Latest / DISGRACELAND / Mark Lanegan: Kurt Cobain’s Drug Runner, Liam Gallagher’s Tormentor, and Matt Dillon’s Firestarter

Transcript

Mark Lanegan: Kurt Cobain’s Drug Runner, Liam Gallagher’s Tormentor, and Matt Dillon’s Firestarter · DISGRACELAND

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: This episode contains content that may be disturbing to some listeners.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Please check the show notes for more information. Disgraceland is
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: a production of Double Elvis. This is a story about violence,
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: about heroin, about the real man who made Liam Gallagher
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: quit Oasis. Hint it wasn't his brother, And it's about
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: some seriously underrated rock and roll great music. Great music
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: made by a man named Mark Lanigan, singer and leader
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: of Screaming Trees and later one of the singers from
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: Queens of the Stone Age. Mark's music was very much
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: unlike that music that I played for you at the
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: top of the show. That wasn't great music. That was
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: a preset loop from my melotron called Kurtz Nightporter MK one.
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: I played you that loop because I can't afford the
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: rights to we Don't Talk About Bruno by the cast
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: of Encanto. And why would I play you that specific
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: slice of weird animated Uncle Cheese? Could I afford it?
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: Because that was the number one song in America on
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: February twenty second, twenty twenty two, And that was the
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: day that Mark Lanigan, after years of rough fights and
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: even rougher nights, after recovering from a nearly three week coma,
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: gave into his own demons and died at the age
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: of fifty seven. On this episode Violence Heroin, Matt Dillon
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: on fire, Liam Gallagher scared shitless, and Mark Lanigan. I'm
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: Jake Brennan, and this this disgrace, Land Lanian, Are you
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: as dumb as you fucking look? You're a piece of shit,
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: that much is true. But my mouth to God's ears, son,
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: I know you're a piece of shit. Your mama knows
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: you're a piece of shit. But don't be going all
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: dumb on me now too, got it? Okay, then I'm
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: gonna ask you one last time which one of your
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: ship bag friends is stealing all the goddamn stereos out
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: of the goddamn cars. Down at the dealership, fifteen year
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: old Mark Lanigan shifted uncomfortably in his chair while his aggressor,
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: Captain olympdick Here from the local Sheriff's department, loomed over
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: him from where he sat on the edge of his desk.
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: Of course, Lanigan knew who was taking the stack bad
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: recognize as bad and all that, and when it came
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: to bad right now in the year nineteen seventy nine
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: in the dead end city of Ellensburg, Washington. Mark Lanigan
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: was about as bad as a gout. He was a thief,
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: a trespasser, He was drunk or stoned twenty four to seven,
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: covering public walls with spray paint and piss, Barely tolerated
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: by his teachers, and abused physically and mentally by his
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: miserable mother. He did what he had to do in
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: order to survive and what he saw as a dead
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: end town, and thus survived the authority, apathy, and stupidity
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: that ran him up there. And yeah, technically Ellensburg was
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: a city, but it was such a backwards, podunk shithole
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: of a city that it had that permanent small town
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: stink all over it. In just a few years from now,
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: by the time Lanigan was a senior, he would destroy
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: Rory's probation officer's van with a sledgehammer, the cherry on top,
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: as it were, of a long list of alcohol, drug
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: and theft related offenses, and those offenses in total would
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: earn him an eighteen month prison sentence, a sentence that
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: a lenient judge would suspend on the condition that Lannigan
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: complete substance abuse treatment. The judge bless him, thought that
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: Mark Lannigan could change. Captain Limptick, on the other hand,
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: despite all his obvious flaws, most glaring of which was
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: the cast he was currently wearing on one arm due
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: to an injury he no doubt sustained while beating on
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: some other unlucky miscreant, Captain Olymptick knew that change was
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: in something a kid like Lannigan was capable of. The
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: bottom was where he was born, and the bottom was
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: where he would stay. There was no amount of blackout
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: drunk knights that could make him forget that, and no
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: matter how hard he fought, he'd never caused way out.
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: That didn't mean that Lanigan wouldn't put up a fight trying.
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: In fact, violence was one thing that Mark Lanigan trafficked
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: in from a very early age. Come on, kid, the
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: Captain said, I'm gonna ask you one more time, and
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: you fucking a better give me a name this time.
