"Eat me, fuckface."
--Mojo's traditional autograph salutation American musician/pagan fertility god, born in 1957. Real name: Neill Kirby McMillan, Jr. He was born in Chapel Hill, North Carolina on August 2, 1957, but grew up in Danville, Virginia. A rock fanatic in his youth, he earned degrees from Miami University in Ohio in political science and history.
McMillan moved to England in 1979. Hoping to break into London's punk scene, he performed old rock-and-roll cover songs for a while before returning to the United States the next year. He formed a punk band called Zebra 123 in Denver and quickly got into trouble with the Secret Service for putting on a concert called the Assassination Ball and making posters that featured Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter getting their heads blown off. He later moved to San Diego, where he met future Beat Farmer Country Dick Montana for the first time.
It was during a bicycle trip across the country that McMillan officially became Mojo Nixon (he liked the idea of combining voodoo and bad politics into one name), and when he returned to San Diego, he began performing with a washboard player who called himself Skid Roper. They released a demo (called simply "Mojo Nixon and Skid Roper") that became a hit on college radio. They later toured with the Beat Farmers before releasing their second album in 1986, "Frenzy", which featured crazed, ranting songs like "Where the Hell's My Money", "I Hate Banks", and "Stuffin' Martha's Muffin", Mojo's tribute to monkey love and MTV VJ Martha Quinn.
Their next EP ("Get Out of My Way") scored them some time on MTV, thanks to "Burn Down the Malls", and 1987's "Bo-Day-Shus!!!" hit the national charts with "Elvis Is Everywhere", which is still Mojo's best-known song. MTV fell in love with Mojo for a while, filming some of his rants to use during commercial breaks and letting him serve as a guest-VJ from time to time, but that came to a quick end with 1989's "Root Hog or Die", which featured "Debbie Gibson Is Pregnant with My Two-Headed Love Child". Mojo made a video of the song that featured Winona Ryder, but MTV banned it immediately -- Debbie Gibson was making big money for MTV at the time, and they were afraid of jeopardizing their relationship with her. Mojo immediately cut his ties to MTV and hasn't said a nice word about them since."Elvis is coming back! And boy, is he pissed! You'll know that Elvis is returning 'cause you gonna turn on the TV -- and the EVIL and INSIPID Jon Bon Jovi will be on there! But {But} But {But} But {But what?} Jon Bon Jovi gonna have some little feet hangin' outta his butthole. {There ya go, there ya go} Jon Bon Jovi gonna have some booties stickin' outta his rectal area. Walter Cronkite gonna be there. Walter Cronkite gonna be there. He's gonna say, 'Uh, Mr. Bon Jovi, what these little feet you got hangin' outta your butthole, man?' Jon Bon Jovi gonna say - Jon Bon Jovi gonna say - Jon Bon Jovi gonna say - Jon Bon Jovi gonna say, '(whimper) Elvis came back and RAMMED JOURNEY UP MY FUCKING ASS! AAAAAA!'"
--from "Elvis is Everywhere" on The Pleasure Barons Live in Las Vegas Mojo and Skid parted ways in 1989 to work on separate projects. Mojo put together a backing band that he called "the first post-cowpunk supergroup" for 1990's "Otis" that included Country Dick Montana, John Doe, Eric Ambel, and Bill Davis -- the controversy du jour for that album was "Don Henley Must Die". Eagles fans were outraged, but two years after the song was released, Don Henley showed up at one of Mojo's shows in Texas, jumped on stage with him, and enthusiastically sang along with the song. Mojo was impressed and called off the feud. Unfortunately, his label, Enigma, went bankrupt soon after "Otis" was released, and he (and his touring band, the Toadliquors) was left label-less for a number of years. Mojo managed to release a Christmas album called "Horny Holidays" with Triple X in 1992, but he spent several years unable to release an album. While he looked for a new label, however, he formed the Pleasure Barons with Country Dick Montana, John Doe, and Dave Alvin and recorded "Prairie Home Invasion" and "Will the Fetus Be Aborted?" with Jello Biafra.We went to a shopping mall
And laughed at all the shoppers.
The security guards trailed us
To a record shop.
We asked for Mojo Nixon.
They said "He don't work here."
We said "If you don't got Mojo Nixon
Then your store could use some fixin'."
