

“Every rock star who came to Los Angeles wanted to meet her,” model Bebe Buell remembers.

She was barely a teenager when she began attending shows in the early 1970s, quickly making her reputation as one of the leading groupies on Sunset Boulevarde. She's a competent musician, competent in everything she has done.Sable Starr was punk’s Lolita. Onstage, she suggests a mix of Debbie Harry and Mae West. ''I knew she could rock,'' said one publishing executive, ''but I didn't know she could rock.'' Well, yes, if your idea of a rock band is Stephen King and Amy Tan, then Bebe Buell rocks.

Wallerstein adopted the perfect question mark pose with his guitar. Buell went to shuck her gown and put on tight black pants, a leopard thong and a long-sleeved black crop top, ''so I can go crazy onstage,'' she said.
JIMMY PAGE AND BEBE BUELL MOVIE
(His movie ''Almost Famous,'' about a rock groupie, er, muse, is inspired in part by Ms. Jill Brooke, the editor of Avenue magazine, said, ''You almost expect Cameron Crowe to be here.'' Twice. ''I'm on a perpetual quest for air-conditioning,'' she said. She circled the room several times, asking Don Hill himself where the cool spots were. ''I'm going to get out of this dress soon, and get into multiple personalities,'' Ms. (After years of indulgence, she found the one drug she really needed, Zoloft, and gave up everything except Champagne.) Buell announced.Īs the sound system played ''Spill the wine and take that pearl,'' a fan handed her a huge box of Bazooka bubble gum. Buell, 48, who was dressed in an off-the-substantial-shoulder black gown by Ghost, strappy sandals and a necklace she hopes you think is made of diamonds.Ī camera team from ''20/20'' was waiting, along with assorted paparazzi, but the night became a gathering of old friends from the rock world like Hilly Kristal, founder of CBGB, the photographer Marcia Resnick (''I'm in the index,'' she said) and new friends from publishing. Buell arrived for her publication party at Don Hill's, a SoHo rock club she says in her book is ''the only place in New York I knew of that upheld some of the spirit of fabulousness'' of Max's Kansas City.įirst out of her town car was her shaggy-haired fiancé, Jim Wallerstein, a guitarist in the Bebe Buell Band, followed by a huge bodyguard, then Ms. Rather, she calls herself a connoisseur of rock music, an inspiration for lyrics, a companion, someone who might accidentally snort heroin when she thought it was only cocaine but who kept her feet on the ground except, that is, when she was in bed. Buell asserts that she was not a groupie. Buell's book is about the many liaisons she recalls with rock and movie stars, including David Bowie, Iggy Pop, Lou Reed, Rod Stewart, Jack Nicholson and Warren Beatty, and is loaded with pictures to prove it. Listen to some of the best new recordings here.īut mostly Ms.