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: Who took the goddamn stereos. Lannigan cocked his head upright,
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: finally making eye contact, and said, I don't know. Captain
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: Olymptick's face went red with rage. He launched at Lanagan
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: and he swung his busted arm at the side of
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: Lanigan's head, connecting with a thud, knocking Lanigan off to
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: the chair and onto the floor, where the captain was
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: now standing over his teenage prey, ignoring the throbbing pain
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: shooting up and down his arm. He wanted to see
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: the abject fear in the kid's eyes, but instead he
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: saw the eyes of a victor, a look of satisfaction
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: even down there on the grimy floor, and that pissed
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: limp dick off to no end. You had this coming, boy,
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: he said, grabbing, landing him by a shirt collar with
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: his good hand, cocking back his bad arm, and then
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: the punch landed squarely on mark Land against jaw. He
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: stumbled backwards the cold, salty air of Asbury Park, New Jersey,
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: stinging his lip where it had been split open. He
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: drunk himself into a stupor again tonight. So the pair
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: of angry bouncers now standing before him looked like a quartet.
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: These meatheads were planet fitness big, not brick shithouse big,
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: like the Conner boys, Van and Gary Lee or Barrett Marty,
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: the guys who collectively, along with Mark, comprised the tallest
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: and most intimidating band from the Pacific Northwest, screaming trees
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: but Van and Gary Lee, where the hell are they going?
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: Off to landing and grabbed a piece of wooden signpost
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: that was rotting in the gutter and waved it at
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: the bouncers who were coming to finish what they started.
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: He turned to see Barrett at his side, his arm
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: dangling in a way that was not natural, screaming, they
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: broke my arm. They fucking broke my arm. The piece
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: of wood felt too heavy in Lanigan's hand. It was
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: wasted enough that he knew that an attempt to wield
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: it would be a fool's errant, or at least of drunks,
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: So he tossed the weapon to the ground, put up
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: his fists, and went in swinging. It was October nineteen
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: ninety two. Mark Lanigan had long since put Ellensburg behind him,
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: saved from a life as a town barfly by the
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: only thing that mattered rock and roll, the sex Pistols,
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: the Stranglers, Iggy Pot gun Club. Discovering music like that,
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: music that no one was listening to in Ellensburg. That
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: was like discovering a new language and While Mark Lanigan
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: may have felt like the only long haired punk rocker
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: in a city full of jocks, in reality there were
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: a few others. So when he met Van and Gary
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: Lee Conner, who not only understood his musical vocabulary but
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: made their own music too, Lannigan knew he'd found his
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: ticket out. Mark Lannigan didn't play an instrument, but he
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: could sing, and within a few years he had honed
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: his voice into the one we know today, the resonant
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: baritone that was gruff like Tom Waite's and gravelly like
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: Billie Holliday if Billy Holliday sometimes had a beard. And
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: by the early nineties, the Screaming Trees had evolved from
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: Nuggets era garage rock into a powerful, behemoth sound that
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: was as formidable as they looked, while also being as
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: catchy as anything the so called grunge scene was producing
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: at the time. And just like Nirvana, Soundgarden, Alison Chains,
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: and the other bands that they'd come up with, the
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: Screaming Trees quickly found themselves riding Seattle's rising tide. Sweet Oblivion,
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: their second album for Epic Records in their sixth overall,
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: also their first to feature Barrett Martin, who replaced the
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: original drummer Mark Pickerel, set them up for the big time,
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: but never actually got them there. Months before it was
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: released in September of nineteen ninety two, Its lead single,
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: Nearly Lost You, have been featured on the soundtrack to
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: Cameron Crow's movie Singles, a fictionalized take on grunge in
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: Seattle starring Matt Dillon. But when Mark Lanigan found out
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: that every other band on the soundtrack got paid while
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: the Screaming Trees were told to wave their sink feet
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: in the name of exposure, that pissed him off to
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: no end. Mudhoney got twenty thousand dollars in the Screaming
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: Trees got fuck all. It made landing and feel like
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: he and the boys were swimming at the bottom of
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: the barrel. At least he was familiar with the bottom
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: of the barrel and glass being half full. In all
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: that there was only one way to get out of
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: the bottom, but not tonight. On the boardwalk in Asbury Park,
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: outside a club called the Fast Lane, where the Screaming
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: Trees were scheduled to play a gig tomorrow night, the
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: bottom embraced Mark Lannigan and tonight. When the bouncers told
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: the Trees bassist Van Connor he couldn't take his drink outside,
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: Van told the guy to go fuck himself, and when
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: the bouncer told Lannigan the same, Lannigan knocked the tyrant's
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: ass off his little stool with one punch. The fistfight
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: that followed ensured that the Screaming Trees would not play
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: at the fast Lane, not tomorrow night, or any other
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: night for that matter. They did tape a performance of
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: their great song Nearly Lost to You on The David
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: Letterman Show the next day, but did so with drummer
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: Steve Faron sitting in for Barrett Martin since Barrett had
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: dislocated his shoulder in the melee. Lannigan, however, was front
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: and center, Van and Gary headbanging behind him, lanning and
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: gripping the mic stand with both hands like he was
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: holding on for dear life, looking very much like the
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: last dude you'd ever want to fuck with, and sporting
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: a huge shiner on his left eye for maximum effect.
