Tuesday, December 18, 2012

Keith Moon, we hardly knew ya

Keith Moon, the erstwhile drummer for the rock group The Who, was famous for flushing explosives down toilets.

Indeed, once in 1967 in Flint Michigan he tried to flush a stick of dynamite down a Holiday Inn bowl.  When the lit dynamite didn't flush, he had the good sense to jump out of the bathroom moments before shards of flying porcelain sprayed the room.

Disappointed that his toilet plan hadn't succeeded exactly as he had hoped, Moon allegedly went downstairs and drove a Cadillac (he later claimed it was a Lincoln Continental) into the hotel pool, causing him to break his tooth.  This account is disputed by others who claim that Moon broke his tooth not by driving a car into a full swimming pool but by diving into an empty one.

As a boy, Moon was sent to the Alperton Secondary Modern School after failing his eleven plus exam at his prior school.  At Alperton, a teacher assessed the future rock drummer this way: "Retarded artistically.  Idiotic in other respects."  I kid you not.

Keith Moon died of a drug overdose in London on September 7, 1978, having dined out earlier that evening with Paul and Linda McCartney.  He was 32 years old.