CLEVELAND, Ohio -- The journalist captures another side of the rock star. It is a thoughtful, in-depth portrait that goes behind the music. Thousands of readers go along for the ride vicariously -- poring over every word, every quote that appears on the pages of a glossy magazine.

Ideally, that's how the story is supposed to go.

But there was one problem in the case of journalist Joseph Lanza. Well, actually a whole lot of problems.

First, the batteries died on his tape recorder, which made him very nervous. So much so that he started mumbling his words and fumbling around with his pen and notebook.

A thought kept ringing in his ears: "I'm gonna get busted."

"I was just a big fan and wanted to meet and hang out with Lemmy when Motorhead played the Variety Theatre," says Lanza, referring to the 1984 show that remains the stuff of rock legend because the volume was so loud that it brought the plaster down from the ceiling. "But I wasn't a journalist - I'd never even written a story before, anywhere."

He was 19 years old when he hatched his plan to meet Lemmy Kilmister, the rock 'n' roll legend who passed away on Dec. 28, at the age of 70.

Lanza might not have been a journalist, but he could spin a story.

"I saw that Motorhead was coming and started thinking, 'Maybe I could tell them that I write for a magazine, and that I'm looking to do a story on the band?' " he says. "So I called up their record label."

FYI: Lanza didn't have an in at Rolling Stone, or anywhere else, for that matter. But he was friends with David James, a teenage punk kid from Parma Heights that was doing a fanzine called Negative Print.

"So, when they asked me who I was writing for, I said... Negative Print," says Lanza.

If you've never heard of Negative Print, you're not alone. Motorhead's record label never did either. After all, it consisted of 10 or so 8-by-11 pages, folded into a booklet and made on a copy machine at Kinko's when friends were working.

"They asked me what the circulation was, and I was like, 'Uh, uh, uh... 130,000?' " he says.

Media companies often exaggerate circulation numbers. Lanza tacked on, well, about 129,900 to Negative Print's numbers.

"I didn't hear from anyone and figured, 'Oh well, I tried, but they busted me,' " says Lanza. "Then, like, three days before the show, I get The Call."

The American poet Delmore Schwartz once wrote, "In Dreams Begin Responsibilities."

Lanza had his own take on the subject: "Oh, [expletive]."

"I couldn't believe I was going to be interviewing Motorhead and hang out with Lemmy," he says. "I was so nervous, it was mind-blowing."

Lanza accompanied the band to an appearance at the old Shattered Records on Lorain Avenue. The Cleveland record store was filled with Motorhead fans interacting with Lemmy, who was jovial and easy-going.

Lanza blended in with the crowd and the situation - all good. He then boarded the bus and hung with Lemmy for The Big Interview.

"I had no idea what I was doing," says Lanza. "Here I was looking at these little questions I had scribbled down and trying to take pictures and trying to hold onto my pen and take notes and tape everything - and then it all fell apart."

The batteries died, leaving the kind of dread and angst bands like Motorhead could turn into outlaw anthems. Lanza didn't have a bullet belt or black hat or the look of the outsider. He was a kid in a Motorhead T-shirt cowering before the man behind the band.

"I was freaking out on the inside," he says. "I didn't know if they were going to throw me out or what."

Within minutes, he found himself right on Lemmy's level, having a good time: Yes, he was guzzling Jack Daniels.

"Lemmy slides me a bottle of Jack and says, 'Here you go, this will calm you down,' " says Lanza. "He was drinking and smoking a lot, and we hung out and got along really well."

In that bonding, Lanza saw what many journalists might have overlooked: the tender heart buried under the denim-and-leather.

"He figured out quickly that I was too young to be doing this - the guy was really smart," says Lanza. "But didn't want to make feel foolish or bad about it. He didn't even care about the interview - he was just a really nice guy."

When Lanza left the bus to enter the Variety so he could see the show, he realized that he had stumbled yet again. He had lost his pass on the bus and couldn't get into the club.

"I headed back to the bus when I saw Lemmy walking toward the club," says Lanza. "When I told him what had happened, he took his backstage pass and handed it to me and said, 'Use mine, I think they know who I am.' "

Lemmy is etched into the ears of rock 'n' roll - not just for penning lightening-speed anthems and growling bass lines on his Rickenbacker.

The band's Dec. 2, 1984, Cleveland show was said to be the loudest recorded until that point - 130 decibels -- breaking the volume mark set by the Who in 1976.

As a result, or perhaps because the Variety was in poor shape anyway, the volume cracked the ceiling, and plaster started coming down, earning Motorhead the title of Loudest Band in the World.

It also marked the beginning of the end the for the Variety Theatre, which closed in 1986.

"It was wild seeing them playing as plaster was coming down," says Lanza. "Everyone was looking up - even the band was pointing at the plaster coming down during the songs."

After the show, Lemmy took it all in stride.

"I think he was thinking more about the girl he picked up after the show," says Lanza, who captured a shot of the renowned ladies' man walking away with a friend down Lorain.

The ornate Spanish Gothic vaudeville and movie house opened on Nov. 24, 1927, with a screening of Clara Bow's "Hula."

Perhaps, it only makes sense that an activist group known as Friends of the Historic Variety Theatre are leading a restoration that would result in a reopening of the place.

With Lemmy gone, that plaster probably stands a better chance.