Melissa Etheridge recounts a strange experience with an obsessive fan in the new episode of U Discover Music’s animated video series Beyond The Bus.
The incident took place early in Etheridge’s career, when she finally had some money to upgrade to “the fancier bus.” She said the bus, which was black and white, “looked like a late ’80s disco inside.” It was driven by a man named Oreo, who she describes as “a white boy from the South – all he needed was a six-pack of cola and a pack of cookies to drive.”
The encounter happened after a show, and Etheridge said it was important to note it was 1989, before she came out as a lesbian. After everyone left and the bus was getting ready to pull out, there was one young man in the parking lot who stood in front of the bus.
“He was clean-shaven, with kind of long hair, but without too much of a mullet,” Etheridge recalls. “He was going ‘Melissa, Melissa, I love you!’ And I believe he’d had a couple of drinks. He basically stood in front of the bus and wouldn’t move, even though Oreo was about to start driving.”
Etheridge says after Oreo grabbed the bat he had on the bus and threatened to hit him, he ran away.
Something like that never happened to Melissa again, with the rocker noting, “After I came out I didn’t have any more young men jumping on my bus … a few young women, but not very many young men.”
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