Badly chosen/missmatched support acts.

Elwood

In another thread @Lixarto mentioned he saw Primus support Rush. I'm a Primus fan and it seemed like a really oddly chosen support band.
So following that though - what is the most bizzare support you've seen?

I'm not looking for simply bad support bands just completely out of place considering the headliner.

For me it was the Asian Dub Foundation supporting Radiohead . . . I guess they were good at what they do but couldn't be more different to Radiohead.

EricTheWeary

I don't mind a bit of contrast. I used to know the bass player in a Megadeth tribute band who supported Megadeth. That would have been one long evening.

RocknRollDave

Howie B supporting U2 on their Popmart tour (Longpigs too, but they were OK). Basically a guy playing records that bounced around a half-empty stadium during the daytime yet still had more in common with club culture than anything U2 came remotely close to, despite their not inconsiderable efforts at the time.

chrisj1602

Chicks on Speed supporting Red Hot Chilli Peppers!

DulcetJones

I didn't see it but apparently Jimi Hendrix opened for The Monkees on a tour in the 60's!?  Rush seems to like doing that sort of thing, One of the many times I saw them, I think the 2112 tour, they had a solo acoustic blues guitarist/singer open for them.  A very eclectic and amusing one, Joe Mendelson, or Mendelson Joe depending on what year it was.  He reportedly now lives in a remote cabin in Northern Ontario and refuses interviews.  He had a semi hit with "Don't be a shmoe, Come Dance With Joe".  I'm not making this up.

StageStruck

Transglobal Underground supporting Page/Plant back in '98. Basically 1 hour of a live drummer playing dance beats with some godawful female singing some tuneless improvised nonsense over the top of the drums. Not exactly the sort of thing you expect to see before a classic rock type gig.

stickyfiddle

Cave In supporting Foo Fighters, not because it was a bad fit, just because they were shit. 

Lily Allen supporting Muse was a bit of a weird fit. She was quite good though.

Most eclectic bill for me has to be Girls Aloud and Jay-Z opening for Coldplay. Cracking gig. GA were rubbish as expected, but turns out the ginger one actually has the best voice by miles as far as we could tell. JZ was phenomenal, as you'd expect.

Reverend

The Killers supporting The Dirtbombs.
Reef supporting Kyuss. (Supposedly - all I remember is it being some appalling corporate rock bollocks)

boogieman

Circus acts in between support bands at Zep's Electric Magic gig at Wembley. I can vaguely remember a trapeze act, but there were definitely performing pigs. Great gig.

Antique_Guitars

stickyfiddle said:

Cave In supporting Foo Fighters, not because it was a bad fit, just because they were shit. 

Lily Allen supporting Muse was a bit of a weird fit. She was quite good though.

Most eclectic bill for me has to be Girls Aloud and Jay-Z opening for Coldplay. Cracking gig. GA were rubbish as expected, but turns out the ginger one actually has the best voice by miles as far as we could tell. JZ was phenomenal, as you'd expect.

By that I assume you mean the Foo Fighters were shit, as Cave In are one of the best bands of the last 20 years!

Philly_Q

The first proper gig I ever went to in 1979 was Hawkwind supported by punk band Billy Karloff and the Supremes (later renamed the Extremes, presumably for legal reasons).  It didn't seem that weird at the time though, I thought maybe all gigs were like that.

The only other one which springs to mind was some unknown (to me) solo girl singer with an acoustic - I can't remember who the headliners were, unfortunately, but it would almost certainly have been a rock band.  Possibly Marillion...

stickyfiddle

Antique_Guitars said:

stickyfiddle said:

Cave In supporting Foo Fighters, not because it was a bad fit, just because they were shit. 

Lily Allen supporting Muse was a bit of a weird fit. She was quite good though.

Most eclectic bill for me has to be Girls Aloud and Jay-Z opening for Coldplay. Cracking gig. GA were rubbish as expected, but turns out the ginger one actually has the best voice by miles as far as we could tell. JZ was phenomenal, as you'd expect.

By that I assume you mean the Foo Fighters were shit, as Cave In are one of the best bands of the last 20 years!

Not on the evidence of a cold night in November 2002!! Happy to admit i haven't listened since. They might be great on record. Any recommendations?

lustycourtier

He who pays, gets his band on bill….

digitalscream

lustycourtier said:

He who pays, gets his band on bill….

Sadly, this is the truth. I shudder to think how much it must've cost Voodoo Six to get on the Iron Maiden tour, for example.

The only odd one I can think of from recent times was when Leogun - a fairly standard bluesy rock outfit from London - supported Extreme in Birmingham. Most of the crowd were scratching their heads a bit.

Reverend

Voodoo Six evolved from the band Dirty Deeds who were signed to Beast records - Steve Harris' label.

Reverend

Oh and their Guitarist used to play in Lauren Harris' band before joining Priest.

mike_l

Radish (IIRC) supporting Faith No More.

Mostly cos Radish were shit. All I can remember was 2 nobbers running around the stage, but barely able to play, and absolutely no songs of note.

 

Gojira supporting Annihilator and Trivium, mostly cos I don't like Gojira's music.

Grunfeld

Van Halen supporting Black Sabbath. 

It wasn't long after VH1 came out, it was Sabbath's 10th anniversary tour, and much as I liked Sabbath then, there was absolutely no way any band in the world could follow an up and coming VH.  They were a force of nature.

scrumhalf

Marquee 1982, a "poet", Eddie Steady Go, supported Gary Moore.

In terms of mismatches it doesn't get bigger.

cpcompany

Midfunk supporting Slayer at Newcastle City Hall. About 3 people standing up watching them whilst the rest were chatting amongst themselves and not paying a blind bit of notice.

Paul_C

The Jam had some dreadful support acts, I recall a lady poet, a rockabilly band who were ok but not popular (the singer amused me by announcing "we going to play our last song now *cheer* TWICE! *boos + laughter and applause from me*) and a Chic-light disco band (IIRC Bananarama were at one gig too).

I always assumed it was deliberate to get the audience a little more desperate to see the main act.