So, I’m listening to Pandora, and some Flogging Molly comes on. Cool – I loves me some Flogging Molly, and I flip over to that browser window so I can turn up the volume a bit. I keep the “About This Artist” page up, just in case a band I’m unfamiliar with comes on and I want to know more about them. And even if it’s a band I know very well, I still like to occasionally read the bio – like in this case:
<SCREEEEEEEEEECH>
Hold the effing phone…“former Fastway frontman Dave King”? Fastway? As in Say What You Will? As in, the band that gave a voice to Sammi Curr?? The guy who I saw at the Philly Spectrum in August of '83 opening up for Iron Maiden and Judas Priest is the same guy fronting Flogging Molly? The guy singing this is the same guy singing this?? Holy fricking crap…
So, anyone else had a “I’ll be damned, that’s the same guy?” moment like this?
Not exactly, but a while back I was trying to remember the name of the awesome guitar player that backed up John Prine when I saw him live a couple years ago. Was it Jason Wilbur? No, that’s not right. That was the name of the awesome bass player that I saw in Bernard Allison’s band a few years ago. Or maybe not. What was that guys’s name?
I finally wound up heading to the internet and discovered that my memory wasn’t playing tricks on me. They were both named Jason Wilbur. Or Wilber. (And one was Jasen, not Jason, I think). Two amazing musicians with the same name but spelled differently.
A few years ago I heard a cover of U2’s New Year’s Day done by Frontline Assembly featuring Tiffany. Yes, the 80’s big-hair Tiffany. Probably one of the most surprisingly good covers I have ever heard.
Buster Poindexter, of “Hot Hot Hot” fame (a faux-calypso song exploited by about a thousand movies and commercials) used to be the lead singer of the New York Dolls!!
This is probably old news to most, but that guy (Creed from The Office) used to be in that band (The Grass Roots, which had a lot of big hits in the 60’s). It was quite a revelation when I realized. Creed is wearing the striped shirt in the video.
I had this rock/southern rock/boogie rock mishmash album by a band called Elf. I don’t remember how I got it, but I loved it to pieces. Yes, this sensitive female vocalist-loving woman used to be into the strangest stuff (James Gang, Black Sabbath, Black Oak Arkansas, Quicksilver Messenger Service, Allman Brothers, Lynyrd Skynyrd, plus 50’s and 60’s Top 40). Anyway, I practically wore that album (LP!) out, knew it by heart. Never read the liner notes though. It wasn’t that kind of album. I didn’t start reading liner notes until I got into Peter Gabriel’s Genesis.
Years later, I found out that Ronnie James Dio WAS Elf. By that time I’d moved out of those genres to prog rock so I still only know Dio from Elf.
Ha, I just listened to the short clips on Amazon. Hadn’t listened to the album in at least 3 decades, but immediately started singing along (to the profoundly stupid lyrics, which didn’t bother me then), humming, knowing what note came next. Oh god, now I just went to YouTube, never expecting to find anything, but the whole album is up there. Brought a smile to my face, “Dixie Lee Junction”, always my favorite song on the album, did. It’s not because of the opening power ballad stuff, it’s when the song kicks off about 3:15 into the song. Oh man, now listening to my other favorite song, “Hoochie Koochie Lady”. That piano!! Helluva blast from the past. Now I have to listen to the whole album. I don’t have time for this. Damn you Hal!
Edit to add: “Never More” now. That guitar!! I guess that’s what he’s known for right?
Ronn Moss, who has been Ridge Forrester on the CBS soap “The Bold & The Beautiful” for the last 20-some years, was in the band Player (famous for “Baby, Come Back”).
John Hall, U.S. Representative from New York, was in the band Orleans, most famous for the songs “Dance With Me” and “Still The One”. He’s probably the only US Congressperson (in history) with the distinction of having been shirtless on an album cover.
One that blew me away this year:Bill Barlett, former lead guitarist with oh-so-Sixties mellow The Lemon Pipers, later kicked butt with some killer guitar for Ram Jam.
Big Lemon Pipers fan here, stepping up in their defense. They were best known for the bubblepsych hits, but they had some Steppenwolf-style hard rock and extended freak-out jamming buried away on their albums.
A well-known example; before he had a solo pop country career Kenny Rogers was the lead singer for the First Edition, best known for psychedelic hit “Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In)”.
Thanks KGS, I’ll have to give a listen. Dio doo wop, that’s intriguing. I realize that Dio was with Black Sabbath, and I said I was into Black Sabbath, but I stopped listening to them about the time he joined. Not because he joined, because I didn’t know he joined. My tastes just shifted to Yes and then Genesis. I was only into the first 4 Black Sabbath albums.
On the opposite side of what the OP is asking, a few years ago I was listening to a local radio station late at night at work. A typical hair metal song comes on, blech, I can’t wait for it to finish. The announcer comes back and says “that was an early song from Pantera”. WTF?? Pantera? I knew Phil Anslemo wasn’t their original lead singer but I had no idea how lame they were early on. Did I menton blech?
A lot of people got early work in Frank Zappa’s bands, including members of Little Feat (Roy Estrada and Lowell George) and Steve Vai. Aynsley Dunbar also drummed for Zappa. If not for a famous coinflip, Dunbar would have been Jimi Hendrix’s drummer instead of Mitch Mitchell.
