Here is an excerpt from Ken "Fast Kenny" Utterback's upcoming book entitled "Memories From The Road". Kenny was Lead Guitarist for PG&E from 1970-1972.

I know that folks like to read the fun and happy times about our experiences, but not all of my stint with PG&E was a bowl of cherries. Perhaps somebody can relate to this chapter, or maybe even learn from it in such a way as to not have to repeat mistakes that some of us made.

The Downward Slide

After manager Frank Cook fired Brent "Boogie" Block, we started to play as a foursome. The road started to take its toll on all of us. Cocaine and lack of sleep haunted most of us. The drummer, Ron Woods, had a bout with pancreatic disease and we had to do a few gigs on the East Coast with drummer and conga player Joe Lala. (He is credited on one of Joe Walsh's albums as Joe "Percussion for Cash" Lala) He played on the hit "Ride Captain Ride" (or was it called "Mystery Ship") Anyway, no one could lay it down as solid as Ron, and Joe's chops didn't really seem up to speed either, so those gigs just didn't feel right.

When we finally got back playing with Ron, I remember a gig in Hollywood that caused a turn in our direction. I forget the club, but a reviewer who was there that night blasted us as "Led Zeppelin wannabees" or something like that, and only named Charlie in the bad review. He said the rest of our names weren't worth mentioning. We took it to heart, of course, and Charlie started to think about restructuring everything. We began auditioning horn players and trying out new songs, which were not anything like the old "boogie-blues" music of PG&E. Charlie started talking about having a Bobby 'Blue' Bland type of band. (Big-band blues sound) The rest of us thought Charlie had finally cracked. I think Frank Cook was behind it, but he pretty much controlled Charlie, who was stoned most of the time. Besides, Cook got his 15% off the top of whatever we did, so I don't think he truly gave a shit. The morale of the band started to nosedive.

Soon thereafter I got a polyp on my esophagus, which burned like hell when I ate just about anything. I took a plane home to Chicago and went to my old family doctor, who told me to have all these extensive tests and gave me a sheet with the ulcer diet plan on it. He said that after the tests I would probably be put on this diet. I figured I'd blow off the tests and just go on the diet. I started drinking Malox and eating the blandest, room temperature food I could get my hands on. It was during that time that I learned to drink scotch and milk. Alcohol had become a major habit by then.

Ron's pancreitis never came back in full force, but he had to beef up the hash and weed smoking, and tone down his booze habit. We all had been drinking Jack Daniels like water for some time and a couple of us were now seeing the downside. Charlie continued to have mini-psychotic episodes in reaction to his coke and drinking and scared us a number of times. Frankie (our bass player), who lived with him in North Hollywood for a time, reported that Charlie woke up one morning after a coke binge, grabbed his gun, paced around the house for a bit and then said to Frank, "Where's my coke?". Frank knew that they had snorted it all up the night before, but Charlie wasn't so clear on it. As the reality of having no coke sunk in, Charlie proceeded to go out on the balcony and take a few shots at Jinx Dawson, the singer from Coven. She was sunning herself on the roof of her house down the hill from Charlie's place. I don't know how we never got busted for some of the stuff we did.

Ron, the vociferous one, finally banged heads with Frank Cook one time too many and got himself fired. I was really pissed when Charlie went along with it and showed my disgust by quitting the band and leaving Hollywood in the middle of the night on a 'red-eye' flight to Chicago. Alan Wachman, our head roadie, helped me get my amp checked in to cargo and I was off to Wheaton without a word of notice to anyone else.

I spent the next couple weeks jamming with local friends and tripping my brains out on some pretty pure mescaline for about a week straight. It didn't take long before I tired of the slower lifestyle of my old friends and yearned for the insanity I had left behind. So, I made a call to Wachman just to kind of feel out the situation. Charlie was pretty pissed off, but still wanted me back, so I packed up my stuff and headed back to Hollywood.

ymnastics in reverse, as two dozen glazed eyes followed my movements without a word. It wasn't uncommon, back in those days, for people in the travelling rock and roll business to walk in and out of each other's lives without introduction. I think we probably took the saying “live fast; die young” to heart, and didn't see the need to constantly be introducing ourselves and each other to the many people that came and went. In this case, though, Charlie broke with that tradition. I later learned that even after the door to the hotel room closed behind me, the room stayed silent. That is until Charlie spoke up, introducing me after the fact, and said to the stunned group, “That was Fast Kenny Utterback, from Chicago, Illinois.” After that, they called me Fast Kenny.