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Too much junkie business >> Taking stock of Royal Trux
by JOHNSON CUMMINS
Even without the palatial digs, to say that Herrema and her partner-in-crime Neil Haggerty are not your garden-variety indie rockers would be a huge understatement. Physically, the couple come across more like Keef Richards and Anita Pallenberg than Thurston and Kim. And to cap it off, Herrema was a (gulp) Calvin Klein model.
"At that point money really opened up new avenues that we would've never explored. Like, I wanted to learn how to drive, so I just went out and bought a Jaguar and learned how to drive," Herrema laughs. This new, moneyed lifestyle has also turned the pair into investment gurus (Herrema offers up this tip: "The trick is to not watch your stocks too closely."). But before Haggerty and Herrema played the Dow Jones, they spent a lot of time jonesin' for some down. Heroin addiction had left them strung out on cots in New York's shelter system and, eventually, in hospital beds. "It got to the point that Neil and I were in and out of hospitals. The worst it got was when I was in the hospital for about a month when my arm had abscessed and an infection had spread to my lungs. It still took me four more hospital visits before I finally kicked for good." Herrema will also toss off comments that all overdoses are simply "getting what you deserve," but you are not likely to coax any public service messages out of her, be it barbed or candy-coated. "I wish I could be one of those people who could do drugs and then leave them alone. A lot of my friends can do that and it drives me nuts, because I really wish I could be like that. But unfortunately I can't." Royal Trux never did anything to hide their love of drugs. In fact, they could be accused of subscribing to the heroin chic of the late '80s when the majority of Trux photos show Haggerty and Herrema in different stages of nodding off. "Those photos of us looking stoned are just because we were stoned all the time. I'm still paying for that because I can't do an interview without somebody mentioning heroin. I guess in 10 years I won't be able to do an interview without talking about investing in stocks."
At Jailhouse Rock on Monday, |
Royal Trux singer/indie babe Jennifer Herrema is a bit perplexed. Not only has she been putting up with lame-ass journalists all day, but she's also trying to organize the painting of her ranch house in Castleton, Virginia. The Royal Trux ranch house is nestled on four acres of land, housing their own 24-track recording studio. It's so big they will go days without ever going into some rooms.
They officially became a "major act" when they stunned the entire industry, signing a $1.5 million deal with Virgin in '95. After three albums that Virgin "couldn't understand," they were better off by a ranch house, studio and Jaguar--and back on their first label Drag City, where they always wanted to be.