He said, “You think just because you’re gorgeous you get what you want?” And he had this fabulous Italian accent.
I said, “Yes.”
And he said, “Okay, then. You are right.” And he put out the cigarette. He said, “I’m Niccolo Argento.” And I thought that was such a great name. I kept saying it over and over. Niccolo Argento. Niccolo Argento. He bought me a drink. And then I bought him one. And then we did a line or two off the side of the pool, as you do, and then I realized he had no idea who I was. Which was sort of a novelty, at that point. Because most people at least knew “Honeycomb.” So I tell him about the band and he tells me about himself, that he travels from place to place, never staying anywhere for too long. He calls himself an “adventurer.” He says he’s in search of a “full life of experiences.” Then, it comes out that he’s a prince. He’s an Italian prince.
The next thing I know, it’s four in the morning and we’re in my hotel room, listening to records at full volume, and the hotel staff are telling us to keep it down and Niccolo has LSD and he’s telling me he loves me and I’m saying that I know it sounds crazy but I think I love him, too.
Simone: I wanted to see her and I had a few weeks off between gigs and I was a little worried about her, which at this point was just status quo. So I bought a plane ticket.
Daisy: Over the next few days, I told Nicky everything. I bared my soul to him. He loved the music I loved. And the art I loved. And the pills I loved. He made me feel like he was the only one that could ever understand me. I told him how lonely I was and how hard it had been to work on that album. And how I felt about Billy. I didn’t hide anything from him. I opened up and just let it pour out. And he listened to it all.
At one point, I said, “You must think I’m crazy.”
And he said, “My Daisy, everything about you makes perfect sense to me.”
It seemed like there wasn’t anything about me, any truth that I could tell him, that he wouldn’t accept. Acceptance is a powerful drug. And I should know because I’ve done ’em all.
Simone: I flew into Thailand and I was exhausted and jet-lagged and I got on a rickety bus to get to the hotel. I checked in. I asked the concierge what room Lola La Cava was in and … she’d checked out. She was gone.
Daisy: Nicky and I were out at this disco in Patong. And he got this idea that we should pack up and go to Italy. He said, “I have to show you my country.” I must have called somebody and booked two tickets to Florence at some point because these tickets just showed up at the door one morning.
So Nicky and I flew to Italy. And I swear I was halfway there before I remembered Simone was on her way to meet me.
Simone: I tracked her down by pretending to be her while talking to her credit card company.
Daisy: Nicky and I were in the Boboli Gardens in Florence when he said, “Let’s get married.” So then we flew to Rome and got married by some family friend of his who was a priest. We said I was Catholic. I lied to a Catholic priest. But I was wearing this gorgeous ivory off-the-shoulder cotton lace dress with huge bell sleeves.
I regret that marriage, but I do not regret that dress.
Simone: I finally found Daisy in this grand, massive hotel room overlooking Vatican City in Rome. In Rome! I had to fly halfway around the world and back to find her. And when I did, she was completely bombed, naked except for a pair of underwear. And she had chopped her hair off into this shaggy bob.
Daisy: That was a great haircut.
Simone: It was a really good haircut.
Daisy: I’ve always said, “The Italians know hair.”
Simone: Daisy didn’t even seem all that surprised to see me. Which just told me how messed up she was. And the first thing I noticed when I sat down was that she had a huge diamond ring on her hand. And this guy comes out—thin body, thick curly hair—and he had no shirt on. And Daisy says, “Simone, this is my husband, Niccolo.”
Daisy: Technically, marrying Niccolo made me a princess. That can’t be left out of the equation. I did like the idea of belonging to a huge royal family. Of course, that’s not what my life with Nicky was like at all. I should have known being with Nicky wouldn’t turn out the way he made it seem. Here’s a lesson for everybody, take it from me: Handsome men that tell you what you want to hear are almost always liars.
Simone: I tried to get her to come home but she wasn’t budging. Because when I would tell her there were things she had to do—you have to get ready to tour for your album or you should stop doing so many drugs at one time or you should try to spend a little time sober—there was Nicky telling her she didn’t have to do anything she didn’t want to do. He was there, amplifying all of her bad instincts. All the time. He was like a bird chirping in her ear, validating every impulse.
Karen: When we all met back up in January, Daisy wasn’t anywhere to be found.
Graham: We are sitting in Teddy’s office over at Runner with Rich Palentino and we’re all gonna give the final mix a listen. And we were all expecting to … Well, we all figured we knew exactly what we’d recorded, give or take.
Warren: I was hungover and there was no coffee in either of the coffeepots at Runner’s offices. I said to the secretary at the front desk, “What do you mean there’s no coffee?”
And she said, “The machine is broken.”
I said to her, “Well, I’m sure as shit not gonna be alive in this meeting then.”
She said, “You’re too much.” And then she seemed a little bit mad, like I couldn’t get a read on her. And I was really hungover.
I said, “Wait, I haven’t slept with you, have I?”
I had not.
Karen: The album starts playing, we’re all sitting around the table …
Eddie: First song, out of the gate, “Chasing the Night,” he changed my fucking lick. He changed my motherfucking lick.
Billy: I don’t think I realized, until we were listening to it all together … I don’t think I realized just how many things Teddy and I had changed.
Eddie: It just got worse from there. He changed the tuning on “Please.” Completely changed it and rerecorded it. As if I wasn’t going to notice he’d shifted to Nashville tuning. Like I’m not going to notice that the song has to be played on a different goddamn guitar. And everybody else, they saw it! They could see what he’d done. But no one was going to speak up, you know what I’m saying? Because Teddy and Runner were so happy with the record that they were talking about booking stadiums and pressing over a hundred masters and all this shit. They’re saying they want to release “Turn It Off” as soon as possible and they think it can hit number one. So everybody had dollar signs in their eyes and nobody said much of anything to Billy. Or Teddy.
Karen: He’d pulled my keys off of two songs. And I was mad, of course I was mad. But what were we gonna do? You’ve got Rich Palentino so excited about the album, he’s spitting when he talks.
Warren: I’d have respected it a lot more if Billy hadn’t tried to pretend he wasn’t producing the album with Teddy. I don’t like underhanded shit. I don’t like saying one thing and doing another.