Read an extract from Moby's autobiography

A pioneering musician on the American rave scene, Moby’s UK breakthrough came with his Twin Peaks-referencing crossover hit ‘Go’. The release landed him a deal with Elektra/Mute and an ever-decreasing amount of success, culminating in 1996’s disastrous, punky ‘Animal Rights’ album. His new autobiography, Porcelain, covers the period leading up to 1999’s worldwide smash ‘Play’, but we alight on the final leg of his ‘Animal Rights’ tour, somewhere in Eastern Europe…

Even before ‘Animal Rights’ had been released it had failed. Pre-release it had received a slew of egregiously bad reviews and my American record label had stopped returning my manager’s phone calls. Nevertheless we had an album party for the week it came out. At the party, I got drunk, played a short live set, managing to alienate the members of Blur, who for some reason were in the audience.

The next day I flew to New Orleans to play in a small bar for radio programmers at a national convention. Trent Reznor came to the show and came backstage to say hello. He said a few nice things about ‘Animal Rights’ and then went to sit in a booth. Earlier that day, I’d gotten a voice mail message from Axl Rose, who said he loved ‘Animal Rights’. He even said he’d be interested in working together. So Trent and Axl like ‘Animal Rights’. If only they wrote reviews for Spin or NME.

For my solo tour, we had opted for small European clubs, imagining them to be crowded and raucous and overflowing with punk rock energy and mayhem. Most nights, though, we had a hard time selling even 20% of the tickets in what were already tiny venues.

The final show of the ‘Animal Rights’ tour was in an Eastern European country I’d never heard of before. I held my head in my hands and said, “I’m so hungover”. As we flew, I realised I wasn’t just hungover, I had the flu. We drove to the hotel and I fell into bed feverish and promptly fell asleep.

Five minutes later, the phone rang. “Hello?” I croaked. “The promoter’s at the hotel. He’s worried about the show and really wants to talk to you,” said Ali, the tour manager.

I stood up and looked in the mirror. I wanted to feel glamorous, a rock star vaguely dissipated in a 19th century hotel. But I looked sick and bald.

When I stepped out of the hotel elevator I saw four large men standing with Ali. One of them walked over to me: “Moby, nice to meet you. I’m Constantin, your promoter.” Constantin was tall and well dressed and I noticed they all had gun bulges under their jackets.

“Ali tells me you’re not well. I’m so sorry, but we have good show planned tonight, no?”

I could barely stand or think, but my promoter was clearly Eastern European Mafia, and even in my fevered brain I knew that I couldn’t cancel the show and expect to leave with all of my fingers.

“I’m sick, but hopefully I can do the show.”

“You do show. Good. Also you do promo for album. I own record label, so onstage you throw cassettes into audience?”

“Ali, is that okay?”

“It’s okay, no problem,” Constantin answered for Ali. “Nice to meet you Moby.” He walked away through the lobby with
his bodyguards.

“Still want to cancel the show?” asked Ali.

“I’d rather not die here,” I said. “I’m going back to bed.”

“Lobby call in 90 minutes,” Ali said.

“Good night.”

I was woken by a ringing phone.

“Wakey wakey, time to throw cassettes into the crowd,” Ali said.

“I’m dying,” I complained.

“You will be if you don’t do the show,” he said, laughing.

I pulled on my stage clothes: jeans, T-shirt and a warm orange jacket that I thought looked like something Flea would wear. I looked in the mirror. I didn’t look like Flea. I looked like a sick man with a receding hairline and a ridiculous orange jacket. A minivan took us to the venue, a hockey arena.

“Hey Moby! How you feel? Constantin asked as he entered the locker room.

“Still sick,” I said.

“Ha, you be fine. These are cassette singles of ‘Feeling So Real’,” Constantin said.

I was too tired and scared to protest. It was the last night of a terrible tour and I was being asked by the local Mafia boss to throw cassettes into the crowd. Cassettes of a song that had been on my previous album.

“Okay I throw them in during ‘Feeling So Real’ is encore,” I said in suddenly broken English.

“Great!” he boomed. “Oh this is my stadium, you like?”

“It’s great.”

“Also I own MTV here, so do good show for them,” he instructed me. “And this is my girlfriend,” he said gesturing to an absurdly tall and bored model. “She wanna be Miss Bulgaria.” Constantin, the aspiring Miss Bulgaria, and his bodyguards left. I lay back down on the bench and passed out.

At 9pm, Ali woke me up. “Get your throwing arm ready, the kids want their free cassette singles.”

I walked on stage, my eyeballs hot with fever. The arena was almost half-full, and the audience was excited. We were mainly going to play older songs, as clearly the audience didn’t want to hear anything from ‘Animal Rights’. During the first song I felt my flu abating a little bit. By the third song I was banging my Octapad and yelling into the microphone. Was this the cure for the flu? Being compelled by mob bosses to play old rave anthems?

As the set was ending, Ali brought the box of ‘Feeling So Real’ cassettes on to the stage. He mimed throwing one into the crowd and and said in his best Eastern European accent, “Is promotion,” and I laughed.

“Thank you for a great night!” I yelled, and the crowd even yelled back. “This next song is ‘Feeling So Real’,” and the three thousand people in the arena yelled even more, as ‘Feeling So Real’ had been a hit throughout Eastern Europe. As the song started I took a handful of cassette singles and hurled them into the crowd. The people in the audience scurried to pick them up as if I were throwing millet into a UN refugee camp.

I looked over at the side of the stage. Constantin had taken his jacket off. He and his bodyguards and his girlfriend were smiling and dancing like little kids. I smiled, happy that I was going back to New York with all my fingers.

Moby’s book Porcelain is out now