USD 
Flying televisions, hidden celebrity boltholes and an access-all-areas pass: Paul Chai turns it up to eleven on a blistering tour of the rock ‘n’ roll history of West Hollywood, which has long been the playground of Los Angeles’ hard-partying crowd.
Like the secret track on a CD, the rock ‘n’ roll history of West Hollywood can arrive as an unexpected delight, popping up seemingly from nowhere when you thought you had seen and heard it all.
“I like to say of Los Angeles that all of its secrets are hidden in plain sight,” says Jon D’Amico, who runs Sunset Strip Rock ‘n’ Walk Tours. Jon has been a stage manager for Guns N’ Roses, Alice in Chains and Stone Temple Pilots, he’s played in “nardcore” band Stalag 13, and now operates fast-paced tours around the storied streets of the famously louche Sunset Strip.
This is the two-mile stretch of bitumen that was the first place Elton John played in America, was the scene of the untimely demise of actor River Phoenix outside the Viper Room and has been Hollywood’s party spot for nearly six decades. It is the few blocks of Los Angeles’ Sunset Boulevard that became a counter cultural magnet for hard drinking actors like Jack Nicholson and the hard-rocking bands of the hair-metal era like Mötley Crüe.
As Jon describes it, the Sunset Strip’s rock roots were formed in the ’20s and ’30s when the area was known as a lawless playground for the movie industry; where people would work in Hollywood, live in Beverly Hills and get up to no good in between in the clubs of what would become known as West Hollywood. Jon’s tours are the answer to the question: what if a punk gig and a walking tour had a love child? After three hours with Jon your head will be spinning faster than Motörhead singer Lemmy Kilmister’s after one of his all day benders at the Rainbow Bar & Grill. It is at this very establishment, seated in a booth bathed in blood-red lighting, that I discover the first of Jon’s plain-sight secrets: not only is there a statue of Lemmy next to the bar he used to frequent but part of his ashes are enshrined here as well. Jon will also take you to surprising parts of the Rainbow that few people get to see and, if those walls could talk, they would immediately be slapped with a non disclosure agreement. But what goes on tour, stays on tour, as they say.
What I can tell you is that Jon’s guided experience is a high-octane ride that matches the extreme spirit of this notorious strip. “I’m going to give you a taste of the Sunset Strip that others can’t and we go places that you simply can’t get without me,” Jon says. “You will come here as a tourist and leave as a local and my aim is simple: I just want to blow your mind.”
As a rock fan who has tried to do his own music tours of LA in the past, Jon does manage a few mind-blowing moments. He takes us to the toilet next to the Tail o’ the Pup hotdog stand where Jim Morrison recorded the vocals for LA Woman because his producer loved the sound quality; we see the table into which Janis Joplin carved her name the night she died; and we visit hotspots like the Whisky a Go Go, the Roxy, and the Troubadour all of which have queues of music fans snaking around the busy streets on any given night. Jon also casually introduces us to an ’80s rapper in a cigar bar and an A-list Australian director lounging in the corner of a hotel courtyard; our tour guide is also regularly stopped himself for handshakes and selfies as he strides purposefully along the neon-washed streets.
Hotels California
The hotels around West Hollywood also have a story or two to tell. You no longer have to watch out for falling televisions or couches as you walk past the Andaz West Hollywood but back in the day the hotel was known as the “Riot House” and was famous for its rock ‘n’ roll bad behaviour. This was the hotel that had its rooms routinely trashed by the likes of the Who, Led Zeppelin and the Rolling Stones. The new Andaz is a much slicker affair these days but it leans into its rock history with artworks made up of colourful platform boots, the homage-heavy Riot House rooftop pool bar and a huge black and-white photograph hung in the lobby of Led Zeppelin’s Robert Plant standing on the balcony of Room 905 before a crowd of fans declaring himself “a golden god.”
For a more low-key but also high-star wattage stay, the Sunset Marquis is the under-the-radar celeb spot that still draws music’s famous faces. The hotel is set off the street in a garden reminiscent of its famous neighbour, the Chateau Marmont. Rooms are hidden down greenery-enshrouded pathways and the pool is an infamous hangout of the Rolling Stones, where Keith Richards would hang a pirate flag from his window when he was in residence, and the poolside lounges were the inspiration for the band’s Voodoo Lounge album. Take another pathway and you will end up lost in “Cyndi’s Garden”, a verdant getaway beloved by Girls Just Want to Have Fun singer Cyndi Lauper.
Sitting at lunch at the hotel’s sunny restaurant Cavatina, I am enjoying a little gem Caesar salad and a glass of IPA, fittingly called a “nose job”, when a film crew sets up for an interview and could-be-famous faces weave in and out of the garden paths to a soundtrack of Counting Crows and Goo Goo Dolls; the hotel is covered in famous rock photography and has the Morrison Hotel Gallery at the entrance which displays even more iconic rock moments.
Back on the streets of Los Angeles, I am soon zooming past taco stands, nail salons and decaying retro motels – they fly by with an almost numbing similarity – but I now know that any one of them could have a rock history story that might just blow my mind.
Discover Los Angeles
This article was originally featured in Issue 7 of Dream by Luxury Escapes.