--"Punk Rock Girl", the Dead Milkmen Mojo finally formed his own label, Blutarski, and released "Whereabouts Unknown" in 1995. Requisite controversies: a cover of the Smiths' "Girlfriend in a Coma" that ridiculed Morrissey and "Bring Me the Head of David Geffen", which got yanked from the album but was later shoehorned into 1997's "Gadzooks".
In 1998, Mojo was named the honorary captain of the Olympic men's luge team for the USA (they won silver and bronze medals) and moved to Cincinnati to work in talk radio. He released "The Real Sock Ray Blue" in 1999, then moved back to San Diego in 2002 to work as a disc jockey."Sometimes, when me and my baby wanna get... sassified... we go behind the couch. The angle of the incident, you know. We got a John Ford movie on the TV. That way, I can do two things: watch John Ford... and get sassified. Right before this happens, I put all the cats outta the house. Don't want no cats fuckin' with me when I'm doin' my business!"
--from "Louisiana Liplock" on The Pleasure Barons Live in Las Vegas Mojo's brand of enraged, booze-drenched, sex-crazed rockabilly combined redneck chic ("UFOs, Big Rigs and BBQ", "Richard Petty", "Are Your Drinkin' with Me, Jesus?") with a leftist libertarian outlook ("I Like Marijuana", "Hamlet Chicken Plant Disaster", "You Can't Kill Me") and an utterly fucked-up sense of humor ("The Poontango", "Amsterdam Dogshit Blues", "I Gotta Crazy Wife", and the gleefully perverted "Tie My Pecker to My Leg"). It was smart and satirical and lowbrow all at the same time, and he could play the hell out of a guitar, and it ain't at all hard to get addicted to Mojo records.
But don't think that all Mojo did was music. He also had an extremely impressive acting career. He played James Van Eaton in "Great Balls of Fire!" and the Spirit of Rock and Roll in "Rock and Roll High School Forever". He also appeared in "Super Mario Bros.", "Car 54, Where Are You?", "Buttcrack", and "A Four Course Meal", as well as providing the voice of Sheriff Lester T. Hobbes in the "Redneck Rampage" computer games.
Ya know what? It is harder'n hell to write up someone like Mojo. You think you've got all the pertinent details, then you find out that he once debated music censorship with Pat Buchanan on CNN. Then you find out that he was arrested when he was 14 years old for protesting leash laws at his local City Hall, wore a T-shirt reading "FREE THE DOGS", and threatened to kill the mayor while sitting in the back of a patrol car. That he was knocked unconscious by Clarence Clemmons after jumping onstage during a Springsteen concert. That he was the Mushroom Party candidate for President in four presidential elections. That one of his sons is named Rafe Cannonball Nixon. He's God's greatest gift to rock and roll -- he can play like a motherfucker, he ain't never seen an icon he wouldn't like to smash, and he's interesting enough to fill up two or three dozen biographies.Mojo, announcing his final concert: "I have nothing more to say. Not only am I empty, but obviously nobody gives a rat's ass about the things I have been saying for twenty years. The masses are just as blinded by the light of stupidity, prudery and the shiny objects of hate. I have debased your false icons, mocked the myths and tried to shine the light of truth and freedom on the Big Lies. I have done all I can." Mojo performed what he said was his last performance ever on March 20, 2004 at the Continental Club in Austin, Texas, and retired to Coronado, California to work as a DJ at KGB, a classic rock station.
A few years ago, my brother and I went to see Mojo perform at a small club in Denton, Texas. We got there early to avoid the crowds due to arrive when the show started, so we got to drink a pitcher and watch Mojo and the Toadliquors drink and tune up. After about an hour's worth of boozing, I had to go drain the lizard, so I went in the restroom, and there was Mojo -- sitting on the pot with the stall door wide open, pants around his ankles, writing in a notebook. I went about my business as if this happened all the time..."Gimme a big ugly G, boys!"
big ugly G commences
"Yeah, rednecks were in caves, banging sticks together, they was drinking homemade wine made out of elephant testicles and shit. These were the original rednecks, back in the Caveman Cromagnon Big Dick Days, the day that everybody had a big dick, all women had motors in their pussies, nobody had a job! It was a glorious time on the Planet Earth! Are you ready to hear my sidewayssuperpsychogirth I-am-ready-to- shout- bamalamadamalamadama - ARE YOU READY, BOYS?!"
--from "Redneck Rampage", The Real Sock Ray Blue Research from www.mojonixon.com, AllMusic.com, the Internet Movie Database (www.imdb.com), and years of worshiping at the mighty altar that is Mojo |
