Music trivia that makes you grin from ear to ear

[alan nagsworth]

AKA falling even further in love with respected musical idols because of some of the mad shit they got up to during their careers.

Butthole Surfers are an absolute gold mine for this stuff:

While in San Francisco at the end of the tour, and without a place to live, the band collectively decided to move to Winterville (a small town outside Athens, Georgia), where they admittedly made a hobby of stalking members of R.E.M.. They would leave a van parked in front of Michael Stipes' house painted on the side "Michael Stipe/Despite the Hype/I'd Love to Suck/Your Big Long Pipe"

and then regarding Haynes' brief side project P, with Johnny Depp and Flea as members:

They often played the odd gig at The Viper Room, of which Depp used to be co-owner. One of these gigs was played on October 30, 1993, where the lineup included Flea of Red Hot Chili Peppers. Haynes, along with other members of the line-up that night, was a good friend of actor River Phoenix. While the band were in the middle of their song "Michael Stipe", which includes the lines "I'm glad I met old Michael Stipe, I didn't get to see his car. Him and River Phoenix were leaving on the road tomorrow" and "but we didn't have a part, not a piece of our heart, not Michael, River Phoenix or Flea or me." Phoenix (unbeknownst to the band at the time) was outside the venue having seizures on the sidewalk. Phoenix died in the early hours of October 31 of heart failure brought on by an overdose of cocaine and heroin.

Eesh.

On a lighter note, regarding the Surfers' live performances:

Known for taking the stage at early concerts with hundreds of clothespins attached to his hair and clothes, Haynes would often strip throughout a show until he was down to his underwear, or less, by the end. Other attire included flasher-style trench coats over his nakedness, ridiculously home-styled wigs and cross-dressing; often enjoying a skirt made of an American flag and a large '60s torpedo-style stuffed bra. At other times he would hide condoms full of stage blood in his clothes and repeatedly fall to the floor, appearing to bleed profusely.

Some of Haynes' other favorite tricks involved throwing handfuls of photocopied cockroach images into the crowd, rolls and rolls of toilet paper tossed across the audience, as well as filling an inverted cymbal with lighter fluid, setting it (and sometimes his hand) on fire, and repeatedly hitting it with a mallet. As previously mentioned he would sing through most anything that would alter his voice, including toilet paper rolls and megaphones early on, which eventually evolved into "Gibby's kit", a.k.a. "Gibbytronix;" a rack of vocal effects stacked as high as he could reach, before which he would often stand for the majority of the show in later performances. He also often utilized various foot switches which would be used to activate certain vocal effects, and when thought to be dancing during some performances he would actually be stepping on his various pedals. Adding to the spectacle were Coffey and Nervosa, who played in unison on stand-up drum kits; behind which they would collapse onto the floor and out of eyeshot, to collect their breath and strength before rising just in time to play the next song. Finally, the whole band would often tear apart stuffed animals while on stage.

In 1986, they first met Lynch (a.k.a. Kathleen, a.k.a. Ta-Da the Shit Lady), who was then working at a strip club called Sex World in New York City. Though never an official member, she became the Surfers' famous "naked dancer", performing intermittently with them through 1989. One show in Washington, D.C. with GWAR saw Kathleen take the stage to dance in nothing but gold body paint and antique wooden snow shoes. And at another particularly wild concert in 1986, Haynes and Lynch, by now completely bald, reportedly engaged in sexual intercourse while on stage, as Leary used a screwdriver to vandalize the club's speakers. This came after only five songs, during which time Haynes had started a small fire.

The Surfers began to take the collection of visual equipment seriously following Coffey's recruitment in 1983, when he added a clear plastic drum fitted with a strobe light to their show. Shortly afterwards, the band purchased what was reported as several thousand dollars worth of stolen strobe lights at a bargain rate, and their visual equipment soon took up more space than their instruments. Smoke machines were later added. Equally memorable was the band's propensity for projecting a variety of films behind them as they played, beginning with one 16-millimeter projector, before adding others. This set-up allowed them to play a number of overlapping movies at the same time which were often strangely angled, upside down or played in reverse. Combined with the increasing number of strobe lights, the effect created a visually disorienting atmosphere, which occasionally caused epileptic seizures in audience members. The films' subject matter was often as disturbing as the manner in which they were played; with images of accidents, nuclear explosions, meat processing, spiders & scorpions stalking prey, gory drivers education films, and penis reconstruction surgery. Not all of the movies were horrific, and they often included nature, wildlife, and aquatic footage; as well as a color negative of a Charlie's Angels episode.

