This One Time, at Rock Camp… Rock N’ Roll Fantasy Camp Wants to Make Your Air-Guitar Dreams Come True for Only $6,000 – Groupies Not Included
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Playboy Magazine By David Peisner This One Time, At Rock Camp… Rock n’ Roll Fantasy Camp wants to make your air-guitar dreams come true for only $6,000 – groupies not included I have convinced myself that the final night of Rock n’ Roll Fantasy Camp is no big deal, no difference from putting on a skit with my cabin mates when I was nine. But this isn’t the stage at Camp Winnawoka, it’s the Bottom Line, a world-famous club in Manhattan. And this isn’t a marshmallow on a stick in my hand; it’s a bass guitar, on which I am expected shortly to accompany camp counselor Roger Daltrey. Yes, that Roger Daltrey. Probably best not to dwell on the fact that I’d never picked up a bass before three days ago. “Hellooo, New York City!” the emcee howls, raising an expectant cheer from the standing-room only crowd. “Are you ready?” For those about to rock, we beg your forgiveness. Stratocasters and fanny packs Rock n’ Roll Fantasy Camp is the brainchild of concert promoter David Fishof. Decades ago, baseball fantasy camps proved that rich, paunchy sports fans would pay top dollar to play catch with rich, paunchy ex-athletes. Fishof applied the idea to music, creating a place where people could “eat, sleep and live rock and roll.” The first RRFC, held in 1997 in Miami, lost money, but Fishof revived the camp in Los Angeles last year, and now he’s brought it to New York City. While financial riches have so far proved elusive, the rock-camp concept has found its way onto pop culture’s ultimate barometer: The Simpsons. During Homer’s stint at camp, his counselors are a who’s who of rock royalty, including Mick Jagger, Tom Petty and Elvis Costello. Fishof’s roll call is somewhat less awe-inspiring: From the website touting RRFC 2003, I learn that this year’s musical director is Mark Rivera, a Brooklynite who blows sax in Billy Joel’s band. Among the 20 or so hands-on counselors are aging classic rockers such as Mountain guitarist Leslie West, Bad Company drummer Simon Kirke and Jack Blades, bassist-singer from hair-metal heroes Night Ranger. While those names don’t mean much to anyone who didn’t spend the 1970’s and 1980’s obsessing over liner notes, some bigger guns are also scheduled to appear, including Grand Funk Railroad frontman Mark Farner, Ramones drummer Marky Ramone, Kiss guitarist Ace Frehley and one bona fide superstar: Daltrey, the Who’s golden-voiced god. Legend has it that bluesman Robert Johnson bought his talents from the devil at the price of his soul. In 2003, music glory still isn’t a bargain. To put an average joe in touch with his inner rock star, RRFC charges $5,995 for five days – not including travel or lodging. As I sit in a cab, zigzagging through Manhattan toward the camp’s headquarters in the Hudson Hotel, I prepare for two distinct possibilities: the fulfillment of a teenage fantasy, or utter humiliation that could take years to forget. Certainly I’m feeling skeptical about the prospect of an authentic experience being delivered at any price. Rock and capitalism have a long, contentious relationship, and lately rock has been getting its ass kicked. In an age when the Clash’s punk anthem “London Calling” sells Jaguars, rock seems to have outlived its mission statement of rebellion. The Hudson is one of those boutique jobs too trendy for obvious signage, so I sneak a peek at the front-desk stationery just to make sure I’m in the right place. I’m told registration is on the third floor. When the elevator opens I’m besieged. “Hey, how was your trip? What’s your name?” yelps a caffeinated middle-aged woman in a Rock n’ Roll Fantasy Camp T-shirt. “Let’s get you a name tag.” She hands me a tote bag and turns me over to impressively busty, bottle-blonde twins armed with a camera. I’m ordered to stand against the wall and smile. I do. A photo is taken for a laminated badge. I’m then ushered into an eggshell-colored conference room where other attendees are already auditioning. In back, Rivera sits behind a long table, jotting notes that will help him divide the 78 registered campers into nine bands. In front, Blades, Farner, Peter Frampton keyboardist Bobby Mayo and Billy Joel drummer Liberty DeVitto set up to accompany the auditions. Campers perch on metal chairs, honing their chops, suitably intimidated by this firing-squad-style