Devo on "Saturday Night Live" — 30 years ago
Paul Boutin
Filed to: rock stars
via videosift.com
Before Steve Jobs, Devo was a precursor of geek chic. If you're 45 or older you probably remember this brain-breaking TV moment, a hot topic after last night's Macworld show at the Warfield. If not, it's still a good clip. For context, 1978's pop music was dominated by the Bee Gees and Debby Boone's "You Light Up My Life." Rock musicians — Journey, Styx, Fleetwood Mac — played big area anthems, had long, feathered hair and wore Spandex. A bunch of robotic shorthairs in radiation suits and dorky eyeglasses singing maybemaybemaybemaybemaybemaybemaybe better come back later next week — produced by Brian Eno, who went on to do the Windows 95 startup sound — was a finger down the throat of the Rolling Stones' contemporary disco hit "Miss You." As they later sang, Devo were the band for those of us through being cool.