How I seriously wish I could have attended those shows! Fascinating and extremely exciting, they just confirm the fact that they're one of my favourite bands based mostly around their attitude, perhaps more so than their music sometimes.

Okay your turn!

[Paaaaul]

Peter Tork's mum invented Prit-Stick.

[gabrielconroy]

This is pretty well known, but the first one that comes to mind is that the dad of E from Eels was the first to propose the many worlds interpretation of quantum physics.

[Famous Mortimer]

If I'm remembering right, the first ever Butthole Surfers gig was two guitarists playing hardcore riffs while Gibby ran around stage with a piece of meat hanging out of his mouth.

[Egyptian Feast]

The chapter on Butthole Surfers in Michael Azerrad's Our Band Will Change Your Life is one of the funniest things I've ever read.

This always makes me laugh:

Early aliases included the Dick Clark Five, Nine cm Worm Makes Own Food, the Vodka Family Winstons, Ashtray Babyheads, Ed Asner Is Gay, Fred Astaire's Asshole, The Right To Eat Fred Astaire's Asshole, The Inalienable Right To Eat Fred Astaire's Asshole, and many others.

[Lisa Jesusandmarychain]

Michael Nesmith's mum used to go out with Tarzan, and invented Metal Mickey.

[doppelkorn]

This image:

[Lisa Jesusandmarychain]

Oh, I meant Mickey Dolenz's mum, sorry.

[SteveDave]

Roy Wood can't/won't drink milk as he believes it to be cow piss.

[holyzombiejesus]

Blue Cheer were so loud at some festival that when a pigeon flew past the PA, it disintegrated.

I like the stuff about members of Talulah Gosh variously going on to become a Turner Prize winner,  chief economist and director of mergers at the Office of Fair Trading and senior commissioning editor for philosophy at the Oxford University Press.

Maybe only of interest to me but Euros Childs got booted out of Stevie Jackson's birthday party as he kept trying to smuggle his own cans in.

[SteveDave]

Alex Chilton's real name is Alice Cooper

[Lisa Jesusandmarychain]

The vast majority of Talulah Gosh members are Oxbridge alumni, and fairly bright, so no surprise about their subsequent careers, but, yes, that bit of trivia brings a smile to my chops, too. I quite admire Amelia for still plowing her particularly indie furrow in her spare time, despite being no spring chicken by now.

I remember a member of Bleach (ask your Indie Grandad) saying that he was a qualified tree surgeon (or was a year away from qualifying, or something), and that he'd chucked it all in, and *this* (being the bassist or whatever he was, I know he wasn't the singer cos she was a young woman who looked like Miriam Margoyles) was his career now. I wonder what he's up to nowadays?

[Kane Jones]

Alice Cooper's real name is Gary Cooper.

[NoSleep]

Robert Wyatt is undoubtably named after family friend Robert Graves, who would later accommodate visits to his home in Deya, Majorca from various members of Soft Machine et al; becoming good friends with Daevid Allen particularly. In fact his mother (Honor Wyatt) left her first husband (Gordon Glover) for the husband of Robert Graves' secretary (George Ellidge).

The outset of this (another bit of trivia) is that Game Of Thrones' Grand Maester Pycelle (Julian Glover) is Robert Wyatt's half brother.

Nice blog about Robert's mum here:

http://soundsfromthespring.blogspot.co.uk/2009/02/in-honour-of-honor-wyatt.html

and a PDF about her, here:

http://www.robertgraves.org/issues/15/6367_article_247.pdf

[bigfatheart]

Bob Mould was a wrestling scriptwriter for a time in the late 90s, which is about as close as real life gets to sounding like a Wikipedia vandalism.

[olliebean]

Erstwhile Marillion frontman Fish is not really a fish. He's an insect, and he lives on bananas.