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: And this was not Matt Dillon with phony long hair
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: in a soul patch up on a movie screen, trying
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: to be a singer from Seattle. This was not singles.
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: This was the real deal. This was uncompromising rock and
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: roll at its most violent, underappreciated best. It didn't give
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: into anything, and it didn't give anything up, just like
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: young Mark Lanagan wouldn't give up any names to Captain
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: Limpdick all those years ago. Some things are better kept
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: the secret. Some things you take to your grave. Did
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: you call for the night Porter? You asked this of
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: your buddy Kurt Kobain, who is looking at you through
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: the crack of the half open front door at his
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: house on Lake Washington. The night Porter is Kurt's nickname
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: for you. Your friends call you all sorts of things. Old scratch,
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: dark Mark, a homeless crack addict that he once ran
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: a scam with to scare up drug money, used to
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: call you Whitey Ford. But only Kurk calls you the
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: night Porter. He does so on account of the fact
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: that you run dope all over Seattle like a bike messenger,
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: but you don't have a bike, and you do your
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: work under the cover of darkness. There's a gaping hole
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: in town that needs filling, and just as you'd sing
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: in one of your later songs, you're there to janitor,
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: the emptiness. Everyone in town benefits from your quicksilver ass.
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: Barista is making minimum wage at Starbucks, tech millionaires at Microsoft,
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: and your good buddy Kurt Kobean here, who just so
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: happens to be the biggest rock star on the planet.
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: You benefit too, because ever since you cut alcohol from
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: your life and replaced it with heroin, your habit is
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: all consuming, and that habit costs a pretty penny. You
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: are not Kurt Kobean or Chris Cornell. Shit, you're not
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: even any fucking vetter. The money you make from screaming
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: trees and from your solo career, which is running on
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: a parallel track next to the bands, it's not enough.
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: It's never enough. So your side hustle helps make ends meet,
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: and it also keeps you within arm's reach of some
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: killer brown. Anyway, when Kurt sees that it's you at
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: his door, not some crazy fan who's figured out where
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: he lives, this huge smile bursts across his face and
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: he shouts your name land again like some god fearing
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: old bitty shouts Amen at Sunday service. Because Amen, brother,
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: you are the light, You are the flesh and the
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: blood that you are the fucking night Porter, and you've
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: got the goods. Kurt knows your situation and does what
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: he can, and you understand that there are some things
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: he can't do, like go out and score heroin. Now
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: that he's the most famous person in Seattle. Kurt always
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: repays the favor. Once he took out three grand in
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: cash from the bank, stuffed it in your fists, just
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: for you being you, for being there, for for being,
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: as he once told you, one of the only real
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: friends he had. Kurt didn't just have your back. He
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: was your champion, and the two of you almost made
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: a record of lead belly songs together, but when that
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: didn't pan out, you had to settle for Kurt guesting
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: on your cover the Bluesman song where Did You Sleep
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: Last Night from your solo debut album, The Winding Sheet.
