In this episode of 'Seeing Them Live,' Charles interviews Rudy Childs, a renowned documentary filmmaker and rock photographer. Rudy shares captivating stories from his career, including photographing legendary bands like Van Halen and Black Sabbath. He reflects on attending iconic concerts, such as the 1976 Aerosmith show at the Boston Garden, and recounts his strategies for sneaking cameras into venues. Rudy discusses his documentary work, including 'The Dogmatics' and '1984 Riding into Hell.' He also opens up about his early struggles with drugs and his encounter with Sharon Osbourne when she threw him out of Ozzy’s dressing room at an Ozzy Osbourne concert. Rudy's tales offer a fascinating glimpse into his journey through music, photography, and documentary filmmaking.
In this episode of Seeing Them Live, host Charles welcomes Rudy Childs, an award-winning documentary filmmaker and rock photographer. Rudy shares insights into his career, highlighting his acclaimed documentaries on heavy metal music and his extensive photography work with iconic bands like Van Halen and Aerosmith. The conversation touches on Rudy's early concert experiences, notably his first Aerosmith concert at 15, which set the course for his unique approach to concert photography by sneaking cameras into shows to capture legendary moments.
Rudy also discusses the highs and lows of his journey, including curious anecdotes such as impersonating a Kerrang magazine writer for a band interview and his encounter with Sharon Osbourne when she threw him out of Ozzy’s dressing room. His passion for rock music is evident in his vivid recollections of concerts and the lengths he went to photograph and videotape these events, despite the challenges posed by his battles with drug use.
Beyond photography, Rudy describes his venture into filmmaking, with documentaries like 'The Dogmatics' and 'Tension,' exploring bands that shaped the punk and metal scenes. He details his creative process and the enthusiasm with which he pursued these projects, despite personal setbacks. His work has been celebrated, winning several awards and being featured in numerous publications.
Rudy concludes by sharing exciting updates and future plans, including a potential publication of his candid memoir 'Riff Raff and Rock and Roll,' which delves into his personal experiences with addiction and recovery. He also hints at a significant project involving a well-known band, showcasing his ongoing dedication to documenting the world of music.
BANDS: Aerosmith, Alice Cooper, Black Sabbath, Blue Oyster Cult, Cheap Trick, Chicago White Sox, David Bowie's band, Tin Machine, Elton John, Flock of Seagulls, Foreigner, J Giles, Judas Priest, Madonna, Megadeth, Men at Work, Metallica, Michael Stanley band, Motley Crue, Nantucket, Ozzie Osbourne, Pink Floyd, Quiet Riot, Rick Derringer, Scorpions, Stray Cats, Ted Nugent, The Kinks, The Outlaws, Thin Lizzy, Tom Petty, Van Halen
VENUES: Boston garden, Cape Cod Coliseum, Comiskey park, Four Seasons, Hammerjacks, Merriweather, Nassau Coliseum
[00:00:00] Charles: Our guest today is Rudy Childs. Rudy is an award-winning documentary filmmaker and producer. His full-length documentaries on heavy metal music have won worldwide acclaim. Rudy is also a rock photographer whose work has appeared in numerous publications. His extensive photography portfolio of seminal bands like Van Halen, Black Sabbath, Judas Priest, and Ozzy Osbourne have been incorporated into many coffee table books chronicling their careers. Rudy's latest venture is directing and editing a feature titled The Dogmatics, a dogumentary which chronicles the band who helped birth the Boston punk scene in the early 80s. Rudy, welcome to Seeing Them Live.
[00:00:44] Rudy: Thank you, Charles. I appreciate it.
[00:00:47] Charles: Yeah, and we're gonna get to RudyChilds.com, your website, in a bit, where I encourage everybody to go check out because there's, there's a lot of stuff there. And I’m just trying to get my bearings for this interview Rudy based on the stories and such that I read on your website, but I thought, kind of how we do with, with all of our guests. We start with the first concert going back to 1976. You were 15 years old
[00:01:16] Rudy: Yep.
[00:01:16] Charles: And you saw Aerosmith at the Boston Garden. So, what, what was that like?
[00:01:21] Rudy: Well, you know, it's a tough, growing up, you know, real strict parents and then finally getting them to finally allow me to go to my first concert and, and going with a couple of buddies from school and, and, you know, I guess around that time, I, you know, we were discovering pot. And so, it was a big thing to go to a concert and, and not be under the supervision of your parents or anyone else.
[00:01:43] And back then they would go into the concert and under the darkness, the cloak of the darkness, they would, they would light up joints, you know, and we would smoke pot in the concert. So that was a real big thrill for me as a 15-year-old to go there. And, and one of the things I. Look back and see that, that, that night when I went into the show, I, I never went to my seat, you know, we kind of like, uh, herded around different areas and like we knelt down next to the railing and watched, it was Rick Derringer first and then, Aerosmith afterwards.
[00:02:14] But, , that kind of set a trend that, that I would keep for a long time. I, I, unless I had. You know, a substantially good seat. I'd never, once I was in the arena, it was just trying to drive towards the front and get, get as close as possible. I didn't get very close that night, but we still, it was just an enchanting evening.
[00:02:35] Aerosmith was, kind of finishing off their rocks tour but you know, the, the, the band was kind of getting into drugs at that point. So, there Tyler's voice wasn't as great back then as, you know, when we listened to those first four albums, it was like, you know, you wanted to hear like the album, and when I went and saw him live, it wasn't the same effect.
