Celebrity run-ins

Members of The Anniversary have also managed to survive run-ins with such celebrity hot shots as Michael Stipe, Courtney Love and Winona Ryder during the past couple of years.\nCelebrity Run-In #1 -- Michael Stipe, November 1999, at an after-party for a CMJ Label Showcase for which the band performed at New York's Bowery Ballroom.\nThe band saw that Stipe was attending the same party as they were. Drunkenly, they approached him.\n"We wanted to see what we could get away with," vocalist/guitarist Justin Roelofs says. "So we convinced Janko (Christian Jankowski, drummer) to go up to Michael Stipe and ask him about politics… So he went up to him and says something like 'Hey Michael, you're into politics, what about Warren Beatty for president…" So then Michael stood up and said, 'I'll show you what it's like to be political,' just rips off his shirt, kisses him on his neck and everyone at the table explodes in laughter. I think the response he was trying to get was complete humiliation, and I think he succeeded in completely humiliating Chris, but for us that was like the coolest thing he could have done." \nCelebrity Run-In #2 -- Courtney Love with Winona Ryder, November 2001 at a concert at the Troubadour in Los Angeles, playing with Mars Volta (former members of At the Drive-In).\n"They'd heard it was the hip show to be at (because Mars Volta was playing)," Roelofs says. "Courtney Love was just exactly what you would imagine her to be… And she's just babbling on about how she's going to play the new (Nirvana songs). She had the two unreleased Nirvana songs that she keeps holding against Geffen before they release the Nirvana box set. Well, she had them at the show and she decided to play them after the Mars Volta (performance). No one even payed attention. I guarantee that she left the CD-R copy at the Troubadour." \nCelebrity Run-In #3 -- Winona Ryder (see aforementioned L.A. concert with Courtney Love)\n"(Winona) was completely embarrassed by (Love's behavior), because I guess they're friends, but she was apologizing to Adrianne (Pope, keyboardist). And Adrianne and her ended up talking all night," Roelofs says. "Then right before we went on stage, there was this girl going, 'A-dri-anne, A-dri-anne,' on the side of the stage. I remember Jim going, 'Who is that geek?' We found out after the show that it was Winona Ryder. Then two months later she gets busted for shoplifting. So we've been trying to have Adrianne send her money or help her out or something. Since they're such good friends"