Interview: Pamela Des Barres

Photo Courtesy of Pamela Des Barres

On November 8, Pamela Des Barres will perform her one-woman show at New York City’s Triad Theater, giving fans a chance to hear some of her amazing life stories straight from her own mouth. As the self-proclaimed “World’s Most Famous Groupie,” she has had unrivaled access to some of the most famous musicians in rock and roll: she has dated, befriended, or worked with everyone from The Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, The Who, The Doors, The Byrds, and Gram Parsons. She has also been a musician herself, as a member of The GTOs (whose 1969 album Permanent Damage was produced by Frank Zappa). In 1987, she published her memoir, I’m with the Band: Confessions of a Groupie, which was so successful that it has remained in print ever since, proving that her story continues to fascinate readers across the generations. Calling from Los Angeles – the city where her story began, and where she still lives – Des Barres is upbeat, insightful, and candid as she tells The Big Takeover about her show and her many endeavors as an author, instructor, podcaster, and more.

Without giving too much away, what can people expect when they come to see you at this show?

PAMELA DES BARRES: I tell a lot of stories about my life and that heyday of rock and roll. I read out of the book – very specific stories about very specific people, and my time in the GTOs. Whenever I read, I never know what I’m going to say. It just triggers stuff, and I start talking during the reading. People just love the idea that someone who’s still alive and able to talk about it was in the middle of this maelstrom of the renaissance of music and sexuality and spirituality. It was a time, really, that’s never coming back. So I take them there. I try to take my audience there with me. It was a time of incredible hope and optimism and joy, which is severely lacking these days. So I think they just want to reminisce with me. We show photos on the screen behind me, and I play a little snippets of music of my boyfriends or my inspirations or my own GTOs or whatever. And so it’s like a one woman show. I think I’ve always wondered if I’d be able to accomplish [this], and I just put it out to the universe that I wanted to do that, and it worked.

How long has it been in the works?

PAMELA DES BARRES: In my mind, probably for five or six years. I would do a lot of readings, and then I’d find myself going off on these little tangents. And I thought, “People seem to enjoy those.” Really, it started in London – about four years ago, I did a show like this, but without the photos and song cues. And I thought, “I could enhance this show a little bit.” And then COVID came, and so my next one was at the Whisky a Go Go [nightclub in Los Angeles], which was my dream because it’s my home away from home. So I sold the Whisky out twice. And I thought, “I’m going to take this on the road – I think I could.” And my booking agent just started calling places, and every single place said sure. So that’s how that started.

It’s really lucky that you had the foresight to keep diaries like you did as you lived through all of these fascinating times.

PAMELA DES BARRES: Yeah, I know. My mom started giving them to me for Christmas when I was about nine, and I just started writing in them. I thought I should do that since she bought those for me. And then I felt like I was talking to a friend, which is really my inner self, so I just kept it up. And I wrote a lot during those peak days, so I was able to utilize those in my first book. It brought some immediacy to the book, I think, and people felt like they were there. At least, that’s what they’ve been telling me.

Do you ever look back at what you wrote when you were so young and have a different opinion on things now, or wish you could go back and tell yourself some advice?

PAMELA DES BARRES: Well, I would have taken less drugs. Even though it was a drug culture, I probably would have not gotten as high, because I would be able to remember more things. Thank God for my diaries! It was a wild time, but I was not addictive, so I would always stop myself in time. Unlike many of my compatriots, I was able to just stop and just say, “Okay, that’s enough.” Most of the time! I can recall a few times I wish I’d stopped sooner, yes.

How did you how did you know that you had found your place when you first started moving up the ranks in the L.A. scene?

PAMELA DES BARRES: I was born in Los Angeles, and raised in the [San Fernando] Valley. And all I had to do was go over the hill, through Laurel Canyon, to the [Sunset] Strip. I mean, I didn’t have to go very far! But it did seem like I was going over the hill to Oz, for sure. And Hollywood became my stomping grounds, and I just felt like I belonged there. And as soon as I could, I moved there. Hollywood is not what it used to be. I do these “I’m with the Band” tours. I rent a van and I have a great driver, and we take people from all over the world through Laurel Canyon, the Strip, and various places where I read out of my diaries in the exact spot where these things happened. Like the Zappa cabin area, Jim Morrison’s old house, stuff like that. So I’m keeping the past alive for people. So I feel like I’m doing a service for people who wish they were there. So many people who read my book contact me and want to know more, more, more.

With all these people who seem to like the idea of what you’re talking about, why do you think that kind of scene can’t happen again?

PAMELA DES BARRES: Because that music was already made, and it was made by the pioneers who made it, and that time can never come again. There will be no more Beatles, nothing near it, in my opinion. It was like the beginning of what became. I mean, the blues guys [were] first, and then Elvis [Presley] glommed onto them, and then everybody glommed onto Elvis, and that is what started rock and roll, in my opinion. So it’s still going, it’ll always go, it’ll always be there – but the people who invented those sounds, that can’t happen again.

Now you have a lot of things going on besides this show…

PAMELA DES BARRES: I hold women’s writing workshops, memoir workshops, all over the country. I never stop traveling. I’m coming to New York [for workshops on November 6 and 7, 2024 – see PamelaDesBarresOfficial.com for information]. I mean, I don’t stop with the writing workshops. And they’re in Los Angeles every weekend, and on Zoom every other Tuesday. So that’s my favorite thing that I do because I encourage other women to tell their stories, no matter what era they lived in or through, and it just opens their hearts and souls to who they really are. And they’re happier for it, usually. And so that is the best thing I do, and that is what I do the most.

What made you decide to specifically do women’s writing workshops, not for everybody?

PAMELA DES BARRES: When I started 25 years ago, I had men, too, and there weren’t very many that came. And I noticed, too, that women held back when men were writing. So, since so few men were coming to class, I just turned it into an all-women’s workshop, and it’s been much more cathartic for them. They can write about the men. They can express themselves fully without men in the room. And I have had some men say, “Why don’t you do men’s workshops?” And if I thought there were enough men willing to open their hearts and souls the way women do, I would have a men’s class, and I still might one day.

How do you know when you should do another book or a workshop or a podcast – how do you know when to do which thing?

PAMELA DES BARRES: I just try to squeeze everything into my schedule and get enough sleep! I have so much going on. And have, for years. Right now, I’m writing two books. Three, actually. Because I’m working on one with a couple of other people about the history of the Whisky a Go Go, which is really important. Amazing it hasn’t been done already. And my third memoir, which is [about] my spiritual life, it’s called Blinded by the Light: Sex, God, and Rock and Roll. And Cynthia Plaster Caster’s memoir. So I have a lot of work to do, but I just haven’t been able to devote as much time to it because I’m on the road so much, but I’ve got to make the time for that.

What do you think, as you look back, about the legacy that you’ve created?

PAMELA DES BARRES: I’m just living my life. I really am. I’m happy I experienced that timeframe, that I felt the freedom to pop the birth control pill on the Strip, that I was born into a time when women could start really expressing themselves. I mean, it wasn’t even that much earlier before I was born that women couldn’t even vote. I voted today, and I just posted it on Facebook, because it’s just very important. I don’t know, I don’t think about my legacy, honestly. Just live my life day-to-day and do the very best I can. I try to treat people the way I want to be treated, which is the Golden Rule, and that’s just me.