FULL MOON

The Who’s Keith Moon is routinely championed as one of music’s most explosive and creative drummers. His exploits away from the drum kit are legendary, too, whether bribing a stagehand to add more dynamite for a surprise explosion of his drum set at the end of The Who’s 1967 performance on The Smothers Brothers Show to earning an master’s degree in wrecking hotel rooms and destroying drum kits, the legend of Moon endures. But admiring “Moon The Loon” from a safe distance perched in your seat during a Who concert is one thing, living with him 24 hours a day was its own uniquely challenging experience. Annette Walter-Lax was Keith Moon’s girlfriend for the last four years of his life, spending wild times with him in Los Angeles and London and was with him the night he tragically died of an accidental overdose. Her new book, The Last Four Years: A Rock Noir Romance, in conversation with Spencer Brown, is an intimate and illuminating look at the man behind the myth and presents an insightful and occasionally somber portrait of one of music’s most extraordinarily talented and colorful personalities.

GOLDMINE: You were Keith Moon’s boyfriend for the last four years of his life, hence the title of your book The Last Four Years. What was best and worst things about having Keith Moon as your boyfriend?

ANNETTE WALTER-LAX: The best thing about having Keith as a boyfriend was that he took me for an experience in my life that I had never thought in a million years was going to happen to me. He was funny, he was witty, and he was the type of boyfriend I could be with at that age myself. So, he really happened to me in the right time for me because I came to London looking for adventure, and I got it; boy, did I get it!

So, yeah, the worst thing about being his girlfriend was, I suppose, the dark side that he had. And had I known then what we know now about the issues of the mental illnesses, the diagnoses and things, I probably would have had a different approach to the whole thing. But I thought it was all