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: That's right, be proud of that man. Everyone connects that
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: song with Nirvana and their Unplugged album, as they should
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: because it's incredible. But you first with Kurt, you put
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: him onto that lead billy shit. And then two years
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: later in ninety two, when the Screaming Trees were banned
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: from all European festivals after you got blackout drug at
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: ross killed and fought the stage crew at the end
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: of your set like a cornered animal. Kurt was the
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: one who orchestrated your redemption. He told the organizers at
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: Reading the Nirvana would pull out of that festival unless
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: the Screaming Trees were back on the bill at fucking
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: Reading one of the most iconic Nirvana performances of all time,
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: and it almost didn't happen because Kurt liked you too much. Still,
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: after a while, it became a lot to manage all
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: this night porter business because being a junkie was hard
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: enough as it was, all the running around trying to
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: find your guy and then finding out your guy got
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: pinched or he skipped town, so you got to find
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: another guy, and that guy is holed up in the
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: sketchiest part of town where if you don't have peace
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: stuff down in the front of your jeans either incredibly
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: fucking stupid or you're about to be dead. And if
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: you're not at home when you score, then you gotta
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: find somewhere to shoot. And let's say you do you
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: find a place, then you have to find a working
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: vein to shoot in, because you're always running out of
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: good veins. Next thing you know, you're pulling down your pants,
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: staring at your cock, specifically at the big vein that
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: runs upside it, wondering, well, it's a vein, isn't it.
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: It'll only hurt for a second, right, And then as
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: soon as the needle breaks the skin, you watch that
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: same vein balloon up and you're like, fuck, am I
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: gonna lose my cock now, just like you thought you
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: were gonna lose your arm that one time. In Quebec,
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: there was no such thing as a clean needle, at
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: least not on tour buses in the nineteen nineties. Everyone
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: shared everything, and once you were high, he didn't worry
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: about that shit anyway. But this time, before the bus
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: crosses the Canadian border, you shoot up with that dirty needle.
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: You hide in one of the vans interior pails, and
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: your arm just fucking goes puff it inflates to twice
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: its size. It's fire red and hot to the touch.
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: You wind up in a hospital where the doctors are
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: telling you, monsieur, you are we may need to how
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: do you say? Remove it? So you're sitting there in
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: a bed waiting it out for twenty four hours to
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: see if the blood infection raging away inside he was
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: gonna come down, or if they're gonna amputate. You're doing
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: this while also sweating out the final vestiges of the
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: heroin left in your system. You're going cold turkey right there,
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: and you feel like shit. Your drum tech takes pity
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: on you and hits the bricks to find a Montreal
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: prostitute with huge lips to come give you one last
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: blowjob as a two armed man, but he can't get
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: her past security, which is a huge buzzkill for your
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: equally huge blue balls. The next day, the doc tells
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: you that you can keep the arm, which is great
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: news because there's a mic stand somewhere that needs leaning on.
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: Its entire purpose is to be there for you to
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: a bit tight with not one but two hands, and
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: that gargoyle power stance you strike designed to scare off
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: all comers, all posers, and if any shit talking roughneck
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: knows any better, they know to keep their distance from
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: Mark fucking Lannigan. The only thing you haven't figured out
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: yet is how to ward off the demons. Lannigan stood
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: at the foot of a set of stairs outside Kurt
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: Kobaine's house. Smoking a Lucky Strike nonfilter, he exhaled and
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: looked up the stairs to where they led a room
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: above the garage. Kurt was missing. He had escaped from
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: a detox facility in la and caught a plane back
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: to Seattle, but no one knew where he was now,
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: and his wife, Courtney Love, was freaking out. Geffen Records
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: was freaking out too. Lannigan's lawyer, the one he shared
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: with Kurt, he was also freaking out. Lannigan shadowed a
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: private investigator, took him to drug houses on Capitol Hill,
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: bought dope with the pi's money, going everywhere and anywhere.
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: He thought Kurt might be hiding out, places to fix,
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: places you checked into but would never leave. But no dice.
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: They called Kurt's friends and searched Kurt's house, nothing outside.
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: Lannigan took another puff off his cigarette. Just days earlier,
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: Kurt had called three times and left three messages on
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: his answering machine, said he wanted to hang out and
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: listen to music. In other words, cop some dope, bro
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: and bring it over and let's get high. Lannigan never
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: answered and never called him back. All that night. Porter business.
