Sly Stone's Surprise

"As usual, it's just us," Rose said, looking at her watch.

Sly finally materialized, in an electric-blue leather jumpsuit, and gave a brief speech, which concluded: "See you soon."

Bucking Hall of Fame tradition, he didn't stop afterward to pose for pictures with his band mates, instead disappearing into the night -- and into the ether, for 13 years of radio silence.

There are rumors, of course: He's broke! He's dead! He's homeless! Insane!

Stone, who is 61 or 62, or maybe 64 ("I've lied about my age so much, I'm not quite sure how old I am," he told the Los Angeles Times in 1987), is either living: In a mansion in Beverly Hills; in a dingy apartment in the San Fernando Valley; on the streets of Hollywood; in a nice place in Pacific Palisades; or elsewhere in Southern California.

"He's in Malibu," said Clinton. But Clinton isn't completely sure, since he couldn't get Stone on the phone -- even after Stone left a message for his friend to call.

In 1986, Stone was living in an apartment in Toluca Lake, Calif., when his landlord filed a lawsuit, alleging that Stone and a roommate were making excessive noise -- and that they'd refused to leave the apartment after being served an eviction notice.

His health is also unclear. Stone's manager, Goldstein, recently told an associate that Sly is "frail." When Stone surfaced at his father's funeral in 2002, he was reportedly in bad shape.

"Sly went down the aisle of his brother's church with his mother on his arm, and nobody recognized him, because he has a hunchback," Selvin said. "He deprived his body of too much nutrition over the years."

There are reports -- unconfirmed, as with much in the murky, mysterious world of Sly Stone -- that he's done recording sessions and then gone in and erased all the tapes.

"He's got hundreds of songs that he's sleeping on," Errico said. "He's been writing the whole time. Where are all those songs? But I haven't heard one in 20 years. He's written and destroyed who knows how many great songs over the years with all the insanity he's been through."

But Stone is said to have been recording recently with his sister Vaetta, who performs in a Family Stone tribute band. Last year he even surfaced at one of her shows, in Los Angeles.

Zola, who's making the documentary on Sly and the Family Stone, was at the club that night and saw Sly Stone with his very own eyes.

"This adventure to find Sly, it can feel hopeless," he said. "There was a period of time where I really wondered where he was. But he was there! It was remarkable."