Ask Blender: December 2003

I heard John Lennon recorded with Paul McCartney in 1974. Is this true? Why haven’t we heard about it?
–NICK WALLIS, HAYWARD, CALIFORNIA

The session happened, but don’t get too excited. That March, McCartney visited Lennon during his “lost weekend” in L.A., partly to pass on word that Yoko Ono was willing to take her estranged husband back. A superstar jam session resulted, with Lennon on guitar, McCartney on drums, Stevie Wonder on keyboards and Harry Nilsson on backing vocals.

The 30-minute bootleg of the event, A Toot and a Snore in ’74, reveals that nothing remotely artistic took place, unless you count shambolic versions of “Stand by Me” and “Lucille” interrupted by Lennon shouting about the equipment not working. The highlight is Lennon asking Wonder, “Do you want a snort, Steve? A toot? It’s going ’round… ” By the way, unlike everyone else, Wonder was in good form that day — toot or no toot!

My friend tried to tell me that DMX, Ja Rule and Jay-Z once had a group together. Is he full of it?
–ALAN DELAMORA, BOSTON

Your friend’s not entirely wrong. Back in 1998, industry mogul Irv Gotti tried to get the three rap giants together in an East Coast supergroup, the Murderers.

However, the sessions never gelled, and the tag was taken for the Murder Inc. stable’s 2000 compilation Irv Gotti Presents…The Murderers (showcasing Ja Rule, with cameos from Jay-Z and DMX). These days, of course, Ja Rule and DMX don’t get along. Responding to X’s claims that he’s a copycat, Ja sniped, “Bitch dog, get at me dog/You always been a pup!” To paraphrase Hart to Hart: When they met, it was almost murder.

I’m a big Incubus fan, and I’ve always wondered: Who is that guy they put on their album covers?
–JEFF YOUNG, LUBBOCK, TEXAS

The identity of the cheesy mustache guy (known as “Chuck” or “Charles Mulholland”) on such Incubus albums as S.C.I.E.N.C.E. has long been a riddle that has gotten fans in a lather. Among the rumors circulating are that he’s a high-school teacher or a cult leader. Adding to the confusion, the band has said both that they don’t know him and that he’s a ’70s porn star.

All of this ignores the fact that former Incubus member DJ Lyfe gave the man away on an Internet posting: He’s lead singer Brandon Boyd’s actor-model dad, Chuck Boyd, who has appeared in a few films, including Predator 2, and a 1975 episode of Starsky & Hutch. “I think he was like the Marlboro man, but for Winston,” DJ Lyfe wrote. “He’s a cool guy, and he calls Brandon ‘Brandy.’” Mystery solved.

Were Trent Reznor and Tori Amos ever romantically involved?
–PSYCHO C, NATICK, MASSACHUSETTS

Neither will say for sure, but the pair were very close circa 1994: He guested on her song “Past the Mission”; she nicknamed him “Stimpy.” Ever since, conspirators have looked for hidden connections between them. Amos’s Little Earthquakes liner notes include the words nine inch nails for no apparent reason; her song “Caught a Lite Sneeze” includes the phrase pretty hate machine.

But the most intriguing piece of evidence comes from a comment Amos made onstage in July 1994: “That tongue! If [Reznor] became a eunuch, it wouldn’t even matter!”

What were the original lyrics to Little Richard’s “Tutti Frutti”? I heard they were really dirty.
–JEFF STERN, BUFFALO, NEW YORK

You heard right. Presumably, when Pat Boone covered “Tutti Frutti” in 1956, he didn’t know the song started life as a naughty celebration of sex. Little Richard Penniman (who was thrown out of his home at age 13 for blatant homosexuality) could never be called demure, but even he didn’t think this self-composed novelty tune, which he played to enliven raunchy club crowds, was fit for general consumption. After all, the original lyrics went: “Tutti frutti, good booty/If it don’t fit, don’t force it/You can grease it, make it easy!”

Producer Robert “Bumps” Blackwell disagreed and persuaded Little Richard that the song would be his first hit — though he also had to persuade another songwriter, Dorothy LaBostrie, to write new “booty-free” lyrics.