[00:02:54] Charles: I first saw Aerosmith. I've mentioned this before in 1978 at Comiskey park, the old Comiskey park where the Chicago White Sox used to play. You know, I was really looking forward to seeing Aerosmith and it was so terrible. It was, it was still to this day, probably the worst concert I've ever been to.
[00:03:16] I couldn't even understand what songs they were playing till about the eighth song when they played sweet emotion and I kind of could recognize it, you know? I don't know if it was a sound thing. I don't know if it was a drug thing, but man, it was super bad. So, uh, when you mentioned that, it just made me think of that, that concert and my experience.
[00:03:36] Rudy: I've seen them other times and they've been good. They've been really good. But, there was a time period and I, I believe that they were using a lot of coke back then, it would affect the nasal drip into his throat and his, his singing wasn't that well.
[00:03:51] Charles: Yeah.
[00:03:52] Rudy: So at least that's because he disappeared all stage and we're all going, he's back there doing lines, you know, later, later down the line at 15 years old, I didn't understand why it didn't sound the way it should have, but...
[00:04:03] Charles: That's a good observation. Cause I was probably at that time 13 or 14 and yeah, like you were saying, you just want it to sound like it sounds like on the radio or the album. And I couldn't, it was so weird. I just, I couldn't believe how terrible it sounded. But, anyway, you answered this, the question you're most surprising, and I didn't see this on your website, which again, we'll get to in just a second when, when you were at a, a Van Halen concert with your friend.
[00:04:33] Rudy: Yeah.
[00:04:34] Charles: Were you still in high school then, Rudy?
[00:04:36] Rudy: No, no, no. That was, uh, like in 19, uh, 83, I believe, the Diver Down tour.
[00:04:42] Charles: Okay.
[00:04:43] Rudy: My friend Walt, he just, he just mounted up and had to start the gigging with the band. And he just, next thing you know, he was just climbed over the barrier and he hit the stage and, and I took my camera out and I snapped the picture before he actually made it into the spotlight, you could see the silhouette of him. But once got to the microphone, it just, the way he went.
[00:05:01] So my buddy, Walt, he just, sometimes you just, uh, the feeling gets upon him so hard that he just has to get, get the gigging and mount mounts up there with the band.
[00:05:12] Charles: That was during, uh, you said Ice Cream Man?
[00:05:14] Rudy: Yeah. It was a good time. Actually, it's the anniversary of it back in 1978. This date, uh, September 4th, I went and saw Van Halen for the first time, and that was probably one of the most mind blown experience I ever had because when I was standing in line. At the Cape Cod Coliseum, general admission, I didn't know who the opener was for Black Sabbath.
[00:05:35] And I, someone said, you know, it's, it's Van Halen. And I'm like, you mean like Van Morrison? I didn't, I didn't. And they go, no, no, they, they do the Kinks song, You Really Got Me. And I think, oh yeah, I've heard that on the radio. So we went in there and Van Halen, literally, you know, 22 years, 23 years old, these guys were just exploded on stage and just demolished Black Sabbath.
[00:05:59] It was really on a downslide at that point because they were only months away from getting rid of Ozzie, I think, by October. Uh, so yeah, it was like I saw him in September, October, he was gone. And you know, I, I read up on that. His vocals were affected by a lot of drug use and, and he, his whole performance was, and it just didn't, um, it wasn't, you know, a powerful concert for them.
[00:06:23] But Van Halen, on the other hand, just took to the stage and, I mean, seeing Eruption for the first time, and the way he, his fingers webbed the part doing that solo, I'm not having the album yet. And there I was, I had 12, I had an instamatic camera with flash cubes and 12 pictures and, and I waited, you know, you would wait for the best picture.
[00:06:45] And then next thing you know, I have Eddie Van Halen doing Eruption in front of me and I'm snapping this picture and it's just, yeah, I can't. It's what a thrill. And then you look back at it now and even seeing him in 84, 83, 82, all those years too and 88, great shows and Eddie Van Halen was like one of the best guitar players that I was, I was lucky alive to see.
[00:07:07] Charles: Yeah, and you mentioned this camera. Your first camera you bought at a yard sale, right?
[00:07:13] Rudy: Yeah. Well, it started with the Instamatic camera that was my parents with the flash cube. And then I, I went to a yard sale and there was a 35-millimeter camera and, you know, they had a price on it for 15 and I didn't, you know, you're a young kid, you don't have money. I was probably like, at this point, 18 or 19. And, I know it wasn't the honest thing to do, but the price was written in like a grease pencil. And my, when I pushed my thumb on it, it just erased the one. So, I had a camera for $5. So, he sold me my camera for five bucks.
[00:07:46] Charles: Okay. Cause you use the camera then, or you would sneak cameras into shows. Right? And, and, and make your way up front.
[00:07:53] Rudy: Right, because in the, when I first, after the Boston Garden experience Aerosmith and all that, I think I went to a couple more Boston Garden shows, Alice Cooper, Emerson Lake, and Palmer, all phenomenal shows. But I found the Cape Cod Coliseum, which was general admission, and I'm a big guy, so I, when I took my camera to the first concert, there was Blue Easter Cult and I pushed my way to the front and I got like four rows back, but all these arms are kind of in my way with people, you know, just in the crowd. And so then I figured out the next show I got. All the way to the front, right to the barrier.
[00:08:28] You know, I was going to be that guy and I'd wait there with my camera, just waiting for that one moment that they came in front of me on the stage. And then I would take the picture. Cause you were very limited how many rolls of film you could sneak in and stuff with the flash cubes.
