 
|
|||||||||||||
              
|
Fans get within a Stones' throw, but only a few get autographs
Thursday, March 11, 1999 By Dennis B. Roddy, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
Flanked by bodyguards who put the lie to the concert tour's title, "No Security," The Rolling Stones breezed into Pittsburgh, checked in at a Downtown hotel and definitely did not leave a 7 a.m. wake-up call.
The quintessential 1960s rock 'n' roll band, famous for loud playing and raucous living, has a concert tonight at the Civic Arena, their third appearance in Pittsburgh since 1989. Thirty years ago, their arrival would have been a scene of pandemonium.
Last night, the band's four official members, backing musicians and their entourage breezed past 11 - count 'em, 11 - autograph seekers, several of them professional memorabilia dealers. Security personnel at the Westin William Penn easily picked off intruders as they tried to slide into the ornate lobby of the landmark hotel, intent on getting everything signed from dark ages vinyl albums to a drumhead.
A handful got autographs. Most got shown the door.
"This close," moaned a young man who slid into the hotel lobby with a white Fender guitar under his coat. He was hoping to get lead singer Mick Jagger to sign the thing. "I sat inside for 15 minutes, and they didn't notice. I had the guitar hidden." The young man steadfastly refused to give his name because reselling rock memorabilia is his business. It also made his face regrettably familiar to a few hotel personnel.
Steve Kalinsky, 30, of Uptown, had no more luck than his guitar-smuggling counterpart. He managed to sneak into the hotel with a drum head, hoping to get it signed by some band member.
"No dice," he said. "The head of security kept getting in between me and the members."
Kalinsky brightened a moment and found some solace: "The main thing was, I was able to penetrate the security. I was able to get into the inner-circle."
Yeah, said the kid with the guitar. Right. Then they went home.
Just getting a celebrity through the revolving doors of the hotel last night seemed to require as much choreography as the average production of "Swan Lake." Hotel personnel were alerted to the Stones' impending arrival. A man named Tom Boyer, described as the "risk manager" for the hotel, quietly assigned his staff places.
People were told to expect the band's arrival when a Lincoln Town Car pulled up.
At least that's what Brian Koerber said. "I have a connection at the hotel," he explained.
Koerber is a stocky, 23-year-old Baldwin Borough man who stood at the corner of Oliver Avenue and William Penn Place, waiting for his moment to pounce. Koerber is famous among hotel security workers for his uncanny ability to locate visiting celebrities and get their autographs.
You name it: the Marriott, the Doubletree, the William Penn. Koerber's been thrown out of some of the best establishments in town and returns with the persistence of a salmon pointed upstream at spawning hour.
He rates the William Penn as one of the less hostile environs, but geographically tough.
"The only reason it's so hard is there are so many exits," he said. "It's a lot easier here than the Marriott or the Doubletree. They'll throw you clear off the property."
Just now, Koerber's biggest obstacle was that Boyer and hotel security staff noticed and remembered him.
"They definitely know me," he shrugged.
And he definitely knows who's moving around Downtown.
While others were setting up stakeouts at the corners of the hotel, Koerber was getting his photo taken with a departing celebrity: Robert Downey Jr. He'd been tipped off, he explained.
"He's a legend," exulted Eugene Poeppert, 23, of Banksville. Poeppert gave Koerber a congratulatory clap on the back.
Originally, the gaggle of celebrity hounds turned up for a 6 p.m. arrival, but the band didn't show until 7 p.m.
When they did, it was a blur of Town Cars - Koerber and his companions had that much right - as well as a large van and then a hard-to-miss bus with the rest of the entourage.
From the edges of the street, the seekers thronged to the edge of the large, red carpet that marked the off-limits zone.
"Charlie, can I please have an autograph?" one young man asked drummer Charlie Watts, the oldest Stone and still its rhythmic foundation at 57.
"Please! Please!" another shouted.
"Keith! Keith!" one wailed as chief guitarist Keith Richards eased past.
Allan Dunn, 53, who gave his hometown as "not from around here," had the most original plaintive request: "Keith, will you sign please? For us peons! For us peons!"
Dunn's album went unsigned.
It remained for Bill Harper and Richard LaMark to emerge from last night's ceremonies looking, well, cool.
Harper, from Dormont, and LaMark, from the South Hills, drove two of the limousines and seemed as unfazed as two middle-years guys could be after ferrying world-weary celebs from airport to hotel.
Harper had Ron Wood, Richards' co-guitarist, in his car. Wood had noticed Three Rivers Stadium and told Harper, "We played there."
LaMark, who turns 76 next week, was natty in a snap-brim cap and described his passenger, Jagger, as "very cordial. Talked about the weather."
Music wouldn't have been quite the subject to strike up enroute to the hotel. LaMark has no Stones albums.
"None," he said.
Not even "Get Yer Ya-Yas Out?"
"None," he said.
Not "Goat's Head Soup?"
LaMark gave that "you-made-that-up-didn't-you" look.
Not "Let it Bleed"?
"Not even that one," he said.
LaMark's tastes, as he put it, are "generally classical." By that, he means the old masters: Streisand, Sinatra and Tony Bennett.
Now, those guys knew how to get their ya-yas out.
|
||||||||||||
