Adios, Motherfucker

The riotous and unbridled confessions of a debauched rock and roller, this is a music memoir that chronicles his adventures in excess while touring Middle America on the ’80’s hair-metal nostalgia circuit.

The Unband emerged from the suburbs of late ’80’s New England and drank, drugged, crashed, and burned their way across the United States until, on the brink of the new century and with the help of their dominatrix manager, a drug-dealing patron bent on revolution, and a willful record executive or two, the band got their Big Break, in a collapsing music industry where boy-band pop ruled and rock music had been declared dead. Equal parts This Is Spinal Tap and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Adios, Motherfucker is the candid and hilarious behind the music account of that experience, now updated and expanded from the version published in 2004 as Gentlemanly Repose.

In this epic, funny rock biography and intoxicated memoir, Unband bassist Michael Ruffino takes readers along on a raucous tear across a surrealistic landscape populated with crack-smoking Girl Scouts, beer-drinking chimps, two-fisted femmes fatales, and murderous headbangers by the horde, while on tour with giants of heavy metal including Ronnie James Dio, Lemmy Kilmister, Def Leppard, Anthrax, and a veritable Who Was Who of reunited ’80’s hair bands.

Into that volatile mix, The Unband brought do-it-yourself pyrotechnics, a giant inflatable hand (for making giant inflatable gestures), a high tolerance for substance abuse of all kinds, and an infectious love of rock and roll and everything it stands for. Chronicling everything from the drug-fueled chaos in the underground caverns of California to shotgun-toting barmaids on Hamburg’s Reeperbahn, Adios, Motherfucker is a reader’s all-access pass to the rock and roll lifestyle, a comic odyssey through the netherworld of heavy rock.

This is the all-access, uncensored tour diary of a band that lived to tell the tale—barely.

• Sex, Drugs, and Rock and Roll: Follow The Unband through a surreal landscape of crack-smoking Girl Scouts, beer-drinking chimps, and do-it-yourself pyrotechnics.
• 80s Hair Metal Mayhem: Go on tour with giants of heavy metal like Ronnie James Dio, Lemmy Kilmister, and Def Leppard, and see the chaos with a backstage, all-access pass.
• Music Industry Meltdown: Witness a band’s big break in a collapsing industry run by dominatrix managers, drug-dealing patrons, and willful record executives.
• Spinal Tap Meets Fear and Loathing: Written with the candid, intoxicated hilarity of a true rock and roll survivor, this epic memoir is a comic odyssey through the netherworld of heavy rock.

Michael Ruffino is a musician and a writer. He lives in Los Angeles, California, the best way he knows how.