Dee Wants to Rock

February 8, 2006
Photo: The Howard Stern Show

Twisted Sister lead man and radio host, Dee Snider came in today to clear the air and discuss why he and Howard haven’t spoken in the last 5 years. Dee started off his interview by saying that he went to the bathroom after the last guest, Buck Angel, and was careful not to touch anything in there without using paper towels. Howard said that Benjy stepped up during the commercial break and cleaned up the studio, so Howard thanked him for that. Howard said he and Dee were really good friends at one point, that they would hang out at each other’s houses all the time and Dee was a constant recurring guest on the show. It all came to an end though, when Dee was offered a job at a radio station in Hartford, CT. Howard told Dee he thought he should take the job, adding that he’d never tell anyone not to take an opportunity to make a living. Howard said that what was actually going on in his mind was that, because Dee was on the air at the same time and in the same market as him, he was now a competitor, which forced Howard to have to treat him as one. Howard revealed that he’s not willing to share his audience with anyone; he even considered it to be a personality problem. Dee asked Howard for permission because he was looking for Howard’s approval and felt bad that he had to, but was in bad financial shape, so he decided to do it.

Howard said that the competition mode was like putting Dee to the test but not telling him that he was testing him. Dee said that Howard was always very supportive and so he was confused by Howard’s actions back then. He said that the worst thing that came out of it was the breakdown of their friendship and it hurt a lot. Howard pointed out though that if Dee hadn’t taken the job, it would have made him feel very guilty and that probably would have been worse than what had actually happened. Howard said that he never revealed how he was really feeling and he feels bad for that. Robin claimed that Dee knew what was going on at the time, but he just couldn’t admit it to himself. Ralph Cirella called in to say that it was really both of their faults that the feud got so out of control. Dee apologized to Ralph because he always thought that it was Ralph who was undermining his friendship with Howard.

A caller wondered if Howard would give Dee another chance now that he was on satellite. Howard said that he wasn’t sure that Dee would even want to do anything like that anymore and said that he would give Dee his blessing again. Dee joked that he was going to probably pull the rug out from under him again. Dee told a story about playing a coliseum show once and yelling at a section of the audience. Dee said that he likes to see a reaction from his audiences when he plays and this one section just wouldn’t stand up and react. Dee stopped the show and singled them out, put the spotlights on them and started yelling at them to stand up. Soon the rest of the audience was chanting “STAND UP!” over and over and flipping this section off. Dee, now livid, raced off stage and ran back to his dressing room. His tour manager came yelled at him and asked what he was doing. He then explained to Dee that the section he had just berated was the handicapped section. Dee felt bad and remembered that he thought he saw some guy try to stand up, but the guy quickly crumpled back into his seat.