[00:08:42] Charles: Yeah. I mean, everybody takes it for granted now with your phone, but I remember even myself, I'm, I'm not a professional photographer or anything, but I would occasionally take, take in a camera with me and I'd have, you know, yeah, somebody bring the film, uh, someone takes the body and, uh, I take the lens and then you reassemble it when you, you get back into the show. Oh, and I. I took some interesting pictures of David Bowie's band, Tin Machine.
[00:09:10] Rudy: No kidding. Wow.
[00:09:12] Charles: A short lived, uh, experiment he had at the Riviera nightclub in Chicago. And I snuck in a, this camera and I was shooting, this, really fast, I guess it's fast film.
[00:09:24] Rudy: Oh yeah.
[00:09:24] Charles: Like dark locations. It was like 3,200 film speed or something. And, uh, so they're kind of grainy, but it kind of adds to mystery of it all. And man, if you got caught, which I never did, you know, you could get well thrown out of the concert or the camera taken away or both.
[00:09:42] Rudy: Well, the, uh, the other thing was Charles, and you can agree on this is that you couldn't take a flash in with either because you couldn't get caught. So, you had to take the pictures with available lighting. And that was a tough thing to do because the colored lighting isn't, it isn't like a stage show you see nowadays where there's a million lights just in, in background screens and stuff like that.
[00:10:03] When you went to a concert, there was a lighting rig and it sat up in the ceiling and the red lights were red and the blue lights were blue and they just kind of switched them back and forth and they didn't have any front spotlights that made it difficult to shoot. So, but, but I, I had set out on a mission after that 78 summer where I went to the Cape Cod Coliseum every weekend to see Van Halen, Black Sabbath, The Outlaws, Thin Lizzy, Foreigner, Michael Stanley band, Nantucket, Ted Nugent, J Giles, Tom Petty, Blue Oyster Cult, Cheap Trick. I saw all these concerts every weekend. There was a different one with a great opener. And then, uh, I was taking pictures of them all, because I'd, I'd bring them back. My friends, everyone was blown away by these pictures.
[00:10:46] So it started me on a mission and I went for quite some years. Just, just, that's all I wanted to do was take pictures of concerts, so. I wanted to be a rock concert photographer and get published, but you know, I'll be honest, you know, drugs got in the way.
[00:11:01] Charles: Yeah, you mentioned that on your website and it's part of, uh, I guess it's all chronicled in your untitled book or the working title of your book is Riff Raff and Rock and Roll. And so you talk about these interesting, interesting stories. Just a few highlights from the book and you do talk about your struggle with drugs and, and such.
[00:11:25] So again, I encourage people to, to check out these stories, but a few that stood out to me. And I'm, I'm not gonna go in any particular order, you had a run in with Sharon Osborne, was it an Ozzy Osborne concert or a Black Sabbath concert, or...
[00:11:40] Rudy: No, it was Ozzy concert. It was, uh, 82. and it was the Merriweather. By this time, you know, 78, I start taking pictures by about 82, I start figuring out that I could get passes somehow. And part of how we got the passes was we, we would go to the hotel and meet the band and we'd meet Ted Nugent and stuff like that, get his autograph.
[00:12:02] And, you know, I had a friend that was a flim flam artist and he was kind of like, oh, you know, can you get me past it? Can you ask people and stuff, but we weren't girls. So, we weren't going to get passes unless we had drugs. So, we ended up kind of weaseling our way into a few situations with with drugs.
[00:12:19] For the most part we relied on this one guy. He ended up getting us passes to this Ozzie concert. I've been sober for like 37 years now, but, back then I was not sober and, and we'd smoked some angel dust and I was pretty high and I was sitting outside the dressing room and I decided I wanted to go, I was getting impatient and that stuff kind of makes you more aggressive and, and I, um, I just went into the dressing room.
[00:12:42] Because I wanted to get high with Ozzy and there wasn't anyone around to stop me. And then once I got inside, I started, there was another door back to the right. And I was like, well, that must be where Ozzy is. Cause it's these two ladies over there.
[00:12:53] And she turns around, sees me and it's Sharon. So, she's like, what are you doing in here? Get out, get out, started screaming at me. Somehow security barreled in and grabbed me and they're dragging me out.
[00:13:05] Charles: Did you ever meet Ozzy or...
[00:13:08] Rudy: Yeah, I did. Yeah. It was really cool. I met him finally, uh, we were trying to find, in 84. I was trying to find Motley Crue or something in, in one of the hotels in the Four Seasons, and he came out and he had this big old fur coat on and stuff. All the times I've met him, like at a album signing, he was always kind of just quiet and, and, you know, just observed and noticed. But when I, one time we've talked to him and I said something about having pictures of the Randy Road show back in 81 in Towson, Maryland. And he was, oh my God, you know, kind of got his attention. But for the most part, you know, these guys just, I see a lot of the artists, you know, when you talk to them, they, it just seemed like they see, hear so many stories from people and, you know, they just kind of try to just listen.
[00:13:54] It's really hard to get them to engage. There are some that I've, I've, you know, had good relationships with over the years though, and, and reach that point where you can have a dialogue with them. But a lot of rock stars, when they're in that certain mode, they're just, they're just doing their job. So it's, it's kind of hard to catch them and you got to catch them at a restaurant or something like that.
[00:14:14] Charles: Then you had this other, story where you, um, impersonated a magazine writer for Kerrang. Is that how you say that?
