I attended a Journey/Montrose/Van Halen concert on April 14th 1978. It was held at Will Rogers auditorium in FT Worth Texas. Van Halen was the opening act and Journey was the headliner. A very strange incident happened during the Journey set. A wild-eyed white guy wearing white pants and no shirt stormed onto the stage and grabbed Ross Valory's Bass guitar neck in the middle of a song. Several roadies grabbed the guy and pried his fingers loose from the tug-of-war he was having with Mr Valory. Normally; anyone who did this would have suffered a beat-down that they would remember forever, but this time the guy was treated gingerly. Either the roadies were very well trained or were very aware of a TV camera crew's presence in the wings. One of the band members remarked to the audience "I guess he wanted to play Bass", and the show was restarted without any more incidents. Several weeks later I was watching the Channel 5 news in Ft Worth when they showed a very quick clip of the incident from the camera I had seen in the wings. The news report concerned violence occurring at local rock concerts. At the time I thought something didn't seem right about the actions of everyone involved. It just felt like it was staged and not true. I don't believe that this incident and camera presence were coincidental. It didn't pass the smell test then or now.
Van Halen played for about 45 minutes, and Montrose for about the same time. The Halen were touring for their first album and were not headlining yet(They soon would be). Montrose was touring for the "Jump On It" and "Open Fire" albums. RIP Ronnie Montrose. You had an amazing talent....
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