Video: DEVO and Jermaine Jackson

Here is an odd TV "performance" of Jermaine Jackson (yes, Michael's brother,) doing "Let Me Tickle Your Fancy" with DEVO's Mark Mothersbaugh and Gerald Casale backing him up. Jermaine Jackson and Devo (YouTube, thanks Gil Kaufman!)

[#1 posted by Cruxx , July 9, 2008 3:23 PM]

Oh my god..I have that same Gibson V2. Had it since the mid 80's, the only guitar I've ever owned.

Might have to burn it now.

[#2 posted by anthropop , July 9, 2008 3:44 PM]

I always loved this song. Never realized the Devo connection. I wonder if Kanye West and Daft Punk ever saw it?

[#3 posted by Richard XXIII , July 9, 2008 3:47 PM]

I remember seeing this on TV. I am pretty sure it was a big, prime-time Halloween special on some network with Devo and others on it. Devo lip-synced to songs off of their (then) latest album. I'm pretty sure I lost all interest in them by this time.
I think either Devo as a whole or Mothersbaugh and Casale were somehow aiding and abetting Jermaine's career in some form or another (perhaps playing on his album?).
I just remember thinking that that show was thoroughly awful.

[#4 posted by pyota , July 9, 2008 4:10 PM]

there have been many devo related posts on boing boing of late .. "AND THAT'S GOOD!"

[#5 posted by David Pescovitz , July 9, 2008 4:28 PM]

@PYOTA (#4), Indeed! Must be something in the spuds I've been eating... ; )

[#6 posted by stephen eighmey , July 9, 2008 4:35 PM]

love devo. someone needs to find that video of conway twitty backed up by the residents that i saw a number of years ago. they were in those eyeball costumes and conway looked super country. and i think he played it straight. nice.

[#7 posted by Bender , July 9, 2008 4:48 PM]

Where fore art thou, Fred Travelina?

[#8 posted by bunnyman2112 , July 9, 2008 5:08 PM]

FWIW, Jerry and Mark did backing vocals on Debbie Harry's first solo record, KooKoo (produced by Nile Rogers). They were credited as Spud and Pud Devo...

[#9 posted by cbm , July 9, 2008 5:36 PM]

Fingersyncing! Mark looks like he's playing "drums" on an Omnichord. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omnichord

[#10 posted by Wingo , July 9, 2008 5:48 PM]

Fingersyncing! Mark looks like he's playing "drums" on an Omnichord

Yeah, that was my first thought. Although I can't figure out if any of the sounds in the song could realistically be attributed to it. Those things can sound pretty killer, but I think the rhythms are all just presets - I don't know if you can physically 'drum' actual beats on it.

I can't figure out what the hell Casale is fake-playing there...

[#11 posted by bat21 , July 9, 2008 6:50 PM]

@ stephen eighmey,

Here you go:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PK5qKhPBnlA

[#12 posted by Phikus , July 9, 2008 11:14 PM]

STEPHEN EIGHMEY & BAT21:

Yeah, the David Sanborn show Night Music was a good show. They used to usually close with a jam featuring all the diverse guests together. Too bad the Residents couldn't actually play on that song with Conway and Robert Cray (not that Devo were actually playing with Jermain. Did anybody else feel like that song might have easily been used for a Diet Coke commercial?)

The only other real memorable ending to one of Sanborn's shows was when Todd Rundgren was a guest and they closed the show with he and Taj Mahal doing Gilbert and Sullivan's "Never Mind the Why and Wherefore" (also features Todd's wife Michele Gray.) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5m33BXNHIHM

[#13 posted by tmccartney , July 10, 2008 6:29 AM]

I saw that Residents/Twitty Night Music episode when it first aired. I remember laughing my ass off at the eyeballs juking behind Twitty as he sang.

The Residents did a couple of typically weird numbers during the show.

Someone needs to release Night Music on DVD, although I guess getting the music rights would be nightmarishly difficult and expensive.

[#14 posted by eti , July 10, 2008 7:18 AM]

Jermaine called up Devo and introduced himself, and they hung up on him figuring it was a joke. Then he called back and explained he was for real and wanted them to add a little of the Devo magic to his album. Mark and Jerry sang backup. I remember hearing this for the first time on the Electrifying Mojo's radio show on WGPR in Detroit. Mojo was all about unity of the black folks and the white folks through music.

[#15 posted by anthropop , July 10, 2008 11:24 AM]

My favorite music was made between 1968-1974 and the best of that era, which was recorded mostly in Muscle Shoals, Alabama and Memphis, Tennessee was made by blacks and whites together. The rhythm sections of Fame studios and Stax studios have no peers. 1968-74 was an amazingly pivotal six years...

[#16 posted by bunnyman2112 , July 11, 2008 4:26 PM]

RE: Nightmusic. I'd have to say that my fave episode was Ratdog (Bob Weir+Rob Wasserman) + Screamin' Jay Hawkins + Bongwater doing a Roky Erickson cover together (You Don't Love Me Yet). It's on the YouTubes somewhere...

[#17 posted by Phikus , July 12, 2008 12:50 AM]

BUNNYMAN2112: If I'd seen that episode before, I would have revised the 2nd half of my post. Thanks!