[00:14:23] Rudy: Yeah. Yeah. That's a very famous heavy metal, British star, London magazine. What happened is, um, I went to the US festival and we were only there to go see heavy metal day. The first day, I think it was like Men at Work, Flock of Seagulls, Stray Cats, things like that. We weren't really into it.
[00:14:39] So we were just hanging out and we went up to the, uh, riding the buses around, trying to stay out of the heat. But we went up to the press, we went up to the front gate and found there was a press tent over nearby. So, we walked over to the press tent and I knew how to flim flam. So I was with my buddy, John Dix.
[00:14:53] And I, and I looked at him, I said, um, we said, yeah, we're here to pick up our passes. And they go, they handed us the clipboard and said, well, what's your name? And so right away, we, we're with Kerrang, you know, so, in we went and, once we were inside, we had these laminated passes, we went back to press Island and, you know, up to the beer garden, we found our friends and stuff.
[00:15:16] But, the second day was the Scorpions were playing heavy metal day. And I had signed up a list that said I wanted to interview the band. All the bands were not congregating on Press Island. It was all the press people there and it was very limited access. And then I went out to take pictures of Motley Crue and Quiet Riot and all that.
[00:15:35] And then next thing you know, they're looking for me to do this interview. And I come back to press. I have my friend, John, they're looking for you. They're looking for you because communication was different back then. There wasn't a cell phone. You either, you were there or you weren't. And it was just a huge crowd there that day at the US festival.
[00:15:50] So they put me in a cart, drove me over to where the band was waiting for to do this interview. And when they, when I got there, they weren't there or something like that. And then they, they ended up changing locations. We went to the other location by that time they'd flown away.
[00:16:03] But in the meantime, I'm like, what am I, how am I going to interview these guys? I don't know nothing about an interview. It wasn't going to work for me, but I, I was making up questions. How, you know, what am I going to ask him? I don't have a tape recorder. I, it was, uh, yeah, I was kind of fumbling and nervous about the whole thing. I was trying to convince him. I'm really want to take some pictures. Just let me go up to the stage, you know, and they wouldn't, limited access wouldn't let me up there or whatever. But yeah, that was one of the ones I would love to have pulled that off if I could have, but I didn't get the interview.
[00:16:32] Charles: So close, but yet so far, right?
[00:16:35] Rudy: I got some great pictures from the US Festival.
[00:16:38] Charles: And then you, uh, you had mentioned too, during a Bob Seger concert, you were backstage and I was wondering how, you know, how did you get backstage and, I think you had one of Bob's beers while he was out there performing.
[00:16:51] Rudy: So what happened is, we would go to the Merriweather, and I guess this is around 82. This is when we started realizing how to flim flam. I think it was the same year we saw Ozzy there and Tom Petty. And what happened was someone got us tickets or passes, and they were going to be at the window for us.
[00:17:08] This guy that we met backstage or at the hotel. So, we went there and my friend went to go pick up the passes. And when he did, they were thumbing through the envelopes. And he, he was looking over their shoulder or kind of like at an angle and he spotted a name and he came back to me and he goes, go ask for Charles Zona's pass. And I'm like, okay.
[00:17:32] So I just wandered on up there and I said, you know, give me your passes. And, and they said, well, you got your ID. I know I left it in the car. I says, well, can I sign for it? And they sure here. So, I'd sign your name and away I'd walk with another set of passes and we figured out this riff raff thing going on.
[00:17:48] And so we've gotten into Bob Seger riff raffing, going up there with fake names. And I've had people's, we've sent people in line to go get a name. And then all of a sudden, the guy goes, hey, wait a minute, that's me. And he's like right behind him, you know? And, uh, my friend would just run away. So, we were riff raffing passes.
[00:18:06] And we got backstage at Bob Seger. And when we were, I was standing on stage, taking some pictures and, next thing you know, I see my friend, he's like, he's trying to take some pictures too, and he trips over something. He unplugs Bob Seger's guitar. And the next thing, the security are chasing him and you know, he's gone.
[00:18:24] So I just go back to the dressing room and since Bob's on stage, nobody's guarding the beer. So, I had my backpack that I would carry around with all my photos and I started just, you know, now I'm carrying my, my photo books under my arm and my whole backpacks full of all Bob Seger's beers. We, we were very bad, you know, drugs, alcohol, you know, you mix it all up a little bit of rock and roll and you get riff raff.
[00:18:48] Charles: Tripping over a guitar chord here and there and you're busted, right?
[00:18:53] Rudy: Yep.
[00:18:54] Charles: All right, Rudy, we could move into, you've made what? Four documentaries, right?
[00:19:01] Rudy: Six, I believe.
[00:19:02] Charles: Six. Okay.
[00:19:04] Rudy: There's Heavy Metal Picnic and then a Tension 25 Years Underground, uh, 1984 Riding into Hell, 1985 Indestructible, and then the Dogmatics, the current one. And then I did one on the soldier just to prove that I could do something outside my wheelhouse.
[00:19:21] Charles: Yeah, that one's called 21 Years, A Folded Flag?
[00:19:24] Rudy: Yeah. And currently, I work with like a lot of bands and I do music videos for them and stuff like that. There's a couple of heavy metal bands that I'm working with right now.
[00:19:35] Charles: Now, on some of the titles, Rudy, like Riding into Hell 1984, is that just the year of the entire documentary, like, highlights that particular year?
[00:19:46] Rudy: And, it's a very, very interesting year in the news, Like, Elton John getting married to a woman, Madonna doing the, MTV music awards, the Mac computer being introduced. There's all this stuff that I, I've, I kind of. put together as like a, a news sort of, reel of, of the year in different parts to carry the story along.