[DrunkCountry]

Through a slightly odd set of circumstances[nb]I recounted a story of me missing this particular BHS gig in a music blog comment thread & King Coffey[nb]at least I think it was him; it was a long time ago, but I remember it was a Jeff - so it might have been Pinkus, the bassist, but he didn't have a journalistic / writing background. Anyway, it was one of them.[/nb] contacted me, having read my post following a Google search for the gig, & asked me if I had any details of the gig, such as who organised it, as he was helping write a history of the band for a book[nb]no idea if it was ever published[/nb] & that period[nb]their first European tour[/nb] was a bit hazy. 

Coincidentally, the husband of the events manager at the NLC was also a reader of this music blog; he contacted me at the same time & told me the story of his wife's career death by BHS. I put him in contact with Coffey/Pinkus & all was well with the world.[/nb] I was told decades after BHS played a legendary gig at Newport Leisure Centre, which inevitably involving topless dancers & pole-dancing strippers, indoor pyrotechnics & general mayhem, the events manager at Newport Leisure Centre, was sacked as a result of that gig.  BHS made a hell of a mess, were openly off their faces + the naked women lolloping all over the stage raised some public order concerns. So this woman took the fall for the supposed moral outrage[nb]it was in all the local papers[/nb].

[WesterlyWinds]

Tom Waits' various legal disputes brought a smile to my face, especially the last one:

Waits has steadfastly refused to allow the use of his songs in commercials and has joked about other artists who do (commenting "If Michael Jackson wants to work for Pepsi, why doesn't he just get himself a suit and an office in their headquarters and be done with it?"). He has filed several lawsuits against advertisers who used his material without permission. He has been quoted as saying, "Apparently, the highest compliment our culture grants artists nowadays is to be in an ad — ideally, naked and purring on the hood of a new car", he said in a statement, referring to the Mercury Cougar. "I have adamantly and repeatedly refused this dubious honor."

Waits filed his first lawsuit in 1988 against Frito-Lay. The company had approached Waits to use one of his songs in an advertisement, which Waits declined. Frito-Lay hired a Waits soundalike to sing a jingle similar to the song "Step Right Up" from the album Small Change', which is a song Waits has called "an indictment of advertising". Waits won the lawsuit, becoming one of the first artists to successfully sue a company for using an impersonator without permission. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed an award of $2.375 million in his favor (Waits v. Frito-Lay, 978 F. 2d 1093 (9th Cir. 1992)).[56]

In 1993, Levi's used Screamin' Jay Hawkins' version of Waits' "Heartattack and Vine" in a commercial. Waits sued, and Levi's agreed to cease all use of the song and offered a full page apology in Billboard.[57]

Waits found himself in a situation similar to his earlier one with Frito Lay in 2000 when Audi approached him, asking to use "Innocent When You Dream" (from Franks Wild Years) for a commercial broadcast in Spain. Waits declined, but the commercial ultimately featured music very similar to that song. Waits undertook legal action, and a Spanish court recognized that there had been a violation of Waits's moral rights in addition to the infringement of copyright. The production company, Tandem Campany Guasch, was ordered to pay compensation to Waits through his Spanish publisher. Waits was later quoted as jokingly saying the company got the name of the song wrong, thinking it was called "Innocent When You Scheme".[58]

In 2005, Waits sued Adam Opel AG, claiming that, after having failed to sign him to sing in their Scandinavian commercials, they had hired a sound-alike singer. In 2007, the suit was settled, and Waits gave the sum to charity.[59]

Waits has also filed a lawsuit unrelated to music. He was arrested in 1977 outside Duke's Tropicana Coffee Shop in Los Angeles. Waits and a friend were trying to stop some men from bullying other patrons. The men were plainclothes officers, and Waits and his friend were arrested and charged with disturbing the peace. The jury found Waits not guilty; he took the police department to court and was awarded $7,500 compensation.[60]

[alan nagsworth]

BHS gig

British Home Stores did all that? They should be kept confined to shopping centers by the looks of it. Leisure centers seem to bring out their wild side. I for one certainly won't be buying another three piece suite from them.

[Sexton Brackets Drugbust]

Alice Cooper's real name is Alice Copper.

[Don_Preston]

REM's drummer was born in the shape of a one Pound coin.

