Peter Bell in 1994

The last interview in the December 1994 issue updated where Peter was then.

“Ten Ten got no respect in Richmond, and I always talked up the town in interviews all over the world, what a great music scene we had here, which is true. But Richmond didn’t return it in kind. I can’t complain. I got everything I wanted. I just stopped wanting things.”

In the final days of Ten Ten, even as a three-piece, “we were hot as shit. We did a concert at the Flood Zone that was broadcast on XL-102 and it’s as good as anything I’ve ever heard live. We sounded like a six piece band, no mistakes, fantastic. Our popularity never waned. But I couldn’t go back, I couldn’t switch gears. The other guys did it admirably, but I couldn’t. I felt like I had paid my dues in The Rage, and in the early days of Ten Ten. I didn’t want to pay dues anymore. It was tough.”

By 1991, he was “sunk very low. My drug use was bad. I lost everything. I didn’t have an income. I wanted to be rescued. I wanted my girlfriend to do it, but she couldn’t. I don’t know why the band couldn’t get another record deal. 

“At least I was doing less drugs. My drug dealer cut me off, and then he got busted. I didn’t have any money and couldn’t get any drugs. As soon as that happens, you lose every friend you have. They are gone so fast, it’s unbelievable.”

But one stayed. JJ Loehr was playing in a cover band with Frank Daniel of Single Bullet Theory and Surrender Dorothy and suggested they work together as BOO. “It stood for Beat Off Odyssey. Our drummer was Danny Fisher. We recorded, but it never went anywhere. I didn’t want to do covers. Others in the band felt we had to. I was drunk all the time.” BOO broke up. Peter and JJ formed another band called New West.

Don Ruzek and Lee Johnson joined New West. “We made some progress. Bruce Olsen let us record at his home studio. We played a few shows. New West could have been good. Flash came back to manage us, but it wasn’t moving fast enough for Don, so he quit. Don and Lee had a problem with my bringing Flash back in. So I brought in Shawn and Brian Collins (Letters from Earth) and we formed Orlando Furioso, playing the same songs as New West. We made some really good tapes. Shawn and Brian were good players. We were doing showcases. It could have gone places, but for various reasons, I fucked up. 

"I didn’t know what I was going to do then. A friend was opening Shockoe Bar and Grill and wanted me to book the bands. I said, great! This will be the easiest job in the world. Little did I know what a hard fucking job that is and what fucking assholes musicians are. BS&M was the epitome of everything a band should not be. The first show I booked with them, they opened with ‘Ohio’ for yuppies who weren’t even born during Kent State. Nobody embraces the views in that song less than BS&M. Who wants to hear bad covers of Crosby, Stills and Nash? But there’s an audience for it in Richmond.”

Bell says BS&M went over his head with the club owner and worked out their own deal for the door and a Grateful Dead cover band to open for them. “So that band came down, people did the worm. It was fine. We made the most money that night. BS&M made $3,800 at the door. The opening band wanted $50. I thought BS&M would pay them. They wouldn’t. The club owner wouldn’t. The house made seven grand that night, but nobody had $50 for the opening band. I ended up paying them out of my pocket, and I told them what happened.”

According to Peter, BS&M didn’t like that and told him to call them at their office the following Monday so they could explain to him what their expenses were. He refused. “Who in a band has a fucking office? Show me the expenses? They had no idea what they were going to make that night.”

Bell clashed with The Fredds as well. “When they were The Limit, they used to kiss my ass until it was clean as a whistle every fucking time Ten Ten played.” After Ten Ten broke up, former members of The Limited wanted to put together a band with him, he says, but they wanted a guarantee he wouldn’t do drugs.

“Well, I was fucked up, but I’m still ten times the musician they are. I don’t need terms dictated to me by a band who up until then, the biggest thing they had done was open for my band!”

He did like Boy O Boy, which rebranded as Fighting Gravity, ZigManZag, and AAE. He didn’t like East Coast Entertainment, which he claimed bragged about booking Ten Ten in their Yellow Pages ad even though they never got the band a single job.

“Shockoe Bar and Grill was a great place to play. We were killing the Flood Zone every night. On Edge would call, but I thought they were a cover band and never listened to their tape. I finally heard them when I was in rehab on radio night. They would turn the radio on for the fucked up junkies and On Edge was on with Eric E. Stanley. They were great! I loved them! I saw them in Roanoke and they were fantastic. They covered The Cure. I told them to play all originals, but they said people didn’t want to hear that.

“I’ve heard that all my life, that people don’t want to hear original music, but I never played covers and was in successful bands. I’ve made $300,000 playing music, just doing my own thing, fucked up or not. I didn’t play the Dead, The Cure, not even bands I liked. And I made decent money.

“A manager is crucial for any band. Even if it’s just a friend you brought along, it makes you look like a working band. You need an agent, too. Firehouse got signed, and they are one of the worst bands I ever heard. Only two guys are from Richmond. The best band now is The Good Guys. I like Bio Ritmo. I love Letters from Earth, but those guys probably hate me. Sorry, I was a drug addict. I apologize.

“I’m not a fan of Vapor Rhinos. I don’t like anybody making fun of music. I take it too seriously. Rocket 69 is a good band. Rock Koplin and Ben Lawes have never been in a bad band. I loved Joe America, but they broke up.”

After his friend sold Shockoe Bar and Grill, Peter went into rehab and came out to find his apartment cleaned out. “They put me out on the street even though I wasn’t behind on anything.” Then Mark Lewis, his bandmate from Ten Ten, invited him to New York.

“I spent the rest of the year in New York, making tapes with two English guys from The Cult, John Ashton from the Psychedelic Furs, and Mark. We called it U.S.U.K. And we didn’t suck! We worked hard. Flash was ready to work for us. We rented rehearsal space. We were hot shit. I was excited. Nobody was drinking or doing drugs. But something was always happening. The other guys kept leaving to do pick-up jobs. It was the brokest band I ever played in, and I have been in nothing but broke bands since Ten Ten. The English guys had no place to live. They stayed with girls they met. I stayed with Mark. We had to keep pushing back our debut date.”

Then Peter got custody of an infant daughter and kept her in New York. “She was 18 months old. It was a fucked up time. It was costing money to record material for a record, and I had to blow it off. Then I got an offer from Nashville.”

While he prepared to go to Nashville, his daughter’s mother decided she wanted the baby back. He moved in with his mother in Roanoke so he could commute back and forth from Nashville to custody hearings in Richmond.

“Nashville is where all the good music is now, and that’s why everybody goes there. That’s where the melody is, the lyrics. What used to be good about rock and roll is there. Sixty percent of all music sold last year was country, that’s how pervasive it is. It’s the thing, and it should be because it’s the best music. Most rap and heavy metal sucks.”

He got married in 1994, started writing songs and switched from bass to guitar. His wife was a country singer, so he got into that. “She had a band and needed a bass player, so I started sitting in.” The band went through different members and moved from folk to rock. Peter and his wife settled down in Stratford Hills where they each had a daughter to raise. Eventually they would add a son to the family.

“I’m slugging along here and it’s time to face reality, whatever the hell that is. I can play as well as anybody in this town, and I can rock harder than anybody and everyone who knows me knows that’s true. I do everything to the extreme. I don’t take anything lightly. I’m going to write some great songs, and my wife is going to sing them great, and everybody will see what a talent she is.

“So that’s where I’m at now. I want to do rock and roll. I want to go full time with something and make the sacrifices you need to make to be successful. I think I’m writing good songs, good enough for a publishing deal. I’m pushing forward. I’m back. I’m rested. I’m ready to do it the way it’s supposed to be done.”