Don't Try This at Home: A Year in the Life of Dave Navarro

Born and bred in Los Angeles, Dave Navarro is best known as the guitarist for the seminal rock group Jane's Addiction. He has also played with the Red Hot Chili Peppers and The Panic Channel, and the cover band Camp Freddy. Dave has also done plenty of session work, with the likes of Nine Inch Nails, Guns 'N' Roses, Alanis Morissette, Marilyn Manson and Porno For Pyros. Navarro has played live with the likes of Michael Jackson and Christina Aguilera

Navarro is just as infamous in his personal life as he is onstage for his musical abilities. A recovering heroin addict, Dave has been married three times, his last being a very publicized union with actress/model Carmen Electra. The pair were married for four years before Electra filed for divorce in 2007.

Long involved in more then just music, Navarro used to write columns for Bikini magazine and has long maintained an official online presence at 6767.com. Dave has expanded his presence into the Spread Entertainment company, producing video clips about places and people in Los Angeles. He has also gotten involved in the adult entertainment business as of late. Navarro has also reunited with his Jane's Addiction bandmates for a tour in 2009.

Although the project was begun in June of 1998, Don't Try This At Home would take roughly six years to complete. Intended to be sort of an art project or a pseudo scrapbook of a section of his life, Navarro's personal troubles and drug addiction would hinder the project almost to the point of incompletion.

The idea itself was rather simple; after installing a photobooth in his home, Navarro required anyone who crossed the threshold to take a picture in the booth before leaving, minimum one per month. Not only would it document the countless friends, family, rock musicians, movie stars, and other famous persons that called on Navarro but it would also show the dark side -- the countless drug addicts and dealers, call girls, and other manner of human flotsam and jetsam.

1998 through 2001 were rough years for Navarro. Having parted with both Jane's Addiction and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, as well as from his record label, his career was in a free-fall. A nasty breakup and other personal problems had lead the once sober Navarro back to using cocaine and heroin. Capturing a year in his life and documenting it, let alone publishing it for the masses to read, seemed to be a thread of hope in a dark life.

The book neither glamorizes nor candy coats the dark subject matter it deals with. In fact, its depiction is graphic in places. For the reader unfamiliar with the world of drug abuse or what really happens in Hollywood and Los Angeles, the book can become overwhelming at times. Navarro never apologizes for the frank subject matter. And why should he, it was his life and in turn it becomes sort of a public service announcement against the use of drugs.

Originally the book was to be published in 2001. By its end, Navarro had entered rehab and begun work on sobriety. When Don't Try This At Home was eventually published in 2004, Navarro had achieved sobriety and had gotten married a third time, to model/actress Carmen Electra. The finally chapters, added before publication, are a look back on the original project with a clearer hindsight.

Though out the book are the four-shot vertical picture slips spit out by the photobooth, documenting the visitors. The famous and infamous, the unknowns and rather-not-be-knowns, and the people who worked to keep Navarro in drugs and those who worked to keep him alive.