LED

Led Man began sinking early in life, long before he acquired his scars, tattoos, and petty criminal record. He was born into a poor family in a small French village on the coast of Brittany, where his father, a fi sherman with a fiery Celtic temper, would regularly toss "le petite homme de led" over the side of the family fishing trawler as punishment for the slightest offense. Little Led Boy, as he was then known, would drop to the bottom of the frigid bay of Saint-Brieuc like a lead weight. He'd struggle back to the surface with great effort only to see his father's wretched tub puttering away toward the horizon leaving him behind. To escape his torment, young Led Boy got a guitar and retreated into his imagination where he lived in a fantasy glam-rock universe. He grew his hair long and wore make-up and tights despite the angry jeers of the villagers who would follow him down the street as he walked to the fi shing boat each morning. Everything changed the day he picked up a transistor radio and heard Johnny Hallyday singing "Joue Pas de Rock'n'Roll Pour Moi." Johnny was a real rocker. Johnny was "tres cool." He knew immediately that he must grab his guitar and chase his new wild-west rock and roll dream to its source in America. By this time, Led Boy had grown quite strong with the effort of staying afl oat, and in the middle of one particularly stormy fi shing trip, he tossed his father overboard, and turned the family boat west into the open sea. He was no longer Led Boy: he was Led Man. It was a long, treacherous voyage, and Led Man soothed his loneliness in song. He earned his gravelly voice from the months at sea chain-smoking his father's Gaulloises to keep the hunger driven hallucinations at bay, and hollering songs while pounding his guitar to the rhythm of the hammering ocean swells. Arriving in New York months later, it quickly became clear that America was nothing like the fantasy that lived in his head. The country seemed grey and bleak and nobody spoke French. Optimistic that the promised land might yet lie further west, he stuck out his thumb and began hitching rides. When asked by accommodating drivers where he was headed, he'd reply "El Dorado," because that's what Johnny would say.