[00:20:10] But the, the other story that's we've been there at the time, I had a video camera and I was recording this stuff. I was, um, managing a heavy metal band called Forcer. And, um, We, we were, I was trying to get them a record label and stuff like that. Actually, I had gotten them a contract, but they didn't sign it.
[00:20:26] So that's why you don't know who they are anymore. But it's a great story. I mean, it's very entertaining. It's, you know, again, mixed drugs and alcohol and a young guy, uh, with a video camera and you get some riff raff. So, we, we, we would do some stupid stuff. And then, uh, eventually what happened is we, I do a follow up to this, 1985 riding are indestructible is, is the follow up to it that the band gets another singer.
[00:20:53] We try to go to Hollywood and make it during the hair metal days in Hollywood on the strip there. You know, at this point we ended up with a microphone to go along with our camera, a CBS microphone. So, we were running around with the camera, pretending like we were the news and we would get into all kinds of crazy places, you know.
[00:21:12] Charles: Yeah. I saw that on that, heavy metal picnic. There was, someone was holding a, a microphone that had the ABC or CBS.
[00:21:20] Rudy: CBS and then, the quick story behind that was in, uh, in 1985, Reagan was getting inaugurated in January. And my friend Curtis was the security guard watching CBS's equipment. So needless to say, we came out with hats and luggage tags and IDs and, you know, microphone clips. And so, we would masquerade around as, at different events as, as like we were the news. So, they're kind of fun videos to watch just to see what, what the young mind will produce.
[00:21:54] Charles: I think I watched a trailer of, I don't know if it was a trailer, kind of looked like one of the, of Tension. So that was the name of the band, right?
[00:22:02] Rudy: Yeah. Tension was a band down in Maryland. And they were, um, actually Marty Friedman's first band. He was like 14 years old and Marty Friedman, of course, went on to 10 years through the nineties with, uh, Megadeth. Great guy and I just had all this footage of these guys and I'm like, let's do it.
[00:22:18] So we tell the story of Deuce, Inception all the way to where they released their first album as Tension. And, uh, you know, they're still good friends of mine. Yeah, but it's like they wouldn't bow down to the record company who wanted to become more commercial and do more radio-oriented songs. They just wanted to do the complex metal sort of thing and speed it up as things were going that way too. So, um, at that time period. Yeah, uh, Tension with Marty Friedman. And then it ended up, uh, once Marty left and went on to do Hawaii and Cacophony and then Megadeth, eventually Megadeth, um, brought in, they brought in, uh, Timmy Meadows.
[00:22:57] Now, these guys, I would have loved to have been the manager of them, but at the time I was still in my addiction and, and they knew it, I was in a fog. If I had not immersed myself into that angel dust and cocaine, I would have probably, it'd be a different story, but as it goes, you know, 30-some-odd years later, now I'm, I've got all these photos and all this video and I'm like, well, you know, let's make it sing and dance.
[00:23:22] So I've been releasing it and it's been coming out. It just, Capital Center book. They featured like nine pages of my stuff in there. And that was a place that I used to get thrown out on a regular basis. I mean, I got some pretty vicious stories about fighting and stuff like that with security guards as they're trying to take me away.
[00:23:42] Charles: Well, in that particular documentary in 2012, you won best feature film documentary, right?
[00:23:49] Rudy: Yes. Yes. Um, somewhere up here on my mantle, I've got a whole bunch of awards. We've done real, I've done really well with them. I mean, it's, it's one of those things where it really starts with the original footage and I was just very fortunate that somewhere in me was driving me to photograph and videotape everything.
[00:24:10] And there I was videotaping it and, and, you know, not knowing what I'd ever do with it. I didn't have any idea of even how to white balance a camera correctly. But I eventually learned. And then I started, you know, the digital age came. I was able to preserve all my, uh, 90 percent of my collection of photography and start digitizing.
[00:24:32] And then people started this, like Martin (Martin Popoff) discovered it. He was like, he found me on a website and he was like, you saw my thin Lizzie pictures, you know, where'd you get the, I got a whole bunch of stuff. And I'm like, and they're not published. And I'm like, nope, just sitting around waiting to be published though.
[00:24:48] Yeah, I'm very excited about that. Uh, yesterday I just found out that I got the cover of a Blue Oyster Cult book by Martin, called a visual biography. So, I'm very excited. It's he's got it in the mail to me now, so.
[00:25:01] Charles: Yeah, because on your website, you mentioned, and I think I mentioned in the introduction that your images are in a number of coffee table books, and I would imagine also like rock and roll books, biographies and things like that.
[00:25:16] Rudy: Yeah, we're getting there. It's like, I've got this certain era of stuff, you know, like the Ozzie book. I took shots of him at different concerts when he was with black Sabbath, and then I saw him like when he recorded the album, Speak of the Devil. I, I was so into this that I would, I worked for Amtrak during the day, but I would get on a train and ride up to New York from Washington, DC, where I was living.
[00:25:40] And I would go to concerts and then sit up there all night till three in the morning, take the train back and go to work. And I did that with Pink Floyd, The Wall, with Ozzie, with Motley Crew. Eventually I wasn't really welcome at the Capitol Center in Maryland because I'd raised such a ruckus between Smoking my PCP, angel dust and all that, and fighting with the bouncers that I actually had to go see shows in Philadelphia.
[00:26:08] And then my family lived in Massachusetts. So, I would come all the way up as far as new England and see shows up here too. So, I was constantly just going to shows anywhere I could, even Indiana. I was so into it. I was so into it.
