The Strange Ballad of Doc McGhee | 22
On August 6, 1989, a chartered 757 nicknamed āThe Magic Busā took off bound for the USSRā¦on board were Motley Crue, Bon Jovi, The Scorpions, Skid Row, Ozzy Osbourne, Cinderella, and a few othersā¦It was the dying days of the soviet unionā¦but other than the communist hardliners, few people were sad about thatā¦Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the USSR, had ushered in the era of glasnost and perestroikaā¦reforms were being enacted and few freedoms were creeping into soviet societyā¦This trip was part of thatā¦a plane full of western rockers was headed to play a two-day festival in Moscow with attendance expected to top 200,000 peopleā¦it was the āMoscow Music Peace Festivalāā¦ it was hoped that the event would promote greater understanding between the west and the east during this time of great change at the end of the cold warā¦It was also set to raise money in conjunction with the āMake a Difference Foundation,ā an organization dedicated to helping local Russian people who were addicted to drugs and alcoholā¦a lot of the money would go to messaging and rehab treatmentsā¦Waitāwhat?... Motley Crue, Ozzy Osbourne, and all these other acts were part of a highly sensitive, properly diplomatic, international anti-drugs-and-alcohol project inside the soviet union?...Oh, yesā¦and on the plane, Ozzy was drunk the whole timeā¦his guitarist, Zakk Wylde, was tripping on LSDā¦you had to be careful where you stepped because there were syringes on the floorā¦at the back of the cabin, people rotated in and out of informal jam sessions fueled by booze and drugsā¦Now youāre probably wondering who came up with this idea and how it ever actually happened?...well, thatās a bit complicatedā¦it involved the CIA, Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega, and 640 tons of marijuana smuggled into North Carolinaāand the teenage mutant ninja turtlesā¦and at the centre of all of it was a man named Doc McGheeāwho just happened to be the manager of most of the bands on the planeā¦This is episode 22 of āUncharted: Crime and Mayhem in the Music Industryāā¦itās how a drug-smuggling band manager helped end the Cold Warā¦have I got a story for you.Show contact info: X (formerly Twitter): @AlanCrossWebsite: curiouscast.caEmail: Alan@alancross.ca Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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On August 6, 1989, a chartered 757 nicknamed āThe Magic Busā took off bound for the USSRā¦on board were Motley Crue, Bon Jovi, The Scorpions, Skid Row, Ozzy Osbourne, Cinderella, and a few othersā¦It was the dying days of the soviet unionā¦but other than the communist hardliners, few people were sad about thatā¦Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the USSR, had ushered in the era of glasnost and perestroikaā¦reforms were being enacted and few freedoms were creeping into soviet societyā¦This trip was ...