, and I'm glad I read it. It does take you back to a different time and place.… (meer)

Much like her first vapid book, Pam plays fast and loose with facts and dates in this book which completely decimates any shred of credibility she may have ever had. In chapter 3 alone she makes the following statements:

1) She states Robert Plant's son died before Detective's album was released, which was in April 1977. However Karac Plant passed away in July 1977, 3 months after the album release.
2) She states Tony Geary was on General Hospital in 1977 when she had an acting role on the show (which is not listed on her IMDB profile), but he did not join the cast until 1978.
3) She states she went to Vegas to see Elvis in 1977, right after the book by his bodyguards came out (which was definitely 1977.) However Elvis NEVER played Vegas in 1977. His last show there was in 1976.

I could continue on with plentiful more examples from throughout the book. Making false statements renders this book and her other books entirely unbelievable.… (meer)

I read and didn't mind Pamela Des Barres's first book, I'm With The Band, enough that I figured I'm move on to her follow-up.

I should have stopped at the first one.

As I made my way through this audiobook (narrated by the author), the only part that didn't seem to irritate me was the heartbreaking story of her father's passing. Pamela cries and chokes up as she narrates it, and you'd have to be a monster to not hear the pain of her loss, all these years later.

But.

The problem is, there's the entire rest of the book. While Des Barres is somewhat entertaining in a flighty, dopey kind of way, I found the biggest reveal about this book was that...unfortunately...the woman is just not that bright.

Yes, she went off script and did what she wanted with her life, which is admirable, and she managed to get into music (with her GTOs), acting, and now an author, she's done most of that with very little talent, and more off her notoriety than anything.

And then there's the majority of this book's story, her ridiculous marriage to Michael Des Barres who she constantly props up as an incredibly talented, amazing artist, but all I saw was a guy that could only step in last minute when the real talent walked away from a project. Probably his two highest-profile moments were playing the lead singer of the fictional band Scum of the Earth on WKRP in Cincinnati, and the fill-in touring vocalist for Power Station, the Duran Duran side project that Robert Palmer walked away from. Michael Des Barres was basically a spoiled child with a royal title and five dollars in his pocket.

Can he sing? Sure. But he's such an @ssh0le through most of this book, I just didn't care.

And then there's the incredible mismanagement of how both of them parented their only child. All I could do is cringe as Miss Pamela relayed the story of one horrible therapist or school placement after another.

Overall, this is just a cringey, awful book of two people who have a little more luck than they deserve, a lot less intelligence than they really required, very little talent, and how they muddled through for fifteen-odd years.

It's just a slow motion rock 'n' roll trainwreck.… (meer)