Ongoing History Daily: A selection of rock star cameos in movies
If you know what you’re looking for, it’s possible to spot various rock stars making anonymous cameos in a number of movies.
(1) George Harrison appears for a few seconds in Life of Brian as a member of The People’s Front of Judea.
(2) Chester Bennington of Linkin Park appears facing down Jigsaw in the first minutes of Saw VII. Spoiler: He loses.
(3) All three members of Blink-182 are seen spying on poor Jim in the first American Pie movie.
(4) Yes, that was Flea in The Big Lebowski. He takes a bowling ball to the stomach from John Goodman. He was also in a Back to the Future movie and a few others.
(5) Jack White popped into a scene with John C. Reilly in Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story. He’s also seen in Cold Mountain with Nicole Kidman.
(6) And both Chris Cornell and three future members of Pearl Jam—Eddie, Stone, and Jeff—get some screentime in the movie Singles.
There’s another lesser-known cameo in Singles. When Bridgette Fonda’s character, Janet, calls Matt Dillon’s character, Cliff, and gets all sexy, describing what she’s wearing and how she is longing for him, the camera flashes over to the recipient of the wrong number call – a somewhat rotund, long-haired, creepy looking dude who replies “I think you got the wrong number lady, but I’ll be right over”. This dude is none other than Tad Doyle of Seattle grunge rockers TAD. Talk about great type-casting. TAD, by the way, also receives a music shout-out in the movie as it’s their killer track “Jinx” that blows the windows out in Fonda’s car. Both instances prove that Cameron Crowe didn’t solely focus on the “mainstream” side of Grunge as he’s often been accused of in the filming of the movie.