rock stars who went back work.

sonicnet and addicted to noise were two separate companies that merged in the late '90s and continued using both identities; i started not long after the merger and essentially worked for both.

must ... fact-check ... self. for the historical record: sonicnet was on broadway. damn close to bleecker, though.

in the late 1980s or early 1990s, i no longer remember, i visited friends who lived in a squatted flat in brixton. I was introduced to a couple that was temporarily staying in one of my friends rooms. they guy looked like a heroin addict. he was introduced to me as topper headon, the clash drummer. i had no idea of his or the clash's fame and had certainly not heard their music before. topper told me he works as a cab driver. not sure if he still would be as some of their songs were successfully rereleased.

re: mid-level indie bands -- lots of them work temp jobs in between tours. this also explains why bands like that tour a lot: its one of their few sources of income.

That would be Tim Quirk: He went on to become editorial director of Listen.com, now a part of Real.com. Great, great guy. TMJ unfortunately didn't make him much money due to the ol' demon RECOUPMENT.

But as for others: Bobby Sherman became a California EMT; and of course Pete Best made donuts at a bakery after becoming an ex-Beatle.

Does becoming a preacher count as "going back to work"? If so, we can add Vanity, Little Richard, Ma$e, and a ton of others.

That's awesome.

actually, i was talking about sandy smallens. tim was tmj's singer and might have had a desk awfully close to the sonicnet office in san francisco, but never inside it. sandy was the tmj's bassist and his desk was inside the sonicnet office in new york. apparently, being in tmj was an excellent background for getting back to work in the digital music biz! (and tmj, of course, had a song back in the day that celebrated noted getting-back-to-worker hugo burnham of gang of four.) ((and if you spend your time in music tv/video circles, you're likely to run into a third member of too much joy.))

Somebody once told me they had met a lawyer at a business meeting who told them he had been in Looking Glass, if not the lead singer
himself.

And what about the bass player in Huey Lewis's old (and for one album, Elvis Costello's) band Clover, who has been known to play with Lucinda Williams but also got a day job as a chiropractor, Dr. John Ciambotti?

Paging Al Green.

guess those stock options never quite paid off, huh? ;-)

Last I heard (a couple of years ago) he was living somewhere down near (Dover?) and still driving a taxi.

Anton Fier was working as a counterman at a local sandwich shop in downtown Brooklyn until recently.

Buzzcocks have been back together (only Pete and Steve Diggle from the origonal line-ups) since 1989....

xpost:
Baby's got back work.

Greg Demos, former GBV.....wasn't he another lawyer type?

I saw Debbie (guitar player) from Curve/Echobelly working at a used disc store in London right across from the Notting Hill tube stop in 2000.

Jack Natz (Undead/Virus/BlackSnakes/Cop Shoot Cop/Lubricated Goat/CrimeWave/Crux) is now a bike messenger.

Supposedly Wild Bill Carter of the Screaming Blue Messiahs is now a scooter messenger in London...with a tenuous grasp on sanity.

an old co-worker used to get her taxes done by (i think) the drummer from the circle jerks.

I've heard that too, only it's not the drummer, it's their bass player circa Golden Showe of Hits (whose name escapes me).

And didn't Sterling Morrison become a tourist boat captain while waiting for the Velvets reunion?

he was a tugboat captain. also, a medieval scholar.

M4rk Ibold is also a "food designer" for photo shoots. Meaning, he makes sure photographed food looks good.

if it's a medallion, and not a license, there would be incredible financial incentive to keep renewing it.

he actually worked at Rocketdyne in Simi Valley. i tried to talk to him about it once but that guy is difficult to talk to. he's always in his own world.

also check this out about my favo heavy metal singer:

Bruce Dickinson juggles life as singer for the band Iron Maiden with flying a Boeing

A ROCK star whose band is famed for long hair and wild on-stage antics has taken off in a new career: as an airline pilot.

Bruce Dickinson, lead singer of the heavy metal band Iron Maiden, has passed rigorous flight exams to qualify to fly twin-engine passenger jets with a new charter airline based at Gatwick.

He now works as a pounds 35,000-a-year first officer, flying 148-seat Boeing 737s to holiday destinations ranging from Portugal to Egypt.

These days, Dickinson, 44, who once had waist-length, ginger hair and leapt around stage in leathers and skin-hugging tights ...