TWISTED SISTER Guitarist Jay Jay French - "Dee Snider Is Extremely Unsocial, Antisocial, So Is Mark Mendoza"
January 22, 2010, 14 years ago
Sleaze Roxx has issued a new interview with TWISTED SISTER guitarist Jay Jay French. The following is an excerpt from the interview, conducted by Kathy F.:
Q: You've been quoted as saying that joining a rock and roll band saved your life. Many people have had the opposite experience, why did you feel that way?
A: "Because I went through a period in my life that was unusual. People may assume we are in our forties. I'm in my late 50's, so I was a 60's kid and had endured a lot of the insanity that went with the 60's. I needed to escape New York City and make myself over again, and I needed to find people who had no idea who I was. I reinvented myself completely and these guys in New Jersey, who became Twisted Sister, had no idea about my past. One of the things that I didn't want to do was drink or do any drugs whatsoever. When I joined I told them I was straight and they didn't care one way or the other. They were all alcoholics, but I didn't have any pier pressure. It is the ultimate irony that I was straight prior to the band and didn't do anything after that."
Q: So you didn't party hardy back in the day?
A: "No never. I've had 5 beers my whole life, and as the band evolved we were pretty unsociable so we never partied together. Dee Snider is extremely unsocial, antisocial, so is Mark Mendoza. I don't think we were ever together socially more than 10 times in the entire history of the band."
Read the full interview at this location.
