Brett Meisner, the self proclaimed "bad boy" of rock and roll, is a world famous rock critic with more than two decades in the business. During his tenure, he's written for countless rock magazines such as Rolling Stone and Spin, in which his brutally honest, "take no prisoners" style has earned him just as many adversaries as fans. He counts fellow writers Lester Bangs and "former friend" Cameron Crowe among his contemporaries--in fact, it was Brett who came up with the idea for the screenplay to "Almost Famous," only to have Crowe steal it away from him. Meisner is also a true ladies man with over 900 sexual conquests notched on his bedpost. With his numerous connections in "the business," Brett can get into any club and can get backstage at any concert, where he's NEVER seen without his trademark clip-on shades. He's friends with just about everybody who's anybody, from Tommy Lee to Brian Wilson. And after spending most of his life in NYC, Brett took his act to the sunny world of Hollywood Hills, where he used his success as a writer to segue into acting. One of his first projects was a show for Vh-1 entitled "Rock and Roll Bad Boy TV," which taped six episodes but never saw the light of day. The reason? Brett Meisner is just "too controversial" and Vh-1 got cold feet at the last minute and tossed the whole thing in the can. Not one to be deterred easily, Meisner immediately made the leap to the big screen--his debut movie "Snow Blind" recently debuted at the Cannes Film Festival and should be hitting theatres sometime in the summer of 2005. In addition to all of this, Brett's book "30 Odd Years" (which immediately sold out its initial printing of 1,500 copies) is set to be re-released this fall. So, as you can see, things are looking good for Mr. Meisner. He even got married recently to his on-again, off-again girlfriend, a buxom beauty named Robin. But that's to be expected when one is as famous and well-respected as Brett is... I mean, this guy is not only a celebrity, he's also a major player on the Hollywood scene.

Or is he...?

By now, I'm sure many of you are pondering the question "Who the fuck is Brett Meisner?"
At least, that was MY first reaction when I first stumbled onto his website sometime in 2003.
I was perusing the Howard Stern newsgroup (as I often do), when I noticed a post from a guy named Brett Meisner who claimed to have a photograph of Jim Morrison's ghost. Meisner's post led readers to his website, rockandrollbadboy.com, where the photograph in question was hosted. The picture, which was supposedly taken by none other than Tom Petty, shows Brett posing at The Lizard King's grave in Paris--and a ghostly image of the late Doors singer can be seen behind him, complete with leather pants and everything. The Stern message board regulars were less than impressed (which is putting it mildly), and dismissed Brett's photograph as a result of someone with Photoshop and too much time on their hands, despite Brett's angry assertions that the picture had been verified as "100% authentic." This led to a lively, nasty debate between Brett Meisner and the Howard Stern fans which quickly regressed into name-calling and threats. This pattern has since been repeated on countless other newsgroups and websites, the feud with the guys at Metal Sludge being particularly memorable. I use the word "pattern" because it always happens the exact same way. It goes something like this;

1) Brett makes a post on a message board. Sometimes it's about the "Jim Morrison's Ghost" photo, sometimes not. Either way, Brett usually says something inflammatory, drops some names of his many celebrity friends and talks about his own status as a respected, well known public figure--but no matter what he says, there's always a link to his website.

2) People get annoyed with Brett and lay into him. "Nobody cares, tubby," they tell him. "You're full of shit." "Fuck off and die." (And so on.)

3) Brett responds to the insults and accusations with colorful language, often calling people names like "asscastle" and "dick snatcher." Besides, Brett tells them, they're all just jealous of him because he's living in LA, cavorting with celebrities and living a lifestyle they all just WISH they could have. For you see, they're all losers living in shithole towns and working dead-end jobs for no money... but HE is a winner, and they despise him for it.

You can say whatever you want about Brett, but one thing is certain--he knows how to get an audience for his website. The more people he pisses off, the more traffic he gets. I was one such person myself, reading through his Usenet rants and wondering "Who is this guy? And if he's a 'celebrity,' why have I never heard of him?" It was my curiosity that first brought me to rockandrollbadboy.com and I've never stopped going since. His "Hollywood Diaries" are especially entertaining, in which Brett spins tales of beating up hippies and bums, eating breakfast with Brian Wilson, stealing a donation can from a 7-11, hanging out backstage at various concerts and even going on a "hunger strike" when Rolling Stone refused to publish his controversial article regarding a Grateful Dead reunion. Some of the things he writes are undeniably vile, and it can't help but make you wonder... "Is this guy for real???

