Dr. Zhivegas and the Lingering Question

Left: What's On Vegas editor Martin Stein, Dr. Zhivegas singer Frankie Muriel and me before making a jackass of myself yet again.

Lori Nelson from Station Casinos phoned the other day, a funny tone in her voice.
"Did you ever write for Circus magazine?" she asked.
Lori is one of my favorite publicists. She trusted me not to crash cars as a Palace Station valet, and handed me the empty showroom at Green Valley Ranch to do with what I pleased as a lounge singer. (It remained empty.)
Whatever her reason for asking this question, I knew it would be interesting. Before whatever it is that you call what I do now, I enjoyed a spectacularly unspectacular career as a rock journalist. My first post-college job was the plotline of "Almost Famous." I rode tour buses and limos with bands into the backstage areas of hockey arenas. Of course, it was with the wrong bands (hair metal), in the wrong decade (the early '90s) and with the wrong magazine (not Rolling Stone). Still, it was cooler than going to law school like my parents hoped.
Lori mentioned my lounge-singer column/debacle to the frontman for Dr. Zhivegas, whom Red Rock Casino just hired to play weekends at 10 p.m.
"Wait!" Frankie Muriel said. "I know that guy!"
It was sometime in what feels like the late 1600s. I was on assignment covering the critically important Nelson concert in St. Louis. Muriel's band, King of the Hill, who lived there, had just had what would prove to be its only hit, "Drop the Gun." I had an expense account and a desire to hang with anyone whose name wasn't Matthew or Gunnar.
I remember rides on both the St. Louis arch and back at my hotel room with the band's own version of Kate Hudson. The problem is that alcohol was so heavily involved -- as it always needs to be for sex with me to become an option -- that only disjointed memory bursts are retrievable.
I looked forward to seeing my old friend, hoping that a reunion at the launch party for his new band's Red Rock stint might clear things up. After Dr. Zhivegas' set, Lori escorted me backstage with Jo Ann (who was more of a sport than she had to be about my obsession), What's On Las Vegas editor Martin Stein, and assorted guests.
Frankie and I exchanged our first hellos in nearly 20 years. I told him that his band's hit was lodged indelibly in my brain. To prove it, I started singing "Drop the Gun" out loud. Then I asked what I came to discover: what he had remembered about my lost weekend. Who was Kate Hudson and what processes (other than vodka-cranberries) were responsible for my conquest?
Frankie gave the matter some thought before replying.
"Dude," he said, "I have no memory of that at all." He added: "Are you sure that was us you hung out with?"
On the ride home, I realized that "Drop the Gun" was not King of Hill's hit. Frankie had stood there, without saying a word, as I sang him a song by a band called Kings of the Sun.