[00:26:24] Charles: Yeah, because you say, I think, on your website that your grandfather got you a job at Amtrak?
[00:26:31] Rudy: Yep. I got a job at Amtrak it like in 1979 and I just finished off a 42-year career with them. You know, there was a couple of years in there where things were really sketchy for me because of my drug use. And I eventually in 1987 went, and uh, sobered up and got my act together.
[00:26:50] And then went on to like, do video production for Amtrak and made safety videos and stuff like that. I, I really, once I got clean, I just really, let me figure something out. And I, I got my head together and wrapped around video production. And then eventually it was like, looking at all these old videotapes, either they're going to throw them in a dumpster one day, or I'm going to do something with them now.
[00:27:15] So, and that's what I decided to do. And so, each project that I've worked on is just had a plethora of old video that you just gotta, I kind of made it sing and dance a little bit, you know, it's just good stuff. Oh but, you can't, go back in time and film it. That's the thing.
[00:27:30] Charles: Right. No, you've got it. You've just got to put it together. But, so I would imagine you get to travel for free then as an Amtrak employee?
[00:27:40] So, that must have factored into this Pink Floyd show, which, because they only played like, what, in New York and Los Angeles, was it?
[00:27:48] Rudy: Yes. And then in London.
[00:27:50] Charles: Because, yeah, I was bummed out that they skipped Chicago, you know? Of course, I really wanted to see that.
[00:27:55] Rudy: I went up the first night and I went up the, uh, the day before the show. And then I ended up back then you start partying with some people and next thing you know, we're in a hotel room and they let me crash on the floor. And the next morning I got up and it was, just try to find a ticket.
[00:28:11] You know, that's all I want to do is get a ticket to get in the door. And I had $60 on me. And, you know, I don't even know what I ate. I don't even think I ate back then. I wouldn't go buy beer or nothing like that. I would just, my focus was, I had film, I had my camera. Need to get in the show. And so finally I was like, had a sign and everybody was looking for tickets and they were lined up down the street in front of me by now.
[00:28:36] And, and I'd been out there for hours and, and I was just catching some guys making a left-hand turn. And the guy spotted me, it's like, Oh, ticket, you know, and I'm thinking, Oh, here we go. No, I need a ticket. You know, he goes, no, I got one. I'm like, really? I says, he goes, how much are you gonna give me for it?
[00:28:51] I said, 60. He goes, I don't know. I said, come on, come on. A little tug of war. Boom. I got the ticket, you know? And then the crowd was just mobbed them afterwards. Like everyone's wants that ticket. And the guy just realized at that point that he just gave away the golden egg. But anyways, I got, I was just about to go into the concert, threw my sign away.
[00:29:10] And then a couple of friends came down from Boston. I didn't know they were going to be there and they showed up next thing, we need tickets too. And I'm like, oh, so we, we bought tickets in the parking lot for Wednesday night for them. And they were going to just go home and come back. Well, I said, well, let's just all sneak in with the tickets.
[00:29:28] So we get to the door and we hide all the camera and film and all that. And we, go to the, I go in first. He tears my ticket. I get through the guy behind me, same thing. And then all of a sudden, the third guy we were with, he looks at the ticket and he's going, this is the wrong night. So, he hands a ticket back to him.
[00:29:47] I'm telling my friend on the other time at the turnstile, go to the other usher, go to the other line, get in the other one. So, he goes over and he, he finally gets up there and he gets in and we all kind of cluster and get down to the floor and what a magnificent show to see the original wall with, at the time state of the art, art, but you know, see what Roger Waters did with it later. It just, it was so archaic. They had to build these big, huge refrigerator size bricks and then try to make them lightweight. And it was just incredible. And the inflatables that came up and, and we were so into the, to the, the album itself.
[00:30:27] And then I remember someone at the concert told me there's a secret message on the wall. And I'm like, you gotta be kidding me. No, you gotta listen to empty spaces. They play it backwards, you know? So here I am when I finally get home, I'm spinning the album backwards, trying to figure out what the secret message is and all that it's good times, man. I was just, you know, and I did took the train back that morning. I remember staying up like all night and then just rolling into Washington, DC and there I am at work, you know.
[00:30:54] Charles: Where was the, show, Rudy?
[00:30:56] Rudy: Nassau Coliseum.
[00:30:58] Charles: Nassau Coliseum.
[00:30:59] Rudy: Yeah. So, I had to take, uh, some, I think Long Island Railroad or something out there at the time. I think that arena is gone now. Seen a couple of other shows there. Saw Paul McCartney years later. And I remember seeing they got all these banners in there now, back in the eighties. I don't think they had them. Because the hockey team that was so successful.
[00:31:17] Charles: So, has anybody used those Pink Floyd images anywhere?
[00:31:21] Rudy: They didn't survive as well as I'd hoped. Cause a lot of times, you know, the negative, the chemical makeup and stuff like that, they faded really bad. By the time I digitized them, it was, it was a little disappointing. I had a house fire 2007 and I lost a lot too.
[00:31:38] But, I do have proof that I was there, but I don't have quality pictures. It just didn't, wasn't real, you know, some nights I'd get too high. I'll be honest with you. And we were getting high at that one.
[00:31:49] Charles: Yeah, you know, that medium, film, I know can be very finicky when you develop it.
[00:31:55] Rudy: Yeah.
[00:31:55] Charles: Archive it, yeah, sometimes it doesn't age.