[holyzombiejesus]

A music journalist once told me how he had met with the Manic Street Preachers and Richie was wearing a woman's blouse. Journalist friend asked him if he got a lot of stick in Blackwood for wearing women's clothing and Richie replied with a smile, "Oh yes, but I don't mind because I look so pretty."

Still in Wales; Cerys Matthews & Tom Jones? THEY DID IT. 

[Glebe]

Bob Mould was a wrestling scriptwriter for a time in the late 90s, which is about as close as real life gets to sounding like a Wikipedia vandalism.

I've actually heard that before, quite strange really.

[Rev Arthur Belling]

Saddam Hussein

The annals of Beach Boys history (check your top left drawer, you'll find them next to other annal-related material unless, unlike me, you aren't annal-retentive) fairly burst with odd coincidences, bizarre barking dogs, and things that go bump in the night.  But few realise that Saddam Hussein was closely linked with the band at one point.

Mostly an unknown tinhorn loony in the latter part of the Sixties, Saddam, being a closet fan of U.S. popular music, used to enjoy vacationing there, attending concerts, "slow dancing, swaying to the music."  In fact, he once owned an Archies beanie propeller and insulted a prominent Iranian Ayatollah by wearing it during the third World Oil Domination Strategy Session & Bingo Bash in Cairo during 1967, but that's another story.

During one of Saddam's anonymous junkets into the U.S., he attended a Beach Boys concert and managed to finagle a backstage pass from a 17-year-old blonde friend of Dennis Wilson's who had decided at the last moment to opt out of the groupie scene and instead join a vegetable commune in Stanton, North Dakota.  Saddam, wearing a striped shirt and Bermuda shorts decorated with orange and blue surf-related silhouettes, spent 15 minutes back stage, barely noticed, before Al Jardine invited him to "grab a guitar." Thinking that he was being asked to join the band (Saddam was notorious for his overblown sense of self-importance) he did so, and a large muscular guy in a Roadie tee-shirt instructed him to carry it to the nearby tour bus.

Saddam, expecting some road jams, found himself instead the victim of a misunderstanding.  Jardine had mistaken him for a roadie, and being afraid to annoy even the most minor Beach Boy, the band's people had put the moustachioed newcomer on the payroll.  Saddam travelled with the Boys to a number of venues and can be seen briefly removing a broken drumstick from the stage in the bootleg concert video, "Mother of all Wilsons."  Saddam was disappointed, of course, to learn that he hadn't been asked to join the band, but there were chicks about, the grub wasn't bad, and his black heart softened every evening during "Surfer Girl" and "Don't Worry Baby."

Eventually, of course, Saddam's vacation ended, and it was time to take up again the quest to dominate the Arab world, but he left reluctantly, and the farewell was rather emotional.  Mike Love, who had taken a gander at Saddam's black beret and the automatic weapons he liked to tote about, nicknamed him "Captain Crackpot" and Dennis presented him a tee-shirt with his name sewn on the front. 

There is nothing to suggest, as is rumoured in some circles, that Saddam actually composed "Only With You" but there is evidence that he contributed lyrics to "Funky Pretty."  The CIA has all of this in its files.  Back in the 1990s I asked Carl Wilson whether he found it odd that the Butcher of Baghdad had once toted his guitar case. "No.  He never dropped it, and he always packed it safely," said big-hearted Carl. "Sure, he'd get drunk and rant about the Great Satan and all, but we were all a little crazy back then."

[PaulTMA]

Come to think of it, The vocal part commonly attributed to Van Dyke Parks at the end of 'A Day In The Life Of A Tree' could easily be Saddam.

[Kane Jones]

Alice Cooper's real name is Alec Hopper.

[holyzombiejesus]

Hmmm, better not.

[Absorb the anus burn]

Crocodile Shoe wearing occasional popster Jimmy Nail had a heated affair with irritating loud chef Rusty 'Boy I'm Going To Barbados' Lee and gave birth to a little rusty nail.

[doppelkorn]

In the song I Shot the Sheriff, the sheriff is mentioned by name twice.

That name is Dick Mussel.

[Olarrio]

I like the simple story of Gibby Haynes touching the end of his penis to Jimmy Carter's suitcase.

In other news, Jimmy Page's favourite guitar solo is that from Reelin' in the Years by Steely Dan.