Gene Simmons insulted my shorts — something like, “Did you sue the guy who sold you those shorts?” This from a guy wearing tight jeans, black cowboy boots and a psychedelic T-shirt,Seedo_shortlist11_02 covered by a black, double-breasted suit jacket with a rose in the pocket. Now I like a good

rip, and it doesn’t bother me in the least that Gene Simmons insulted my decade-old cargo shorts 30 seconds after I shook his hand. What bothers me is that my rejoinder was, “Hey man, you don’t like my shorts?”

Talk about your lost opportunities. Ah, to have that moment back. It might’ve gone like this: “Did you sue the guy who sold you those shorts?”

“Uh, yeah, how long does it take to glue on your hair?”


This article appears in Mar 29 – Apr 4, 2006.

Eric Snider is the dean of Bay area music critics. He started in the early 1980s as one of the founding members of Music magazine, a free bi-monthly. He was the pop music critic for the then-St. Petersburg...