Rockin' the Vote with Martha Quinn - My MTV All-Nighter

As an unsullied early-career kid, circa 1982-83, I had but one dream: to move to NYC and work in business development for MTV.  I got my shot in 1985, but before then something even more magical happened: I met and of course fell in love with Martha Quinn.

My Martha: Ah, the Eighties ...

Well, we all were in love with Martha, once she and her confreres hit the airwaves in August '81. But of course I was sure that I loved her more than anyone else possibly could.

California My Way - 5th Dimension, later Main Ingredient

So it's late 1983, and I'm an east coast boy on his first visit to California. Had already hit the beach in Malibu with Dick "Laugh-In" Martin, then rented a car and drove in a SoCal freeway Lot-49-and-L.A.-Woman revery down "the 5" and then east and west on Ball Road, bulked at Spaghetti Station, before checking in to the Anaheim Hyatt on the Disneyland perimeter for two days of the Western Cable Show.

I quickly found out where the night's action would be: upstairs at the WASEC reception.

Deep Purple: Place in Line

Bob Pittman was there, I schmoozed him a bit, hung with the marketing guys for a while, and then I spotted her, perched on a stool at the countertop, and lighting up the hospitality suite with her smile and laughter.  Martha Quinn - tiny as a mouse, and bubbly like new champagne. Chortling along: uplink site techie Paul Beeman, a jolly middle-aged guy from the Smithtown TOC.

Diamond Dave - Always On

What developed next was a boisterous, high-pitched music trivia game between the three of us, and it went on for over three hours.  Her handler got cranky because Martha was engrossed with us instead of working the crowd, but finally gave up and left us alone.  Forward we rolled like Def Leppard - On Through The Night.

I'll Join You In That Time Capsule

Martha really knew her 60's stuff, 80's Thompson-Twin techno/poppy-pop, and folk music, and she of course had the inside track on all the acts of the moment including the L.A. hair-metalers.  Beeman was an encyclopedia - acts, songs, dates, labels and chart position.  I held my own on heavy metal/NWOBHM, 70's soul/R&B, San Francisco sound - and early 50's vocal groups.  It is safe to say that we all showed each other up, and blew each other away.  Over and over and over.  I could hear music....

*  *  *  *  *

We stayed up nearly 'til sunrise.  Paul disappeared.  Great breathtaking fun, lots and lots of jazzy, twinkly eye contact.  Where would it end?  Well, it would end back in New York....

All Within Reach ... If You Know What To Do.

Naturally - what a rube! - I imagined/hoped that this night was just the beginning.  We exchanged numbers in the Hyatt lobby, agreed to each think about a trivia question that was really just a conversation continu-er concerning Van Halen and the high number and interesting selection of cover songs they had produced and might next produce, and we made vague plans to see each other in New York.

Martha in Malibu - I Want My ...

I had to call through the MTV switchboard many, many fruitless times for her (it was obvious there was a never-ending queue of clowns calling and panting for her, and I guess I was one, albeit ultimately with an edge of slight legitimacy), and we did indeed re-connect later that winter, for coffee on Astor Place, and separately, briefly and awkwardly, at the Cherry Lane Theater, but the magic was gone.  She was in her world, and I a visiting nobody from Nowheresville.

I later had opportunities to cross paths at the end-of-'84 MTV New Year's Eve Party, and at the 1985 MTV Music Awards, but by then fate had cruelly decided that nothing would materialize.

Still, ....