The photo is of me and my friends before an INXS concert in 1984. I want to introduce the people in it. Jess is not in the photo because she was taking it. I met Jess through Terri. Terri is third from the left, wearing the purple shirt. Terri and I met in the seventh grade when I moved to Hillsdale, New Jersey. Jess, Terri and I met a few years later because of a mutual interest in soccer and the New York Cosmos. Jess lived in Wayne, New Jersey.
Jess, Susan (fourth from the left, between Terri and me), and Dana (far right, wearing the Relax t-shirt) can be seen in the Wham documentary that is on Netflix. add link? They are in the footage from an autograph signing at Sam Goody at the Willowbrook Mall in New Jersey. I was at school in Philadelphia, so I wasn’t there.
Maria, first on the left in the photo, was a fan of Kirk Pengilly, same as me. We met her at an INXS concert earlier in 1984. I think we also met Susan at a different INXS concert or maybe she was a friend of Dana’s. I don’t remember. Dana had some kind of INXS fan club going. I think it was called INXS Alliance. We either met her because of that or at an INXS concert. Jess, Terri, and Dana all saw INXS open for Adam Ant at St. John’s University in April of 1983 and met members of the band but I don’t think they met each other.
Jen, second from the right, lived in Tampa, Florida which is where Terri went to college. Jen also had an interest in soccer and music. I don’t know how Terri and Jen met. It’s possible that they were pen pals long before Terri went to Florida.
What I remember most about the day Terri, Jess and I went to the Ritz to see INXS in concert was how tired and uncomfortable I was. We didn’t just go there for the show. We went early (around 3pm) and waited on the steps in front of the Ritz for the band to show up for soundcheck.
My mother’s future second husband owned the Ho-Ho-Kus Bakery and he gave me a job there during the summer between high school and my freshman year of college. Now I had just come back home from finishing freshman year of college and I worked at the bakery that morning from 6am until 1pm.
We were eating while sitting on the steps when INXS showed up for soundcheck. Tim Farriss, the guitarist, said, “Are you having a picnic?” I was wearing a sleeveless shirt with a blue diamond pattern and long pants. Jon Farriss, the drummer, looked me up and down when he passed me and he said, “Hi!” I said, “Hi!” back. I didn’t mind because I thought Jon Farriss was the best-looking and sexiest guy in the band. But we weren’t there for that. Nothing else happened as far as I can remember.
The band left and we still had hours to wait. I had to pee, so we pleaded with the doorman to let us in to use the bathroom. When I got in there I couldn’t go. Either my bladder was shy, or I was holding it too long. I couldn’t stay in there for long so I went back outside and had to wait a few more hours before I could try again. It was not fun. I thought I damaged something in my body.
We were first in line so when the doors opened, we took spots up against the stage. We still had to wait for a while. I was able to use the bathroom successfully. What a relief! We met another girl named Donna- Donna B while we were waiting for the show to start. We went to future shows with her too and she is also part of my story.
First the opening act, New Models, took the stage. I was so tired that I put my head down on the stage while they were playing. I was oblivious until Terri tapped my arm and told me to get up. I looked up to find the lead singer jumping up and down two inches from my head. I think he was trying to wake me up.
INXS came on and I listened and watched- no sleeping. They were good. I liked them. A couple of times when Michael Hutchence, the lead singer, was in front of me, I touched the top of his shoe with my index finger. No screaming, nothing crazy, just a tap with my finger.
Later on during the show, Michael drank some water from a glass Tropicana orange juice bottle and then handed it to me. I was thirsty so I drank some water and then passed the bottle to Terri. She drank and then passed the bottle to Jess and she drank. They passed the bottle back to me and I drank the rest of the water and then kept the bottle as a souvenir. I threw the bottle away a few years later.
We hung around near the stage after the show and the band came out onto the floor. I don’t remember anything about that except that Kirk Pengilly (guitar, vocals, saxophone) was standing around and I took a close look at the back of his head. He had very short hair in back and there were zig zag designs cut into his hair there. He turned around and said, “Hi!” I said hi and told him that I liked his haircut. He said, “thanks.”
I have no idea what time it was exactly, but I would have been awake for close to 24 hours at that point. I don’t know how long it took me to write anything down from this night. If I was really busy, I would just jot down notes and not write out the whole story until later. I was probably too tired to remember much. Maybe Terri or Jess talked to some of them. I don’t remember. We made it back to New Jersey without incident. I don’t remember who drove. I just know it wasn’t me because I didn’t have a car. I could use my mother’s car to drive to work but that’s it. Terri had her own car- a little Datsun, back when those existed!
