Boring day here at work. There are only about three of us here today, and my boss is cranking this Christian metal-rap stuff in his office.
So, I'm going to play a round of one of my favorite games: given two arbitrary musicians, find a link between them, without using any kind of reference material. Since I decided to do this while reading a review of a Primus record, while also a Fleetwood Mac song on the iPod, that that's what I'll attempt: Primus to Fleetwood Mac.
calculating....
calculating....
calculating....
Done.
Les Claypool of Primus played with Adrian Belew on Belew's last string of records.
Belew played guitar on David Bowie's Lodger.
David Bowie teamed up with Queen for the song Under Pressure.
Queen is currently working with former Bad Company singer, Paul Rodgers.
Paul Rodgers played in a band called The Firm, with Jimmy Page.
Before Led Zeppelin, Jimmy Page was in The Yardbirds.
Before Jimmy Page, Eric Clapton was in The Yardbirds.
Eric Clapton played in John Mayall's Bluesbreakers, along with John McVie.
And John McVie is the bass player for Fleetwood Mac.
Wow. That one probably took 45 minutes. Easily the hardest one I've ever finished - some I've never finished.
I usually try to do these in my head, but this one just wasn't happening, so I started diagramming the relationships I was coming up with. See below, if you're interested.
First, from the Primus side of things:
Primus
+-- Les Claypool
+-- Adrian Belew
+-- Bill Bruford
+--Yes
+--Asia
+-- Robert Fripp
+-- Greg (?) Lake
+-- ELP
+-- Tony Levin
+-- Peter Gabriel
+-- Phil Collins
+-- Kate Bush
+-- Laurie Anderson
+-- David Bowie
+-- Bing Crosby
+-- Stevie Ray Vaughan
+-- Mick Jagger
+-- Keith Richards
+-- Tom Tom Club
+-- Talking Heads
+-- Frank Zappa
+-- Steve Vai
+-- James Hetfield
+-- Metallica
+-- Megadeth
And now the Fleetwood Mac side:
Fleetwood Mac
+-- Mick Fleetwood
+-- Warren Zevon
+-- Jackson Browne
+-- Stevie Nicks
+-- Sheryl Crow
+-- Tom Petty
+-- Don Henley
+-- Eagles
+-- Joe Walsh
+-- Glen Frey
+-- John McVie
+-- Eric Clapton
+-- Duane Allman
+-- Yardbirds
+-- Jeff Beck
+-- Jimmy Page
+-- Robert Plant
+-- David Coverdale
+-- The Firm
+-- Paul Rodgers
+-- Queen
+-- David Bowie
The key here was The Firm. Took me a long time to make that leap from Jimmy Page to Queen.
OT: I guess something like Band Aid would make this kind of thing much easier. But easy isn't the point...
Nice. I love this game. You might kill a step or two if you go through “Stop Dragging My Heart Around” where Stevie Nicks sang with Petty. Benmont Tench from the Heartbreakers is one of those little gold stars on the game board that radiates everywhere.
Another gold star is Lennon- Belew played with Tony Levin who played on Lennon records.
We used to play this in bands in LA. Once I’d played with Mike Kennealy (from Zappa’s last band) I was able to jump anywhere in very few steps because Zappa is one of those DOUBLE-gold stars. I got Andy Partridge to strum a few chords on a toy guitar at a signing and I sang a line from “Reign Of Blows” just for the express purpose of getting “the connection”. Pathetic.
Benmont Tench you say… a little allmusic search on him turns up: Jackson Browne, Johnny Cash, Elvis Costello, the Cult, Neil Diamond, Bob Dylan, Brian Eno, Hall & Oates, Green Day, Don Henley, Indigo Girls, Ziggy Marley, Alanis Morissette, Stevie Nicks, Bonnie Raitt, Remy Zero, the Rolling Stones, U2, Robin Zander, Ryan Adams, Travis Tritt, and Ringo Starr.
wow. yeah, that would cut out a bunch of stuff. some very interesting possibilities there. he could replace Belew as my hub-of-choice.