When I flounced into his suite, Robert was winding up a rare interview with a sweet-faced kid who seemed particularly thrilled to meet me. Actually, Cameron Crowe has much better recall about that afternoon than I do. Perhaps because it was his first gig writing for Rolling Stone, and he was interviewing Led Zeppelin. Apparently Robert had been enlightening Cameron about the significance of the GTO’s and the other girls on the scene. Here’s what actually made it into the article that day:

“It’s a shame to see these young chicks bungle their lives away in a flurry and rush to compete with what was in the old days the good-time relationships we had with the GTO’s and people like that. When it came to looning, they could give us as much of a looning as we could give them.”

(Cameron:)

“When I first met you at the Continental Hyatt, Robert and Jimmy had been talking about you and how important the GTO’s were. So when you showed up and were so nice and appreciative of the same things I loved as a fan, it was like, ‘Here’s royalty.’ You were a rock star in your own way, but so approachable and so much about loving the music. And you cannot discount the fact that they set the tone about how to view you.”

[[I love how similar this all seems to scenes in Almost Famous with William trying to interview Stillwater, Penny generally being fabulous, etc]]

“And that’s the spirit of Penny Lane. She’s not in a crumpled heap by the side of the road. She’s more rock than the band, and that was always the point. There’s a scene in the director’s cut of Almost Famous where Billy Crudup talks about, ‘When you get a little bit of success, your career becomes about maintaining the lifestyle.’ So many of those guys trail off into the world of lifestyle maintenance. And who’s left knowing what it’s truly about?”

I know the answer: “The girl on the side of the stage!” Cameron smiles, “Exactly. That girl. She is still there. And she’ll always be there. I wanted the whole movie to be about that feeling, and the celebration of that feeling. The girl off to the side of the stage is the keeper of the flame.”

(from Let’s Spend the Night Together by Pamela Des Barres)

“When you tell me how it’s captured a feeling for real people - the groupies and rockers - that’s why I did it. To capture that amazing feeling.”

Cameron seems surprised when I tell him that many modern groupies call themselves Band Aids. “If that term empowers someone, whether she calls herself a groupie - which to me doesn’t have a stigma - or a Band Aid, then fire any arrow you want at the movie, and I’ll regard it with amusement. I love that the opportunity wasn’t missed to create a hero of the muse.”

(from Let’s Spend the Night Together by Pamela Des Barres)