Three Rock Superstars Who Didn’t See What Was So Funny About ‘Spinal Tap’
While it wasn’t a huge hit upon its initial release, This Is Spinal Tap found a subculture of rock fans who dug the movie’s satirical body slams, including Martin Scorsese, director of actual rockumentary The Last Waltz. “I did feel a little protective about rock ‘n’ roll itself, because the music was a transcendental force for me and millions of others — the best of it, that is,” he says in A Fine Line Between Clever And Stupid: The Story of Spinal Tap.
But he knew Rob Reiner and company weren’t out to skewer all rock music. “That wasn’t the point. They were definitely having fun with a certain reverence for the music. But the satire wasn’t aimed at great music. The not-so-great music, that whole rock ‘n’ roll milieu — that was the target.”
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So Scorsese got it, but not everyone in love with heavy metal felt the same way. A Fine Line Between Clever and Stupid reveals three rock superstars who didn’t appreciate being the target of Spinal Tap’s punchlines.
Ozzy Osbourne
Michael McKean was filming Light of Day with director and rock fan Paul Schrader, who ran into Osbourne and told him that he’d been working with the Spinal Tap frontman. Osbourne told Schrader he wasn’t a fan, mainly because the movie was too close to real life.
“Everybody was saying to me, you’ve got to see this film, This Is Spinal Tap,” Osbourne told New Music Express a few years later. “I wasn’t laughing! It was fucking real. It was fucking real, man. It’s like a documentary, not a fucking funny film. That’s it, man! That’s what it’s like!”
Steven Tyler
Joe Perry, lead singer of Aerosmith and future star of Wayne’s World 2, thought Spinal Tap was funny and persuaded Tyler to check it out. “You’ve got to see this movie,” he said. “It’s so fucking good. It’s hilarious.”
But Tyler thought the joke was on him. “That movie bummed me out,” he confessed. “Because I thought, ‘How dare they? That’s all real. And they’re mocking it.’”
Axl Rose
“I never saw Spinal Tap when it came out,” the defiant Guns N’ Roses singer told Melody Maker in 1987. “I read an interview where these guys said they wrote it after they read something about Iron Maiden calling themselves troubadours of rock ‘n’ roll. They thought it was fucking ridiculous. What do they mean, fucking ridiculous? These guys are in a band, they tour the fucking world, they’re like a miniature army. That’s their job.”
Lead guitarist Slash was more forgiving. “The movie’s okay,” he said. “When I saw the singer stand up and say, ‘This is a beautiful ballad called ‘Lick My Love Pump,’’ I thought, ‘Yeah, it’s okay after all.’”