[00:31:59] Rudy: No, it turns red. Sometimes it just, yeah, I don't know if it's the original film that you bought that wasn't a good purchase or whether it was the chemical or, and then I had problems with people stealing my photos at the developing lab. They all of a sudden, they have a whole bunch of Blue Oyster Cult pictures.
[00:32:18] And I went to a party one time, the dude had him hanging on his wall. And I'm like, I'm looking at them pictures and I'm like, one of my roles of film was missing from that night when we developed it. And I'm looking at the pic. I said, whoever took these pictures was right next to me. And the guy starts telling me the story about how he stole them.
[00:32:34] Cause he works at the photo lab. And I looked over at the dude, I was going to kill him. He's like, and he went quickly into his bedroom. Cause I, you know, I'd kind of met him through a friend and he went back there and got the negatives real quick.
[00:32:47] Charles: What are the odds of that?
[00:32:49] Rudy: Yeah, I hear you, but that's where a lot of the, uh, photos would be sent to, and it was real close to where we lived. So, it wasn't a surprise that someone lived in that area that stole them.
[00:33:00] Charles: The movies, are available on your website. They look like they're around $15 maybe, is that correct?
[00:33:06] Rudy: Hard copies. I got hard copies available. DVDs, but they're also available. And, um, there's a thing called ThunderFlix and, uh, what it is, it's a Netflix for heavy metal.
[00:33:16] Charles: Oh, okay.
[00:33:18] Rudy: I think you pay $6 and 66 cents a month and you can see Scorpions, Ozzy and Megadeth, Metallica, and all these. Great Alice Cooper and, and, and my movies are all mixed in there with them too.
[00:33:30] So, yeah, we're all happy about that. I got some sort of distribution. It doesn't pay, you know, it doesn't, it doesn't pay the bills, but it, it, you know, it's nice to have a little bit of something for, for my efforts. You know, um, we're, we're really hoping that the book takes off because the book that, you know, I mean, I've had a very candid conversation with you about things.
[00:33:52] And I really get into detail from a fan's perspective of what went on. And I I've read a lot. I had to read a lot of books to compare mine as I did a book proposal, but you can read a book and you can feel and almost tell when they're holding back. And it's a little embarrassing for me sometimes to talk so candidly about like the drug use and stuff like that.
[00:34:15] But I was I would document stuff. I was I was on some sort of mission. I would write things down. I would take pictures. I would sneak tape recorders into concerts. I would videotape what I could and I just kept answering machine tapes and I thought about it and you know back in the time if the district attorney ever found me, he would go thank you Mr. Childs you just made our job a lot easier.
[00:34:40] So I took all that information and translated it to the story. And then we worked with a media consultant and paid a very handsome price to help us polish the book. But the thing is books are not getting published like they are back in the day, and I'm not a famous person.
[00:35:00] So, we're still working the rounds of trying to get it out there, but we've had to get it down from 144,000 words into under 100,000. And the whole book, it's very detailed in, in what, what a young guy will do to, fulfill this mission that I was on, you know, and how I recovered through my addiction, how it blocked me from my path, you know, relationships, it's got good story arcs, it's not just a bunch of crazy tales. That's what I had at first, you know.
[00:35:29] Charles: Yeah well, I mean, having all that documentation really helps when you go look back at things like you were saying, reading books and probably fan websites and, and stuff like that to fill in the details. But that's quite an accomplishment. So, congratulations on that. It's hard to write a book.
[00:35:47] Rudy: It is very hard. It's taking years.
[00:35:49] Charles: But as of right now, it's not published. You're still kind of shopping it around.
[00:35:54] Rudy: We're still shopping it around, but you know, stay in touch with rudychilds.com. And I've constantly got new stuff coming up either a new music video by some of the bands up here in the Boston area I work with. Some of them are garage bands. Some of them are heavy metal bands. I have books or pictures getting published. I got something really big happening and I, and I'm not even allowed to, I had to sign court document or a lawyer's thing to say, I can't reveal any of it and I hate to tease you with that, but yeah, something very big is happening down the line, not with the book, with some other band that's really a big-name band, so.
[00:36:30] Charles: Awesome. That's great. Well, once the legal stuff gets cleared up, maybe you can come back on and talk about it.
[00:36:35] Rudy: Oh, I'd love to. First, it seems I don't know what to do about it, but they, they really liked my footage and they liked what I had to say, so.
[00:36:43] Charles: Awesome. That's really cool.
[00:36:45] Rudy: Yeah, I've always got something going like this. I'm actually retired from Amtrak for like four years now. So, I, I focus a lot on my last year was doing the documentary with the Dogmatics.
[00:36:56] They're just a fun band. As a matter of fact, the band Forcer in my 1984 video, was offered a deal from Homestead Records, Dutch East Indies, and, they didn't accept the deal, but my friends up here in Boston, the Dogmatics did, and they've got a couple of albums out and so they, they've got a legacy and they're very popular in this Northeast area and, uh, they've done well with XM radio and stuff like that.
[00:37:24] And so they, you know, they're currently doing new stuff and that's being received well. So, I'm tagging along with this band and now we released their, their video of the documentary. We won the LA Punk and Film Festival, back in December. We won up in New Hampshire, uh, best of show at the Manchester International Film Festival in New Hampshire.
[00:37:46] I'm kind of looking around my wall there and yeah, we won at the World Music and Independent Film Festival for Best Documentary. So, we, we have a bunch of victories with that and I'm currently talking with another distributor because I don't know if it's the right fit for Thunderflix. I could put it on there, but I'm looking at another distributor for that one.
[00:38:06] Charles: Ok.