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: It was too exhausting, and Lannigan had no idea that
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: Kurt was a wall when he called, and now he
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: wished he had picked up. He looked up at the
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: stairs and at the door leading into the room above
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: the garage. He didn't feel compelled to make the climb,
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: so instead he tossed the butt on the ground, crushed
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: it with his boot, and left. The next day, his
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: phone rang. Kurt Cobaine was dead, and they found his
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: body in that room above the garage, just steps away
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: from where Lanigan had stood. Courtney called him soon after
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: and told him that Kurt had been listening to Lanagan's
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: new solo record, Whiskey for the Holy Ghost for days
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: before he pulled the trigger, which just fucked Lanigan up
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: to no end. He didn't need to hear that, but
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: there was no one hearing it now, just like there
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: was no unthinking the thought that he was the last
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: person Kurt ever called. His friend was gone on his watch,
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: and Mark Lanigan was left to contemplate his place in it.
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: We'll be right back after this. We're we're where reputation
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: is everything in the music business, or though whatever business
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: doesn't matter, your reputation precedes you if you're doing it right.
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: Some have to work on building the reputation, but for
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: Mark Lanagan it came naturally authentically just by being himself.
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: Did his reputation evolve to where it was firmly established
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: in the mid nineteen nineties, and it didn't really change
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: from there. Everyone knew Mark Lanagan took no shit. Didn't
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: matter who you were. If you got on Lanigan's bad side,
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: if you pissed him off, watch yourself. And that goes
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: for Heckler's in the audience calling his bandmates fat, or
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: even for those same bandmates when they did something that
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: he felt was deserving of his well documented physical retaliation.
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: I mean, have you seen Van and Gary Lee Conner.
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: Those dudes were nine foot tall, Andre the giant looking motherfuckers,
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: But shit, man, sheer size did not phase Lannigan one bit.
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: He even challenged Liam Gallagher to a fight when The
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: Screaming Trees opened Oasis's brief American tour in nineteen ninety six.
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: This after Liam insulted him, insulted his band and in
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: general acted like a proper cunt, as they'd say in
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: his native Manchester. Liam fancied himself a brawler but Lannigan
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: knew the type. His idea of fighting was a loud
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: mouth that wouldn't shut the hell up. So when Liam
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: Gallagher told Mark Lanigan that he throwed down Mono Amano
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: at the tour's final stop in Miami, Lannigan could rest
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: assured that all this time spent around this prick would
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: be worth it when he got to break Liam's nose
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: at the end of the line. But they never got
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: to the end of that line, because right before the
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: Miami date, the final night of the tour, Liam Gallagher bailed.
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: He quit Oasis and flew back home to England. Yes,
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: Liam Gallagher briefly quit his own band in nineteen ninety six,
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: and it wasn't because of his dysfunctional relationship with his
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: brother Noel. It was because he was terrified that Mark
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: Lanagan was going to beat the shit out of him
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: if Lannigan shared something with Liam. It was that intimacy
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: with dysfunction. The Screaming Treees's function was one thing pushing
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: them further into a solo career, But in ninety six,
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: the Trees remained an important part of Lanigan's revenue stream,
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: which was necessary in order to maintain his all consuming
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: drug habit. That was the other part of Lanigan's reputation.
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: He was known as a junkie and a fiend and
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: an amateur cook who made crack cocaine in his kitchen
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: that he could sell on the side when he wasn't
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: shooting or smoking whatever he could get his hands on,
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: with friends like Lane Staley from Alison Chains, who incidentally
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: filled in for Mark Lanigan at the Screaming Tree Show
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: at Montreal when Lanigan was laid up in that hospital,
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: wondering if he was going to lose his arm. But
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: I digress. But in a bad part of town in Rockford, Illinois,
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: home of Cheap Trick, where the trees were passing through
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: as part of the lollapaloozatur that same year in nineteen
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: ninety six, Mark Lannigan his reputation didn't mean shit. He
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: was just another Mark with crumpled up bills in his pocket,
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: looking for a fix, some brown, some rock, some of
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: whatever came easy. And the old guy standing guard outside
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: this dilapidated drug den said it was ten bucks to
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: get inside, and then he looked over at the tall
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: dude standing next to land again. Josh Hami formerly of
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: Kaius in a new addition to the trees. As they're touring,
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: second guitar player, short red hair, white puka shell necklace,
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: nice polo shirt, His palm desert jocko Fucko vibe was
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: in direct conflict with Mark Lannigan's strung out shoulder length
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: hair and beard. And that's ten bucks each, the old
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: guy corrected. Lannigan forked over the cash, and then he
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: and Josh walked inside. The place was dark. Cigarette smoke
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: hung from the ceiling, ready or not, but the fujis
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: was blaring from a set of shitty speakers behind a bar,
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: where a dope he had nodding off made a show
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: liquor from a dirty glass. Some skinny piece of ass
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: draped herself on Lannigan's arm. Give me a twenty and
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: I'll take you to score. Lanigan reached into his pocket
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: and pulled out another Andrew Jackson Price had do him business,
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: and the woman stuck the money down her bra and
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: began to walk up a set of old stairs. She stopped,
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: turned back, emotioned at Lannigan and Josh should follow, and
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: Landinggan could feel it already, the rush, the high, the escape.
