Danny Elfman

[Swofty]

Am I the only person here who didn't know that Danny Elfman used to be the lead singer for 80's band Oingo Boingo in the 80's, their most famous song being Weird Science for the comedy film of the same name? ... then as we know he went on to compose for the later two Evil Dead films for Sam Raimi.

Danny doing his thing with Oingo Boingo:

 

[DyD]

Yeah, I remember being pretty surprised when I found out about it too... But that was more than 20 years ago. If I'm to be completely honest, I think I'm much more surprised by you not being aware of it until now than I was by discovering this tidbit back then.

All kidding aside though, I think everybody who first took notice of his name as a film composer rather than a pop singer eventually has that moment – and that'd be pretty much every movie fan who grew up in the late '80s, early '90s. It just took you a little longer than most of us to find out.

 

[Kain]

I thought it was common knowledge?

 

[Swofty]

Yeah, I remember being pretty surprised when I found out about it too... But that was more than 20 years ago. If I'm to be completely honest, I think I'm much more surprised by you not being aware of it until now than I was by discovering this tidbit back then.

All kidding aside though, I think everybody who first took notice of his name as a film composer rather than a pop singer eventually has that moment – and that'd be pretty much every movie fan who grew up in the late '80s, early '90s. It just took you a little longer than most of us to find out.

I must have missed that thread .. I've been listening to Weird Science on Alexa on and off recently as well ...

 

[DyD]

I must have missed that thread

Oh, I didn't start a thread about it here 20 years ago, if that's what you mean... What I meant is that I thought everybody would know this by now, but 20 years ago I also wasn't aware and was surprised when I randomly stumbled upon the info. I was pretty familiar with his movie scores and I had heard the Oingo Boingo hits before, but I was completely unaware it all came from the same person – and I know a lot of people shared this experience. Maybe it's just because his career as a movie composer has outlasted and outshined his work with Oingo Boingo, so much so that it became the main thing he's known for.

 

[Swofty]

On a side note, exactly the same thing happened in the UK with the lead singer of a techno/punk band called Pop Will Eat Itself that I used to like. Years later I learned that the lead singer had instead chosen to carve a career as a film composer, he's composed the music for a lot of A list movies.

He went from this ..

Def Con One (including The Twilight Zone) - YouTube

To this ..

Clint Mansell - IMDb

 

[DyD]

His work as film composer has been so great and critically praised the past few years that I feel the same thing could maybe happen to Trent Reznor eventually, but the much more significant cultural imprint and lasting popularity of Nine Inch Nails might keep it from happening.