The former Headbangers Ball host talks Sunset Strip debauchery, the legend of The Cathouse and his new one-man show.
No one had a better front row seat to the boom and eventual bust of the hard rock hair-metal scene than Riki Rachtman. As both host of MTV’s Headbangers Ball and co-founder of the legendary Los Angeles sleaze pit The Cathouse, Rachtman saw more than his fair share of XXX sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll.
These days, Riki has traded his dazed nights on the Sunset Strip for a home in North Carolina, which is where HUSTLERMagazine.com caught up with him via the phone to discuss the gory gloryhole days on the Strip, the legend of The Cathouse and his one-man show One Foot in the Gutter.
HUSTLERMagazine.com: Are you okay being interviewed by us?
Riki Rachtman: Am I okay being interviewed by HUSTLER? (Laughs.) Yes. I don’t care what people think. The very first interview I ever did about Cathouse, which was way before MTV, was for [HUSTLER sister publication] Chic, the porno magazine. In that interview they called me “Hollywood’s Reigning Sleaze King.”
Did that title come with a crown and a cape?
There was no crown. Or cape. Or throne. None that I remember.