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: They reached the second floor, where the woman knocked on
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: a wooden door. It opened and no sooner had Lanigan
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: and Josh stepped inside. The three dudes, big dudes, leaped
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: at them, chests out and ten up. The fuck is
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: he doing here? One of the guys yelled, are you
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: a fucking cop? Lanigan had never been accused of being
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: a cop before, but then he realized he wasn't being accused.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: They're all staring at Josh Hamie. Shit, Lannigan thought, looking
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: at his friend through the eyes of a parent nod
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: drug dealer. Yeah, he could see it. Josh had a
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: nark written all over him. Look, man, we're not cops,
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: Lanigan said, trying to diffuse the situation and get his
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: fix and get out. You may not be a cop,
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: but he is motherfucker. Landing and panicked, and Josh slowly
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: began to reach for his back pocket, which is where
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: as Landing and knew he kept his switchblade. Shit. All
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: three of these mean looking bastards were no doubt strapped.
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: If Josh snapped open his blade, they were fucked. Landing
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: and put his hand on Josh's shoulder has to say
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: cool it, clingings to it, and then calmly addressed the room.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: Excuse me, gentlemen, but I think we've made a mistake.
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: We will see ourselves out. You're fucking right, you will,
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: old man. Take your bitch ass cop with you now.
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: Lannigan and Josh were back out on the streets of
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: Rockford for dollars lighter with no direction home. They'd been
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: dropped off in this neighborhood earlier and had no idea
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: which way was out, so they started walking up the
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: road apiece. Lannigan spotted some dudes loitering under a broken streetlight.
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: Definitely looked like they were holding and he still had
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: a few bucks on him, so he told Josh to
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: hang tight for one minute and went to score. Josh
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: stood stone solid, watching helplessly, and before Lannigan could say
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: anything that the guys he hoped had what he so
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: desperately needed, he heard footsteps come up on him fast
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: from behind, and then the feeling of cold steel pressed
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: into the back of his neck, followed by the sound
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: of a pistol cocking. Keep walking caught. Lannigan wasn't running now,
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: but he was moving faster away from another potential score.
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: Those early symptoms of dope sickness beginning to set in.
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: Josh Homie was there with him every step of the way,
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: freaking out but trying not to show it. Then headlights
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: a car was making its way toward them, engine humming,
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: the muffler doing God's work. It began to pick up speed,
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: and as it got closer Landinggan and Josh could see
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: the barrel of a gun hanging out the rear driver's
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: side window. They had no time to react. The car
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: was rumbling directly past them now and the kid holding
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: the gun was squeezing the trigger and suddenly, landing In
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: and Josh were sprayed with water, standing there soaking wet,
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: the car's tail lights fading into the night. Landing and
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: Josh laughed. It was the only appropriate response to thinking
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: you were just about to lose your life on some
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: back end street in Cheap Tricks hometown, only to find
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: out that the joke was on you. Moments later, Hommy
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: went quiet, his smile fading, and he said, if you
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: ever do that to me again, I'll fucking kill you.
