Least amicable band split stories...

[Downunderwonder]

Lucky MrPerpetual showed his stripes early on!

[EliasMooseblaster]

On 18/09/2025 at 11:47, MacDaddy said:

 

I read Keith Richards autobiography and was surprised by how the 'Stones never have been great mates. It's purely a working relationship.

Similar situation with The 'Oo, from what I gather - Roger Daltrey has frequently admitted to any disputes descending into fisticuffs, especially in the early days. It sounds like there was some camaraderie between Moon and Entwistle, but otherwise they just learned to get along on tour and then went their separate ways until the job forced them back together.

[Dan Dare]

On 18/09/2025 at 11:47, MacDaddy said:

I read Keith Richards autobiography and was surprised by how the 'Stones never have been great mates. It's purely a working relationship.

 

That's probably why they've lasted. In virtually any workplace, people wouldn't expect to be best buddies (or sworn enemies). As long as you can get along with colleagues/co-workers, that's fine. You make the odd friend through work, but it's not the norm in my experience.

 

Yet music seems to be different for many. Is it because we are trying to recapture the lost halogen days of our yoof, when our first band was a band of brothers, us against the world, etc? And as for relationships within bands, just don't go there. Guaranteed to be a disaster.

[Downunderwonder]

46 minutes ago, Dan Dare said:

lost halogen days

You rehearsed under fluorine lamps?

[chris_b]

Bands with personal issues; The Kinks, The Beatles, The Stones, Oasis, Pink Floyd, Cream, etc etc . . . .

 

You don't have to like everyone in the band, you just have to be able to make music with them. Success is good at papering over the cracks.

[Lozz196]

As Steve Jones from The Sex Pistols said, you don’t have to be best mates in a band any more than if in a football team, you still pass the ball to the best placed player even if you don’t get on with them.

[Downunderwonder]

21 hours ago, Downunderwonder said:

You rehearsed under fluorine lamps?

You need a tunsten filament and a halogen to make a halogen bulb. Fluorine is not the actual one they use but it would probably go to 11, seemed appropriate for your halogen days.

[SteveXFR]

I was in a prog metal band for a relatively short time. We wrote and recorded enough for a 40 minute set and then had a meeting about getting ready for gigs. At this meeting, the front man brought lists for each band member with specific items of kit each of us had to have. This wasn't little things like leads etc, my list included Ampeg SVT Classic with 410 cab, the guitarists list included a HiWatt amp and a load of pedals. After a relatively short argument, we all quit. The front man contacted me again recently claiming he's a bit more chilled out now, I told him to get stuffed.

[Downunderwonder]

22 minutes ago, SteveXFR said:

I was in a prog metal band for a relatively short time. We wrote and recorded enough for a 40 minute set and then had a meeting about getting ready for gigs. At this meeting, the front man brought lists for each band member with specific items of kit each of us had to have. This wasn't little things like leads etc, my list included Ampeg SVT Classic with 410 cab, the guitarists list included a HiWatt amp and a load of pedals. After a relatively short argument, we all quit. The front man contacted me again recently claiming he's a bit more chilled out now, I told him to get stuffed.

How old am I that I recall the righteous indignation you posted at the time?

[SteveXFR]

2 minutes ago, Downunderwonder said:

How old am I that I recall the righteous indignation you posted at the time?

 

I think it was only about four years ago. 

[Downunderwonder]

5 minutes ago, SteveXFR said:

 

I think it was only about four years ago. 

So you might just about be able to remember your lines? Seems like a worthwhile thing if the rest of the band and yourself got the knucklehead vocalist to accept his place in the world.

[mcnach]

It wasn't quite a band yet but...

 

I wanted to start a new project in a particular vein, as a side thing to my main band, with as many new people (to me) as I could. I made it very clear I wanted it to be a collaborative thing, writing together etc. Mostly reggae-tinged.

One guy stood out, who played guitar and sang and we seemed to be looking for a similar thing, so we met. It was fun initially. He showed me some of his stuff, singing mostly in French (he's from Senegal), and it was cool enough. He was going to do a little solo thing at a coffee shop in a couple of weeks and I agreed to play his stuff with him, mostly on bass with a couple of songs on guitar. 

It was fun, and then we went busking and it was fun...

Until it wasn't. Very quickly it turned into just playing his stuff, and only the way he wanted. Basically I had no input... and since this was not bringing money or what I had set out to do, I brought it up one Sunday afternoon while jamming at his, with his teenage son playing various percussion instruments, and it was as I had farted, no, sharted on his face. He basically kicked me out of his place

 

I was a little amused by it because it felt so crazy. As I was packing my stuff he was just ranting about his integrity as a musician and how it's impossible to find someone to play with because everybody wants to do their own thing and be creative with HIS songs. I had to remind him the premise under which we first met, which only aggravated him more. His son looked like he didn't know where to hide...

 

He slammed the door behind me, and as I walked to the car I was laughing, it was so surreal...

 

A bit later I was talking to somebody who had seen me busking with the other guy. I told him I was not doing that anymore and that's when he smiled and said "I didn't think it would last". He knew the guy...

 

3 years later, the guy is still playing solo. It sounds good, I enjoy his stuff, I just don't want to play with the guy. His erratic sense of timing in particular was really difficult to deal with... but as a solo artist he's good.

[WalMan]

On 21/08/2025 at 17:24, Burns-bass said:

I was once in a band where the singer and drummer were in a relationship. Drummer decided to dump the singer before a gig. As we approached the last song (and therefore the denouement of their relationship) she turned to him in tears and threw her guitar on the floor. I picked it up and played the last song.

 

On 21/08/2025 at 17:52, PaulWarning said:

how thoughtless, he could've waited till after the gig

At least it wasn't the Park Avenue split with only half the lines from Don't Go Breaking My Heart 🤣 - sadly I can't find the video.

I am still mates will all former bandmates, indeed the drummer comes back and sits in with the band (that has been going yonkers) on occasion.. We even get together with the original guitarist from years ago and have a session banging out the old tunes. Still tight with all of them and able to catch changes/mistakes on the fly with a quick look or nod  

 

Back in the day said guitarist and original vocalist could clash at times, eventually guitar went, we kept going with a couple of other guitarists, then vocals guitars left and we carried on for a bit with another guitar & vocals, but eventually drums had had enough and went & I followed. Roll on some years and drums vocals & I got together for a showcase with the guitarist from the band the drummer had ended up with and that continued for many years 'til the vocalist emigrated and we enrolled the vocals from the band drummer & guitarist had been in during the interim before the showcase gig. Drums has moved on but we still all get together for parties, Christmas, and sadly most recently funerals  

 

Pretty much all splits were amicable though I have memories of difficult moments with the original lot as guitar & vox clashed heads.

• Did a gig around Easter time. Guitarist thought it would be a good idea to give the audience eggs and got some bags of the candy coated eggs for the vocalist to hand out. Vocalist just hurled handfuls towards the bemused crowd. Guitarist had a hissy and walked off. Thankfully I think it was pretty much the end of the night.
• Girlfriends throwing their 6p in and screams of "Kev's the worst one" ... a phrase that still gets bandied about on occasion 40 years later 😄

 

Also had a difficult one with the guitarist in a club band I played with. He was in a bad place and had started drinking...a lot. Driving him and the drummer home from a gig one night he got us to stop by a club so he could go in and get some ciggies. Gone for ages to the point where I was about to say "**** it" leave him to it and tell the doorman to let him know he could find his own way home. But even with him, now he's settled down many years later, I do the occasional dep.

Edited 2 hours ago by WalMan