Seth Marquee either was or was not a sludge-rock bass player from Mississippi who smoked opium and put applesauce on his testicles. During blurred-out, open-sore tours up the Eastern Seaboard, he would huff glue, give himself IQ tests, order hookers, and watch Labyrinth all night long. Marquee was a legend, some would say in his own mind, gaining notoriety in the '80s with Alabama doom-metal band the Contaminants. As bass players go, he was okay, but his story lies in the things he would do to be "rock and roll." He had self-imposed eccentricities that he thought made him mysterious, like his idol Jimmy Page. Mainly, Marquee wanted to get laid. It was all for sex. He'd say he was haunted by the ghost of Herman Melville. Marquee cared more about the musician's lifestyle, and sex, than he did about playing music. For him, it wasn't about playing the show, it was about what went on after the show. His performances took place in stained, cigarette-burned motel rooms decorated with lily flowers (because Jimmy Page had lilies). I tracked down Marquee's roadie/manager, Walter Bruxton, who now lives in Atlanta. We spoke for an hour and a half. It all sounded like bullshit to me.

Who was Seth Marquee?

Walter Bruxton: He was a beer- and drug-guzzling infant who never lived a real life. He was a liar.

What was your job? Sounds like you were friends.

I was a bodyguard. I was paid by management to look out for him and drive the van. I couldn't stand him. I'd sock him in the face when I knew he wouldn't remember. I didn't like the way he treated girls. He was into tests. He made girls do math problems and IQ tests. He'd say he could only have an erection if he had sprouts in his mouth, and a Hitchcock movie had to be on. Or he would make a girl hold a knife while he dressed up like a female version of the Mad Hatter. Sometimes he'd put on John Denver. Or he'd make the girl wear a frog costume. He traveled with a frog suit. Sometimes he would say he was possessed by the ghost of Herman Melville. Or Harriet Tubman. I heard him tell one girl that he founded McDonald's. He didn't even know who Herman Melville was.

And that turned girls on?

If they were high enough, yeah. It was all about making himself seem complicated. Because Jimmy Page was complicated.

So he's possessed by the woman who founded the Underground Railroad freeing slaves, he invented the Big Mac, John Denver's "Leaving on a Jet Plane" is on, he needs you to divide 9,941 by 5,000 while wearing a frog suit, and he's got sprouts in his mouth? I'm totally turned on. Just the Big Mac part alone. Was he a good bass player?

No.

What does he do now?

I have no idea. Someone told me he lives in Turkey.

What do you do now?

I teach kindergarten. I bench-press 280 pounds.

What did he care about?

Sex. I only worked with him on one tour. I don't think he did much after that. The Contaminants broke up. One of the guys went on to be in Crowbar. If bass players were painters, Seth would be Jackson Pollock.

Why?

Because he was all about being something besides what he really was.

Which was what?

An asshole. He sucked his thumb, too. No one knew about that but me. The other band members would see him and he'd act like he was scratching his nose.

And he had lilies in his room like Jimmy Page?

They were cheap motel rooms. With cockroaches and pubes on the drain. I started putting fake flowers in his room, because he couldn't tell the difference. He idolized Led Zeppelin. He tried the sex with a fish thing once. He stole a live lobster from a Chinese restaurant in Jacksonville, Florida, and brought it back to his room. It ended up biting him on the dick. I heard the girl scream, and made her leave. My job sucked. I socked him in the face for that.

What were other influences for him?

He tried to do a Ziggy Stardust unisex thing, and he looked like a bad tranny. He would eat his eye boogers. Once, in a bathroom, he ran his finger through his own stream of urine, then put it in his mouth.

How do you know?

I was holding him up.

Tell us more.

We visited a famous actor's daughter's house in Nashville, and she had an aquarium with exotic fish. It was an afterparty. Seth was trying to be a rock star, and he reached in and grabbed one of the fish and swallowed it. He got really sick, was throwing up. The girl made us leave. On the way out, he spat the fish up, still alive, into a plant in the corner of the room. I put it back in the aquarium.

That's amazing.

No, it's not.

Yes, it is.

Seth's attempt at all this big excess fell short. He tried to be suave, mysterious, and complicated, but he was just a giant clodhopper. Sex life with fake intricacy, like with forced innuendos and hang-ups, isn't for me. He tried to act like only certain things would get him off. Really, the guy would have banged anything that squatted to piss.

Hang-ups like what?

Like he could only have sex if the girl wore a Scooby Doo mask, or a Ronald Reagan mask.

How do you know all this?

He would brag about things the next day. After a while I started to realize he was an idiot.

Scooby Doo is pretty hot. I don't know. Why did you tell me how much you could bench-press?

I think it's pertinent.

How so?

Because I'm a strong man.

Who's hotter: Scooby Doo or Ronald Reagan?

What are you saying?

I'm saying, I think you find Scooby Doo attractive, and you just can't admit it. Come on, we can do this.

You're messed up. Good-bye. [Hangs up the phone.]