Hell's Angels

One of my neighbors happens to be The Hells Angels. They have a clubhouse on third street that's been there for a million years. My friend Ken Nahoum once photographed them. It was an elaborate process to get them to allow it. He was persistent and finally won them over. He struck up a friendship with a few of the Angels including the famous Chuck Zito. When Ken and I used to make MTV videos together, he would occasionally hire the Hells Angels to be security. Crowd control on the streets of New York. Sometimes he would put them in the videos as extras. One time we were shooting a Robert Palmer video and Chuck was there. A bunch of Angels on motorcycles were extras. During a long break, a bunch more Angels showed up. Ken and I had Harleys at the time. Chuck Zito turned to Ken and asked if we wanted to go for a ride with the Hell's Angels. No shit. Well of course. We tooled around loudly on the west side highway. That was some experience. When I was doing this drawing, one of the wives came out and asked if she could see my sketch. She was blown away. I told her I would mail some prints to the Angels. She said she couldn't wait.