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: Josh Hami did not kill Mark Lanigan, but a few
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: years later he did hire him as a secondary lead
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: singer in his new band, Queens of the Stone Age
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: being asked to join Queens. In the year two thousand,
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: when Lanagan was thirty six and at a personal and
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: professional crossroads, it saved his life. And I'm not being
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: hyperbolic here either. Let me set the scene. Screaming trees
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: had finally broken up, but not before that close call
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: in Rockford, Illinois some years prior had gone full blown
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: bad omen and Lannigan was robbed in Amsterdam at knife
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: point while trying to score. And then in London it
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: happened again, only this time Lanigan's old school captain Limp Dick,
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: defying fight or flight instincts kicked in and he beat
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: the living shit out of this would be mugger. And
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: when he got home to Seattle, he was broke his
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: phone and his electricity had been shut off. And before
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: he got himself evicted, he was frantically cooking up batches
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: of cracked cocaine that he could sell for a few
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: bucks on a Coleman propaying camping stove. Soon he was homeless,
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: sleeping under a tarp near the freeway. Lannigan was then
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: saved not once, not twice, but three times, first by
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: Courtney Love, his unexpected benefactor who put up cash when
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: Lannigan needed it most, just like Kurt used to do
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: back in the day. She paid for Lannigan to live
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: at drug treatment facilities and halfway houses in California for
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: nearly a year so that he could get clean. Next
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: by Seattle resident Duff McKagan, bass player for Guns N' Roses,
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: his unexpected sponsor who helped Lannikin get back on his
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: feet as the caretaker of his two houses. And then
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: by Josh Hami and Queen's the Stone Age, his unexpected
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: new boss who gave Lanagan a new creative Lisan life.
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: Not to mention a great gig, Lannigan used to say
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: that being in Queen's was the best because he only
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: had to be the center of attention for one third
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: of a show. And following his brief but impactful tenure
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: with Queens of the Stone Age, Mark Lanigan continued making
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: great solo records and continued to find inspired collaborations with
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: Greg Dooley, the Afghan Wigs, and Isabelle Campbell of Belle
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: and Sebastian, and with soul savers Moby and Uncle. He
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: was the go to guy for discerning musicians and their
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: fans with a voice like top shelf bourbon, and it
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: was a voice that only comes around once in a
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: great while. You can't learn that voice or teach it.
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: It's just always been inside you, just like your attraction
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: to violence and hard drugs and conversely to close fellowship
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: with those who get you and are worthy of your
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: good graces. It's all part of what makes you so authentic,
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: for better and for worse, because above all else, inauthenticity
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: is the greatest sin. And to that end, you find
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: yourself in a bar in New York one night after
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: a show and someone taps you on the shoulder. You
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: turn around, you take a drag off your lucky strike
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: and narrow your eyes. Mark do you know Matt Dylan?
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: And the actor sticks out his hand to shake yours,
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: says he's a big fan. Yeah, thanks, man. You don't
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: have much beyond that to say to him. So you
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: stand there, smoking your cigarette and feeling awkward. Nothing personal.
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: But every time you see this guy, all you can
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: picture is him wearing that stupid wig and that stupid
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: movie that turned your friends into a cartoon and screwed
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: your band out of thousands of dollars. Someone else catches
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: Dylan's attention and he turns his head away from you,
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: and as he does, you drop what's left of your
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: lit cigarette and Dylan's suit jacket pucket, and it begins
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: to smolder. And then Dylan's jacket catches fire and he's
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: wildly stamping out the flames with his hands, now looking
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: around to see who did this to him. But you're
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: long gone out the door, onto the sidewalk, and there
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: but for the grace of God, into the emptiness.
• 33:17
  Speaker 2: I'm Jake Brennan in This is Disgraceland.
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: All right, hope you dug this episode. Apple podcast listeners,
• 33:36
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• 33:38
  Speaker 1: never missed an episode of Disgraceland. This week's question of
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: the week, Guys, who is your favorite but most underrated
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: rock star? Is it Mark Lanigan? Is it someone else?
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: I want to know who, and I want to know
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: why you love them?
• 33:51
  Speaker 3: Hit me up voicemail and text six one seven nine
• 33:54
  Speaker 3: oh six sixty six three.
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: Eight and let me know. I can also be reached
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: on Instagram, Facebook, x at, disgrace sampod and disgracelampod at
• 34:02
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• 34:04
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• 34:07
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• 34:11
  Speaker 3: Disgraceland was created by Yours Truly and is produced in
• 34:14
  Speaker 3: partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for this episode can be
• 34:17
  Speaker 3: found on the show notes page at disgracelampod dot com.
• 34:21
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• 34:24
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• 34:25
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• 35:00
  Speaker 1: Slam Pod, rock a Rolla.
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: He's a bad, bad man.