Random questions.

I've been reading up on the guy a lot, in the three weeks that I've been consciously aware of his existence. But there are a few things I can't seem to find answers to by googling. Hopefully someone here knows.

1: The book Trailblazers the Tragic Lives... Is the stuff it says about Jeff considered trustworthy at all? I don't care if he was bisexual, but the exerpt I read sounded a lot like some sort of slash-fic. Like something the writer wishes happened. He claims Matt and Mick disliked each other, and that Jeff had a non-sexual love relationship with either Matt or Michael. Oh, and apparently Jeff made out with Keith a few minutes before he died, which he claims is from an interview with Mary G. He said plenty worse too. It has horrible ratings on Amazon.

2: How accepted is the theory that SMeyer based Edward's appearance on Jeff? As painful as it is to contemplate, talented people often inspire less talented people, and then stuff like Legolas by Laura happens. Or possibly Twilight. (Eddiekins is described as being "painfully beautiful" with messy brown hair, amazing cheekbones, full lips and a strong chin. And also glorious pecs, so from the neck down he's definitely based on someone else. She also seems to have given Edward some of Jeff's musical tastes, since he likes old stuff, but thinks the 60s through the 80s were crappola.)

3: In the video where Jeff and Gary Lucas play an early version of Grace, did Jeff honestly think harmonica improved it, or was he sabotaging Gary by drowning out his guitar riff? It just sounds like random notes that have nothing to do with the tune of the song. I haven't read Gary's book, so I don't know if he talks about this performance at all, but it seems to be one of the later ones. I can sort of understand that Jeff (I keep typing it as "Jesse", WTF?) was frustrated about not being allowed to play the guitar, having to settle for rattling on a tambourine, and Gary kind of plays like he's competing with Jeff rather than backing him up.

I tried to add a link to the actual video, but I got an "invalid URL" error. You've probably seen it.

4: Is the red ink incident actually explained in any of the books?

5: Okay, so this one is pretty gnarly. I've read several times that Jeff was identified by his piercings. But you know... usually dead people are identified by their teeth, and his were pretty characteristic. Someone who knew him well enough to recognize his navel ring should know what his gnashers looked like. Was he really horribly mangled, or something? I know this sounds very insensitive, but I've got some second hand knowledge of forensic pathology, so stuff like this tends to come to mind.

Edited by Natalie1207 - 5/6/2015, 04:01

1. No. It's a fake. This guy is not a real journalist. He wrote many similar "biographies" on classic Hollywood actors and musicians. His book full of mistakes and misspellings.


There is another fake biographer Marc Eliot, he writes about famous people too, mostly actors.

Ah... Welp, if you're going to write a book about "tragic lives", you should at least run it through the spell checker first, in respect for your subjects.

I'm gonna read up on Marc Eliot. Now I'm kind of intrigued.

I don't think they care, it's only for the money. Everyone is gay in their books.

Bret sounds like a right sweetheart, from what I've read about him. x(

Well, you can try one of his books, just out of curiosity. Maybe you'll like his style and find all those distortions funny.

Um, no thanksies. I was being sarcastic. (I thought the x( gave that away). Not going to support a writer who harasses and threatens his opposition. Blerh!

1. Like the other commenters here, I wouldn't consider the book particularly trustworthy. I haven't read it but from the reviews, most of it sounds like nonsense. I've never heard any evidence that Jeff was bisexual - in fact I once found an interview with Penny Arcade (his long-time friend) where she said he was quite homophobic before she knew him and introduced him to her queer performance-thingy, which always sounded kind of out of character to me. I do think it says in the Dream Brother book that Jeff gave Foti a kiss on the lips before going in the water. But I can totally see that happening with Jeff, as he was a dramatic and flamboyant guy; I don't think there was necessarily anything sexual involved, and I sincerely doubt they 'made out', considering he had a long-term girlfriend at the time in Joan Wasser.

3. Possibly it was just a live musical error which sounds a bit naff in hindsight with recorded video, but considering how big into Dylan Jeff was at the time, he was probably channeling some of that. I don't think it sounds that bad.

4. Red ink incident? You probably mean the story about him being in the bath a few nights before he died, - he chewed his pen so much that it split and he got ink all down his chin. That's about it, really.

5. I've no idea about this as it's the details of the case, but you have it the wrong way round. Dental records are usually used to identify a body as a last resort (i.e. if the body is so damaged that there's no other way to do it, like with burn victims, etc.). I would imagine that the pierced naval was enough to identify him, so they didn't need to put the family through the trauma of showing them his face/mouth/whole body.

1: Alright, the book is fanfiction! And yes, I agree. Kissing doesn't have to be anything sexual. I think a lot of people just like the idea that maybe he was into guys, because that's "cute".

4: Ah, okay. I wondered if he had put a cartridge of red ink in his mouth, pretending it was blood, and scared the kittens out of someone. It was mentioned somewere as an example of his "erratic behaviour", so I though it had to be something crazier than chewing a pen to death.

5: Ooops, I actually meant when they're otherwize unrecognizable. Several articles I've come across pointed out that he was, since he'd been under water for about a week. Drowning victims can look pretty terrible, so it's kind of understandable if they didn't reveal his face at the coroners office. I thought that under American law, a positive ID required that someone did indeed look at the whole body (according to a friend of mine), but maybe that's different between states? The way I read it, was that there was nothing else recognizable left of him at all, apart from the navel piercing. He'd only been in the water for less than a week, so I wondered if they were trying to say that he'd been dragged against junk at the bottom of the river and taken a serious beating.

Anyway, it's none of my business. I've just got a dark and morbid mind. Thanks for replying.

A coroner definitely would have looked at his face. His face was probably extremely puffy when he was discovered, which would have made him look quite different. His entire body was probably in similar shape. It's a terrible thing to think about and not worth the pain. It was a horrible accident that never should have happened and I still think about how unavoidable and depressing it is on a regular basis; even after being a fan for nearly 15 years. It is something that will always leave me wondering how and why?