Who The Fuck is

Raz Cue

Back in 1985, a little ol’ band called Guns N’ Roses formed in my living room. And thus, I became the band’s first manager. For the remainder of the decade, I witnessed the iconic band tour the world’s stages as they rose to the pinnacle of rock ‘n’ roll. Add a crippling spinal injury during high school, through rehabilitation into a life of riding a wheelchair, my story just keeps rolling along.

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How I Learned to Love L.A: 1965-74

February 1965 – a baby boy they called Rached entered this world ass-first, screaming like thunder. Not from the smack on my bottom, but because the doctor yanked me from a warm, moist environment I had grown quite fond of. My resistance

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These Were the Best Days of My Youth: 1975-78

We rented a place at “Our Town Apartments.” The mega-complex, billed as “A Place for Kids and Their Families,” sat right across the street from Orange Coast College. It sported a community center with pool tables, swimming pool, BBQs, and a “Teen

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A Fourteen-Year-Old Boy Has Great Plan: 1979

A day later, I sprang from Ma’s Kawasaki KZ 750 twin, semi-eager to enroll at my newest school. Ralph Waldo Emerson Junior High boasts several illustrious alumni, but a girl named Norma Jeane Baker attended decades before me and tops the list.

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How to Survive Behind The Orange Curtain: 1980

A midnight drive south in Pops’ Lincoln Mark V delivered a far scruffier Raz back behind the Orange Curtain. We hadn’t spoken the entire – year and a half, six schools, and felony conviction – time I lived with Ma, so we

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How To Face Life Head First: 1980

Monday afternoon, I caught a downtown bus to grab my final paycheck. It was far less tense with Pops away, so I hung out long enough to burn a few bowls and shoot the shit with the kitchen guys. In case he

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How I Gained a Whole New Perspective in 1981

And so, back to the real world to witness years fly by from a seated position. Pops’ newest house had a pool in the backyard, which my therapists thought was great. By simultaneously providing buoyancy and resistance, pool therapy is the best

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How to Meet Super Famous People: 1982

Shortly after 1982’s first hangover subsided, Ma’s kind friend, Robin, let me have her super-cheap, street-level, one-bedroom apartment. Three days before my seventeenth birthday, I got my own pad to come and go as I pleased. The place was a block from

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How to Believe You’ve Become a Man: 18 in 83

Pops must’ve climbed into his van right after hanging up, because he was at my door within the hour. He didn’t bring the much-needed firearm, instead suggesting I flee and move in with him. It was obvious that getting the fuck away

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Open G is The Best Tuning For Air Guitar: 1984

The outstanding Ian Gillian, of Deep Purple fame, banded together with Black Sabbath to put out a kick-ass metal record, Born Again. A few weeks into 1984, Mike and me went to enjoy that evil shit live at the Long Beach Arena.

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How to Start a Fire Using Hundred Dollar Bills

Barely a month after my chat with a top-ten all-time-great rock god, Ronnie James Dio, my lawyer called to report two of five opposing parties were offering to settle my lawsuit. For two hundred and fifty grand, all I needed to do

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How To Convince Axl Rose to Join L.A. Guns

About two weeks later, I got a call from Mr. Axl Rose himself. He didn’t beat around the bush. Right after a hello, he straight-out asked, “Is L.A. Guns still looking for a singer?” We met up to have a few drinks

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How to Squander a Shot at the Big Time: More 84

Six days after Axl Rose departed L.A. Guns, Ronald Regan earned a second presidential term with the largest electoral vote landslide victory in United States history. Maybe it just seemed like it because I was nineteen, but times were good in a

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How to Make Ten Bucks In The Music Business: 1985

My freelance music-business school courses depleted my settlement funds at a pace comparable to lighting up blunts using hundred dollar bills. I invested in the wind and blew through eighty-five grand in six months. Plus, when there’s a dude selling killer blow

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How to Get Invited to Guns ‘N’ Roses First Show

Shortly after that Iron Maiden concert, Izzy and Axl regrouped Hollywood Rose for a one-off gig at Dancing Waters. The South Bay club featured an actual waterfall cascading down behind the stage, but I never actually saw it because the joint wasn’t

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The Guns N’ Roses You Know N’ Love: 1985

Axl only had one guitarist in mind. But Izzy expressed a desire to explore all options, in hopes of finding an older, more established musician. Axl remained steadfast and eventually convinced Izzy to at least invite Slash over to talk music, and

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A New L.A. Guns Steps Up to Challenge GNR: 1985

Whatever Tracii Guns believed he had going on, right after getting the boot from G N’ R, never panned out. After a few months of sitting around twiddling his thumbs, one afternoon he dropped by my house to tell me he formed

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The Very First Steps to Becoming Infamous: 1986

Guns N’ Roses pulled a capacity crowd into the Troubadour on the first Saturday night of 1986. Along with a first-ever opportunity for fans to purchase Guns N’ Roses T-shirts, club goers also heard and felt the “My Michelle” debut. For months,

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When Guns N’ Roses Were Brand New: 1987

By the start of 87, The Wild were also long gone from their Gardner Street studio. All the cool 24/7 parties moved to Orange Street, right around the corner from the iconic Chinese Theater. A recent building boom had produced several mostly-wheelchair-accessible,

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How to Get a Thrill That Will Get You: 1988

After months of relentless touring, G N’ R earned themselves a little time off. At the start of 1988, they returned to Hollywood as conquering heroes and were without a doubt the new band with the biggest buzz in the business. But

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How to Become a Legend in Twelve Steps: 1989

I don’t know if it was something I did or said, but Axl never again called or gave me his phone number. I wasn’t officially blacklisted, and never had an issue getting show tickets and passes. Plus, whenever I ran into Axl,

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How I Learnt to Love the Normies: 1986-89

Theoretically, this book is about me, so let’s jump back to 1986 and right after Guns N’ Roses signed with Geffen Records. While they were busy conquering the universe, I was living my version of a normal life. I turned twenty-one, so

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How to Make it Big in Show Business: 1989

So there I was, dicking along in life, figuring my embarrassing juvenile criminal record automatically sealed upon the day I turned eighteen. Wrong! One needed to apply and then have a hearing before a judge. A year after beginning the process, I

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How to End It All on a High Note

While I was still in the music business, I attempted to purchase a music rehearsal studio. I couldn’t secure financing, but remained confident the bank got it wrong. Then, during my open-mic career, while still believing I was to be the next

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Rap, Uncle Ted & The Rock Hall of Fame

“Rap overtakes rock as the most popular genre among music fans,” shouted a 2018 USA Today headline. Born on the streets of 1970’s inner-city America, the influential genre has dispatched to second place the formally dominant, seemingly immortal art form known as

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