[00:38:06] Rudy: You know. That's the trick is just to try to get the stuff out there. It's different from how I grew up and how it was done in the old days. It's different now, so.
[00:38:16] Charles: So now when I was on your website, Rudy, it looks like I could sign up or leave my email and then what, is that like a newsletter or what?
[00:38:25] Rudy: I gotta get more busier when I'm, I'm gonna actually start a blog. I do a blog, but a podcast, I'm going to try to get some of the stories out there just to kind of get an audience built.
[00:38:36] Charles: Cause you, well, you have a blog. I think you'd call it a blog, right?
[00:38:40] Rudy: Yeah, I got to get more active with it. I get so busy with so many other projects, you know, production. I didn't even tell you that after I got sober, I went and took video production classes at a night school while I was still working with Amtrak and had learned how to do this stuff. And then I started a boxing show and we started a boxing show in 91.
[00:39:01] I did and on public access and it went for five years and I won a whole bunch of awards, cause I was really good at it. And then I moved up onto regional sports networks. And then I was on home team sports. And then, Fox sports, Detroit, you know, Sacramento, we, we, I did distribution and we were, we were in 133 million homes with this boxing show.
[00:39:25] And yeah, I'd still go to concerts, but there I was doing video production. And in the end, I ended up going to China multiple times to Produce over there and bring back the product and distribute in the United States. And that was before COVID was the last time I did a show, a boxing show, but I was the actual producer.
[00:39:46] I would go in there on a truck, and I mean, this is the same guy that was all spaced out on green and there I was, you know, producing boxing programming. And so, yeah, I had that experience. That I had done for almost 30 years as I was still working with the railroad. I was still running around doing all this other stuff and going to concerts still and snapping a few pictures. So I'm still on that mission I guess. It just hasn't quit me yet.
[00:40:13] Charles: That sounds like you're keeping busy.
[00:40:15] Rudy: Yes.
[00:40:16] Charles: Rudy, as we come up on time here, is there anything you'd like to plug or talk about? I mean, we talked about a ton, and again, I encourage people to go to your website because I'm sure I missed a few things.
[00:40:27] Rudy: Yeah, the media page, and I've tried to figure it out. I have got so much stuff that I've been involved with, whether it's rock and roll or boxing. I mean, like YouTube and trying to get music videos out there. And it turns out like one of my most popular music video is from the Shining Star Baptist Church. I did a Ride Out Your Storm. It's like five million hits or something and I was afraid to put my name as the producer on it because the guy I was working with wanted to plagiarize something and use like something out of the movie Platoon and I'm like, I'm not gonna get, you know, dragged into court for that.
[00:41:02] So I put myself as the editor, but that thing's done spectacularly well over the years. But my heavy metal, it's still there. I got links to a lot of my music videos, the trailers. There's actually links to the actual documentaries, if you go on Vimeo. I feel it's more important for the people to see it than it is for me to get paid. That's kind of how I feel about it. I mean, I just needed to catch fire. I throw so many things at the wall. I'm just waiting for that one thing to stick, you know.
[00:41:29] Charles: Yeah. for sure. You've got a lot of material out there.
[00:41:32] Rudy: I'm on a mission!
[00:41:34] Charles: I only scratched the surface, but it's really interesting and your writing is very candid as you said. So, yeah, I'd encourage everyone to go to, rudychilds.com. That's pretty much wherever you could find everything, Rudy?
[00:41:48] Rudy: Yeah, and then, like I said, the media page is just so much stuff on there. You could spend a lot of time on there just grazing through it. So, time for a quick story?
[00:41:57] Charles: Yeah, absolutely. Sure. Go for it.
[00:42:00] Rudy: I'm at this concert in 1990. I'm with my friend, Mike Kovar, and I go to see Joe Walsh. He's playing at Hammerjacks. And, uh, we're there about, I don't know, five or six rows back. And, and I decided I wanted to hear a song off the So What album, which was, All Night Laundromat Blues, which is just some stupid little studio song he did to fill in the little gap on the album. And so I'm yelling in my loud voice, All Night Laundromat Blues!
[00:42:29] I screaming it every time between songs. Finally, Joe Walsh has had enough. He looks over at me, would you shut up? I'm gonna play it. Just shut up. So, he gets up to the microphone. He does it. He looks down at me. Are you happy now? Will you shut up now? I'm good, Joe. So, the rest of the concert, good time, you know, a little embarrassing.
[00:42:56] But, uh, years later, my friend Kovar goes to see Joe Walsh. And it's at the, he's doing a residency in Vegas and he was in second row cause he's a big Joe Walsh fan and he sits down to the second row and Joe Walsh has his back to him and he's doing something with his guitar and my buddy just couldn't, couldn't help himself.
[00:43:15] He yells out, All Night Laundromat Blues Joe Walsh just turned around as quick as possible. peering eyes. And he was just like, who said that? Where is the bastard? I'm going to kill him. So, I think I left an impression on Joe.
[00:43:31] Charles: Man. Yeah, that's a pretty funny story and people might follow your lead on that one for Joe Walsh, concerts.
[00:43:39] Rudy: Joe Walsh, he'll never hear the end of it now.
[00:43:41] Charles: Well, Rudy, uh, yeah, this has been awesome. Thanks so much for coming on. I really appreciate you spending time Seeing Them Live and chatting about your rock and roll stories, concert stories. When other things develop, we'll stay in touch and maybe we'll do an update for everyone to hear what you've been up to.
[00:44:00]
Rudy:
Excellent. I appreciate it, Charles.