Brad & Brett Seperated At Birth?

Well, as it turns out, there is some dispute about that. The heart of Brett's site is definitely his message boards, made up mostly of people that saw one of Brett's posts on another message board, came to his site and now seem determined to expose him as a complete and utter fraud. They have some hilarious exchanges with Brett, bickering back and forth and saying some absolutely cruel things to Brett and his "fans." (I use the word "fans" in quotes because many of the posters on the board think that Brett's supporters are actually just Brett himself, posting under various pseudonyms.) It's the best part of the site in my opinion, watching Brett and his detractors go at it. And believe me, they just LOVE to pick apart Meisner's claims, one by one;

CLAIM: Brett is a well-known journalist with over twenty years in the business.

"Okay Brett," they say, "Then where is your work?" Despite Meisner's claims of writing many, many articles for countless magazines, most people seem to have great difficulty in finding even one example. If you do a search on the Internet for "Brett Meisner," you'll find plenty of links--but they invariably lead you back to his website. Whereas people like Cameron Crowe have plenty of their work online, Brett doesn't have ANY. None whatsoever. Doing searches for his name on the official sites for Rolling Stone and Spin yield no results, either. Of course, Brett has an answer for this. (He ALWAYS has an answer.) He talks vaguely about "copyright issues" and tells doubters to hit their local library and look for answers there. Some people have actually tried to do this, and claim they STILL found nothing. On the other hand, Brett's small (but very vocal) group of supporters say otherwise, and maintain that Brett's work can easily be found... if you look in the right place, that is. Many people have challenged Meisner directly, asking him to give specifics--as in "If you've written as much as you claim to have written, what specific magazines has your work appeared in and what are the exact dates?" For whatever reason, Brett has yet to give any definitive answers.

CLAIM: Brett played the starring role in a "major motion picture" that was screened at Cannes and should be released to theatres this summer.

Interesting thing about Brett's movie--a full length version of "Snow Blind" has supposedly already been shown to backers and distributors, yet there is ABSOLUTELY NO MENTION of this film on IMDB.com. And while Brett himself has a profile on that site, his film isn't mentioned there, either. Very strange, considering that IMDB lists all movies, even ones that are only in pre-production. So what about the Cannes Film Festival, you ask? Surely if Brett's movie was shown at Cannes, if MUST have been listed on their official website and schedule, right? Wrong. Stranger still, aside from the title, Brett gives very little details about the movie. He's never said who directed it, who co-stars in it, who produced it... nothing. All we know about this mysterious film is its title and its star--one Brett Meisner. And although Brett seems to think he has more than just a passing resemblance to Brad Pitt, I think we can all agree that he doesn't look like your typical movie star...

CLAIM: Brett had a TV show called "Rock and Roll Bad Boy TV" that was slated to air on Vh-1. Several episodes were shot, but the "controversy" surrounding Meisner led to the show being shelved.

Before this all went down, Brett had been hyping his show for months and swearing up and down that it would air. He was going to make all those naysayers eat their words once and for all and apologize to him for doubting his sincerity. After much hemming and hawing, Brett finally gave them a definite air date and even a network, which turned out to be Vh-1. But a search on VH1.com provided no mention of Brett Meisner or his soon-to-be-aired show. Never mind, Brett insisted, because if the show DOESN'T air, he will walk the streets of Hollywood carrying a sign that says "I'M A LIAR." Guess what happened? The show never aired. Brett quickly posted some "Associated Press" articles talking about both his show and its cancellation--but these articles were cut and pasted, with no links given. A search for "Brett Meisner" on the official AP website came up empty... yet again. Soon after, Brett provided a link on his site that would supposedly allow viewers to view a "CNN Live Press Conference" regarding the status of his failed show. But Brett's detractors were quick to point out some odd things about this "press conference." If CNN was behind this so-called press conference, they asked, why did it never air on the network? Why is there no mention of Brett on CNN.com? And why was Brett's website the ONLY place to host live, "streaming video" of the event? "Because it's phony," Brett's critics say. "You can tell it's phony by the old CNN font on the video... they don't use that font anymore. And look at the 'stock quotes' graphic! It NEVER changes!"