arrangement. Any hopes that camp might deliver a Dionysian cocktail of sex, drugs, and rock and roll are quashed as I survey my fellow campers. The dominant demographic here is male and balding, with a heavy concentration of lawyers, salesmen and guys from New Jersey. Some are more enthusiastic than others. Craig Langweiler is a 48-year-old stockbroker from suburban Philadelphia who bears a striking resemblance to Paul Shaffer. Langweiler stands front and center, clapping along through most of the auditions. At one point he even joins in on harmonica. If there’s a guy Fishof had in mind when he conceived Rock n’ Roll Fantasy Camp, Langweiler is that guy. “To play harp with Mark Rivera and Liberty DeVitto is about as good as it gets,” Langweiler tells me. “I guess playing with Billy Joel would be like sex. This is the foreplay.” Not everyone here fits the same mold, though. I spot a few pimply teenagers and about a dozen women. Shana Golden, 30 (by her reckoning), is a Vegas showgirl who won a contest to attend the camp. She’s sitting in the corner, strumming a white Stratocaster, with sheet music spread in front of her. “It’s all because of Roger Daltrey,” she says. “I heard about the camp on the radio. If his name wasn’t mentioned I just would’ve gone, ‘Oh that’s cute.’ But I said, ‘Oh my god, I have to try.’” The thing most campers here do have in common is that they can play. As I listen to accountants rip through the guitar solo in “Mississippi Queen” and orthopedists pound out the beat to “Won’t Get Fooled Again,” I’m reminded that I can’t. My musical history is a chronicle of abandoned piano lessons, ditched school band concerts and a guitar that’s been gathering dust in my closet for several years. They call my number, and someone hands me a top-of-the-line Gretsch hollow-body guitar courtesy of the house. It doesn’t help; I butcher “All Along the Watchtower.” After the last sour note peters out, Rivera says, “Great job! It’s gonna be a fun week.” He actually sounds sincere. I head to my room and inspect the registration materials more closely. Each day’s schedule looks the same: breakfast, band practice, lunch, band practice, dinner, “celebrity” jam session. Planned activities run from 9 A.M. to 11 P.M., with little downtime. Oddly I don’t find the sheet that lists sessions such as Advanced Hotel-Suite Destruction, How to Use Your Coke Habit as a Tax Write-Off and Management of Nubile Groupies. Dirty Deeds, Not Dirt Cheap My audition debacle weighs on me early next morning as I trudge into a gray rehearsal space to meet my freshly selected bandmates. I’m resigned to being the worst musician in the entire camp, destined to spend four days slapping a tambourine against my hip a la Linda McCartney. So it’s a relief when I discover seven campers nearly as hopeless as I am. The first guy I meet is Andy Oringer, a 45-year-old attorney from Long Island. He’s one of two drummers in our group and our most experienced rocker, having played a law firm party. Of our five guitarists, not one has ever been onstage. Our only real talent is Ryan Bruch, a gangly 16-year-old keyboardist from Roanoke, Virginia. Ricky Byrd, a mop coiffed former guitarist for Joan Jett and the Blackhearts, is the counselor responsible for whipping us into shape. He hands us each an autographed photo and a copy of his solo CD, then asks, “Does anyone sing or play bass?” Silence. Despite never having attempted either, I offer to do both. Another guitarist, Lori Interrant, 42, a frizzy-haired data-entry clerk from Queens, New York who enrolled in the camp after winning the lottery, volunteers to sing. Our lineup is cemented. “What do you wanna play?” Byrd asks, to a chorus of non-committal murmurs. “Okay, let’s try ‘All Right Now’ by Free.” I guffaw, concerned I won’t be able to keep up on bass. “Don’t worry,” Byrd says. “It’s just like playing guitar, but easier. It’s got two less strings.” “But I can’t really play guitar, either.” “Even better.” Later I catch a van ride to lunch with Langweiler, the harmonica-playing stockbroker. His enthusiasm comes from experience: In the 1970’s he played music semiprofessionally. “But I decided I needed to make a living and become a family man,” he says. Langweiler wanted to attend last year’s L.A. camp but was too consumed with a divorce. Now he’s a free man. “The whole thing for me is to do what I always wanted to do,” he says. “The Who, Grand Funk – I used to play all that stuff. That was my teenage years.