Credit: Neil Zlozower
Devo is known for its sense of humor. But not everyone is in on the joke.
Devo’s Gerald V. Casale was a recent guest on the Paltrocast and recalled the time an in-concert joke at the expense of David Lee Roth didn’t sit well with the Van Halen frontman.
I only met David Lee Roth in passing,” Casale told Paltrowitz. “Back then I never met any of the other guys in the band. We never were in the same event at the same time, in the same room, it just didn’t happen.
Casale continued: “I think the only time I heard anything was… We were shooting a lot of interstitial video to show in concert with this nefarious character Rod Rooter that represented the worst of corporate record companies. He’s talking about his favorite band, The Evil Clowns. He’s talking to [Saturday Night Live] star Laraine Newman, he’s putting down Devo. He goes, ‘You know something? Now Evil Clowns, now there’s a band.’ And it cuts to the famous image of David Lee Roth shot by Helmut Newton where he’s chained to a chain link fence. We morphed Mark’s face over David Lee Roth’s face so it was not David Lee Roth, it was Mark [Mothersbaugh of Devo], but with David Lee Roth’s hair and body and chains. Laraine ‘poo-poos’ The Evil Clowns. Then we heard, maybe six months later, that David Lee Roth didn’t like that.”
Paltrowitz offered up a few additional interesting Devo/Van Halen notes to the VHND: Devo 2.0 drummer Kane Ritchotte was briefly David Lee Roth’s drummer. According to Paltrowitz’s brand-new book DLR Book: How David Lee Roth Changed the World, Ritchotte was slated to be part of Roth’s band for some shows in Las Vegas in 2018 and again in 2020. Also, former Devo drummer and current Foo Fighters drummer Josh Freese was not only the drummer backing Wolfgang Van Halen at 2023’s Taylor Hawkins tribute concerts, but he was also Hawkins’ drummer in Chevy Metal, which often performed Roth-era Van Halen songs live.
More DLR stories in Paltrowitz’s new book, which is available now through the Van Halen Store, and in the podcast he co-hosts with Steve Roth called The DLR Cast: The Essential Podcast by and for Fans of David Lee Roth!