Even without this somewhat damning evidence, there's plenty of things about Brett's site that just don't quite add up. He has an online store, in which you can purchase official "Rock and Roll Bad Boy" merchandise such as beer steins and autographed pictures of Brett. This is all fine and good--but in order to purchase anything, you need to first fill out a very intrusive information form. This form asks for things like your social security number, your bank routing number, your PIN... hell, it even wants to know your fax number and your pager number. So what if you don't have, say, a fax machine? Too bad, because the form clearly states that "all fields are required." (And these fields also ask for such information as your sexual preference, how much money you make a year and your political affiliations. I mean, all of this information is necessary to buy a fucking beer stein?) Some people say they've jumped through all the hoops anyway, only to be told that the item they tried to order is "sold out." And there's more; Brett's "rock trivia" section has a decent number of legitimate facts, but there's plenty of inaccurate information as well. For example, Brett claims that once, during an outdoors Poison show, drummer Rikki Rocket shot a 9-point buck from behind his drum kit. This is a dubious claim, to say the least--Rocket is not only an animal lover, he's also a member of PETA. Another bit of trivia claims that KISS recorded a song called "Stutter" which offended people who suffer from that very speech impediment. Only one thing wrong, though--there is no such song. There is, however, a classic KISS tune about a sexy woman entitled "Strutter." Oh, and speaking of KISS, Brett claims to be friends with Gene Simmons and once spoke about having "a few beers" with him. Considering the fact that Gene doesn't drink, this has to be taken with a grain of salt. Besides, some of Brett's detractors actually wrote to Gene via his official website at genesimmons.com and asked him if he was friends with Brett. Simmons claimed to have never heard of Brett Meisner and bluntly stated "He's a liar." Does Brett have an explanation for this? Of course he does. "Gene is upset with me," Brett tells us.

So, the question remains... if this guy isn't who he claims to be, who the hell is he? Many people think that "Brett Meisner" is a character, and the entire website is a sham. But if this is true, what is the purpose of it all? Is the Brett character a parody of some well-known person? Is the website some kind of social experiment, in which someone claims to be successful and famous in order to see if saying it might actually make it happen? If so, this wouldn't be the first time this has happened. KISS used that very same strategy, attending their very first few shows in limousines and telling everybody how huge they were--even though they were absolute nobodies. The idea behind it was this; if you project an image of success and get people to believe it, you eventually WILL be successful. So maybe Brett's website is employing that same strategy. Or maybe "Brett Meisner" is somebody's alter ego, much like Tony Clifton was the alter ego of Andy Kaufman. However, if Brett Meisner is somebody's Tony Clifton, who is the Andy Kaufman hiding behind the curtains? Some people think it's director Kevin Smith, but I've heard a lot of other rumors as well. The simple fact is, nobody knows for sure. Maybe Brett Meisner is some arrogant guy with simple delusions of grandeur. Or maybe... just maybe... this guy is truly legit and the joke is on us.

Consider the following--on February 18th, Brett made an announcement on his message board about how Charlie Sheen and Denise Richards were going to get divorced. The information hadn't been made public yet, but since Brett is a journalist who lives in LA, he had the inside scoop. "Look for an announcement in the next week or so," Brett wrote. Well, nobody believed him, of course. They made all sorts of negative comments, telling him he was a loser, he was full of shit, etc. But then, just under two weeks later, an interesting thing happened--the announcement actually came! Somehow, some way, Brett had managed to scoop everybody. How did he do it? Who knows? And what was the story behind that character Jason Bateman played on a recent Saturday Night Live skit, with sunglasses and a name that sounded suspiciously like "Brett Meisner?" Although, to be fair, I must say that I've watched the clip and it sounded like they might also have been saying "Brent Mousner.") Brett seems to think it was based on him and was reportedly set to sue SNL--but apparently, things were settled out of court and Brett got some money out of it. At least, that's Brett's version of what happened.

I don't claim to know the real story behind Brett Meisner, or rockandrollbadboy.com. But there's definitely more to this website than meets the eye. So, I decided to go straight to the source and ask the man himself, operating under the assumption that he is, in fact, "real." I will say this much for Brett--when you aren't slinging insults at him, he comes off as fairly decent guy. He also responded to all my questions, even the tough ones. In other words, he had answers... he ALWAYS has answers...