The Official Leif Garrett Website

The Birmingham News (City Scene section: Cover Story)
Birmingham, AL
Friday, October 26, 2001

LEIF'S FATE: TEEN IDOL LEIF GARRETT IS BACK SINGING AGAIN AND NOW HE HAS A NEW BAND, F8
By Mary Colurso
News staff writer

Once again, he's turning over a new Leif. Let's not get all botanical about this, but former teen idol Leif Garrett, 39, is bringing his recently formed rock band, F8, to Birmingham.

The four-member group, which has been together about six months, will perform tonight at the Boiler Room after opening act Lynam.

F8 (a skewed spelling of the word "fate") is on a mini-tour of the South, testing its repertoire and figuring out just how this music collaboration is going to work.

"It's a cross between Led Zeppelin, early Elton John and Stone Temple Pilots," Garrett explains during a phone interview. "All new stuff, all new material. I wrote all the lyrics and vocal melodies. Then the band took over and wrote the rest. I like to think our songs have journeys in them. They lyrics are very personal to me."

Garrett says he used word-of-mouth and instinct when recruiting players, finally settling on bassist Darrell Arnold, drummer Chuck Billings and guitarist Karl D'Amico. Their songs-about an hour's worth of music, D'Amico says-include "All I Need" and "Promise Me."

According to a popular internet site, www.leifgarrettfans.com, F8 also hammered out a hard-edged remake of Garrett's 1970's disco smash, "I Was Made for Dancin'."

"F8 really kicked!!!!," says a message-board posting by a fan named Leslie, who saw the group perform at the Canyon Club in Dallas. "I dragged my boyfriend with me and even he enjoyed the show."

F8 began touring on Oct. 19, Garrett says, and will conclude its maiden voyage at the beginning of November. Southern stops are on the agenda mostly because bassist Arnold is from Jackson, Miss; he touted several nightclubs in Dixieland.

"I think people are nicer between the two coasts," guitarist D'Amico says. "You get a more jaded audience in the bigger cities."

Although the band members insist their music is legit, congenial audiences are exactly what they need right now. F8 is untested, untried, unrecorded-and, except for Garrett, these performers have a name recognition factor of zilch.

"It's risky, but we're doing it an old-school way," D'Amico says. "At first, Leif didn't even want his name out there as part of the band."

Garrett, understandably, says he'd like to shed his image as a poster boy past his prime. The singer readily admits he'll probably always fight for legitimacy in the music world, although his uphill battle is "less of a steep grade these days."

Also, Garrett's struggle with drug addiction has been well documented in the press, especially after a revealing episode of VH1's Behind The Music a couple of years ago.

On that biographical show, Garrett detailed his substance-abuse problems and discussed a tragic car wreck that left his best friend at the time, Roland Winkler, paralyzed from the waist down. A court battle ensued; the two became estranged for many years.

Garrett professed to be clean and sober on TV, but he was arrested for cocaine and heroin possession shortly after the show aired. Then, in August 1999, he entered a pricey detox and rehab program at a Beverly Hills company called the Institute.

"A couple of really tragic things happened in my life, including the death of someone close to me, and I used that as an excuse to become numb again," Garrett says. "Getting busted was a wake-up call. I was a slave to drugs and I wanted to stop. Also, going cold turkey is one thing; going to jail and becoming Bubba's love slave is another."

In conversation, Garrett's voice sounds like he's smoked too many cigarettes, but he's candid, agreeable and not at all defensive about sensitive personal questions.

"There are so many rumors and lies surrounding my life. I figure the truth will set you free," he says. "I'm very bottom line. Why waste time telling, thinking of and remembering lies?"

One thing he does hold in reserve, however, is what he and Winkler talked about in an emotional encounter during the filming of Behind The Music, when a choked-up Garrett asked the crew to nix the camera.

"That's just between us," he says. "It'll always be between us. That was our moment. I'm keeping it to myself because everything else was so exposed."

Positive exposure

Some positive public exposure would please the guys in F8, all of whom express optimism about joining Garrett in his latest project. The music business is extremely fickle, and Garrett's track record is mighty spotty. However, the three are experienced pros who say they appreciate Garrett's grassroots, do-it-yourself attitude.

"He wants us to do whatever comes naturally," D'Amico says. "It's a very organic approach. This is as far from corporate rock as you can get."

All describe Garrett as a democratic frontman-Thomas Jefferson in a bandanna, so to speak-who regards his band as a partnership of equals.

"There are no chiefs here; we're all Indians," says drummer Billings, who has known Garrett for 23 years. "Or make that, we're all chiefs."

Garrett uses another metaphor, saying he feels no need to put on the spiky collar of an alpha dog. Peace is his watchword, so he uses his status only to advise other musicians on the joys and perils of fame.

"I'm freer and more aware of myself than I've ever been", he says. "I'm keeping busy. I have the most loyal fans. And I'm finally getting to do the music I've always wanted to do."

OH, LEIF, THIS IS YOUR LIFE!

Here are a few more things about Leif Garrett:

· He was born Leif (say it "Layf," not "Leef") Per Garrett on Nov. 8, 1961, in Hollywood. In a couple of weeks, he will 40.

· His mother, Carolyn Stellar, was an actress and script writer. She split from her husband when Leif was a child.

· Garrett's sister, Dawn Lyn, played Dodie on the TV series My Three Sons from 1969-1972.

· His acting resume includes the movies Walking Tall, The Outsiders, Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, Cheerleader Camp, Thunder Alley, Party Line, Delta Fever, Shaker Run, The Banker, The Spirit of '76, Skateboard, Diamonte Lobo and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band..

· In 1975, a one-year run on the TV series Three For The Road helped Garrett catapult to stardom.

· He made television appearances on Family Affair, Gunsmoke, The Odd Couple, Family and CHiPs.

· In 1996, he made a cameo in Suddenly Susan, playing himself in an episode called "The Wish List."

· His first love was actress Nicolette Sheridan, with whom he had a torrid relationship from 1979 through 1985. Garrett also dated actress Justine Bateman in the late '80s and early '90s. In 1999, his girlfriend of five years died of a heart problem.

· His discography: Leif Garrett, Atlantic, 1977; Can't Explain, Atlantic, 1978; Same Goes For You, Scotti Bros., 1979; My Movie of You, Scotti Bros., 1981. Scotti Bros. also released The Leif Garrett Collection in 1998.

· His biggest music hit was the 1970s disco single, "I Was Made for Dancin'." However, Garrett also released successful, sugary remakes of "Surfin' USA," "Put Your Head On My Shoulder" and "The Wanderer."

· In 2000, he sang on a cover of Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" on the Melvins CD The Crybaby. The Melvins, as you may recall, recently opened for Tool at Pelham's Oak Mountain Amphitheatre.

· Before his current band, F8, Garrett fronted a group called Godspeed. IT broke up in 2000, after playing dates that included the Rhino RetroFest in Santa Monica, Calif.

· Last year, he appeared on stage in National Theater of the Deaf's production of A Child's Christmas In Wales at Seven Angels Theatre in Waterbury, Conn.

· Memorabilia bearing his likeness can be bought on eBay. A recent scan of the auction site included a jigsaw puzzle, videos, posters, 45s, albums, clippings, pins, tour programs and vintage copies of teen magazines such as Tiger Beat.

· An expanded "director's cut" of Garrett's Behind The Music episode for VH1 will be broadcast Sunday at 3 p.m. It includes a half-hour of previously unreleased footage and clips with his new band, F8.