Nick Nolte attended Guided by Voices' first concert (1983 in Columbus, Ohio). He was in town filming a movie.
I just saw a video clip from 2013 where Danny Tedesco,Herb Alpert,Jerry Moss & Lou Adler present studio drummer Hal Blaine a plaque in honor of the records where he was a session member and later became a Grammy Record Of The Year. The plaque has seven 45 singles,actual singles, and one is kinda strange. The 45 of A Taste Of Honey is not an original but a Forget-Me-Not reissue 45. Don't you think Alpert or Moss could have rustled up at least one with the original label? Maybe those styrene copies did indeed disintegrate.
Not really "absurd" but still pretty interesting, at least to me: The Cure's Lol Tolhurst used Rick Buckler (The Jam)'s drum kit on the Three Imaginary Boys recording sessions.
This reminds me of this bit of trivia: Karen Carpenter tried out for Kenny Rogers & The First Edition but wasn't selected.
With Dionne Warwick, the name change came about by accident. There was a misprinting of her last name as "Warwick" on her first record and she kept the spelling (at another point for a time she changed her last name to "Warwicke").
According to Wikipedia, "You Light Up My Life" by Debby Boone is actually a cover. The original version, from the movie of the same name, featured a singer named Kasey Cisyk. For Boone's version, they used the same backing track used in Cisyk's version and replaced her vocals with Debby Boone's.
Derek Griffiths of 70s UK Children's TV fame is one of the chorus singers on The Beatles' I Am The Walrus.
Russell and Ron Mael once made a jokey comment about being the sons of Doris Day. This apparently led to their Swedish publisher giving Doris a cut of the profits from This Town, but I don't know how true the story is. Why would they give profits to an artist's mother (while the artist is still alive) to begin with?
Link Wray played the guitar opening on the song "Seasons In The Sun" by Terry Jacks.* Per the book "I Hate Myself And Want To Die - The 52 Most Depressing Songs You've Ever Heard" by Tom Reynolds.
Billy Ocean had three number one hits. All three had eight words in the title Carribean Queen - No More Love On The Run Get Outta My Dream. Get Into My Car There'll Be Sad Songs To Make You Cry "When The Going Get's Tough, The Tough Get Going" only went to number 2 because it had nine words.
I agree. The book is a great, and very funny, read. I'm working on getting all 52 songs (plus one*) so that I can have the ultimate depressing playlist. *"Gloomy Sunday" by Billie Holliday, which is in class of its own when it comes to depressing songs.
Probably not news to Kiss fans but for the uninitiated Lou Reed co-wrote some of the songs on Kiss’ The Elder Album Lou Reed’s collaboration with KISS
My all time favorite trivia pertaining to music is this James Joyce lost an amateur Irish Tenor competition , and figured if he wasn't good enough to win an amateur competition then maybe he should give up being a Tenor completely. He was encouraged to enter the competition by John Mccormack, the greatest Irish Tenor to ever live.
Tony Hazzard wrote “Ha Ha Said The Clown” and “Goodnight Sweet Josephine,” both done by the Jimmy Page-era Yardbirds. The former is usually considered one of The Yardbirds’ weakest records. Tony Hazzard also wrote the stone-cold bluegrass classic “Fox On The Run,” done by Emerson & Waldron, Tom T. Hall, The Country Gentlemen & many others. Weird.
Did Manfred Mann issue “Ha Ha Said The Clown” before The Yardbirds recorded it? Manfred Mann did “Fox On The Run” too. They recorded “Fox” first, I think.
Not really my favorite bit of absurd music trivia, but here's some grim trivia someone pointed out to me: Question: Which classic American band once recorded an album that included three songs written by convicted murderers (though two of the songwriters were convicted of murder well after the album was produced)? Answer: The Beach Boys. The album: 20/20. The songs and songwriters in question: "Cotton Fields" (written by Leadbelly) "Never Learn Not to Love" (adapted from Charles Manson's "Cease to Exist") "I Can Hear Music" (co-written by Phil Spector)
...and although not on that album, a convicted and mentally ill murderer played on one of their recordings at one point...Jim Gordon.
