The Black Lips, an indie rock band that played in Chennai late last month, was allegedly chased out of the country by the local police. The reason was the garage-rockers’ raunchy act onstage. A US magazine quoted Black Lips drummer Joe Bradley on the Chennai show. He said that bassist Jared Swilley got the crowd riled up with his comments—“weak ass” and “bitch”—before guitarist Cole Alexander mooned the audience, kissed guitarist Ian Saint Pe and then dove into the crowd.

This stage act would hardly raise eyebrows elsewhere for there have been other ‘vile’ acts abroad. Forty years ago, a man got on stage and took off his pants. The long-haired, bearded, 25-year-old singer exposed himself, briefly rolling down his leather pants and gyrating lasciviously. The above mentioned concert was a lousy one according to many Jim Morrison fans, but it is remembered till date. The poet-rockstar who had young America high with his piercing screams and helped his fans break on to the other side felt that a concert was “involving many people into the world of private thought”.

He was not alone. Iggy Pop has traditionally performed bare-chested. When he played with the The Stooges from 1968 to 1975, he was famous for cutting himself with broken bottles, rolling in raw meat, contortionism and stage diving. He is also one of the first people in recorded rock ‘n’ roll history to stage dive.

And if you want something fleshier, how about celebrating a new record deal with some bloodshed? After signing his first solo career record deal Ozzy Osbourne bit off the head of a dove at a record company meeting in New York. He did spit the head out. And once bitten was no reason to be shy for Ozzy, who on January 20, 1982, bit the head off a bat, which he claims he thought was made of rubber, while performing on stage. While a Rolling Stone article said the bat was alive, some say it was brought to the show dead. Ozzy himself said, in the booklet to the 2002 edition of his album, ‘Diary of a Madman’, that the bat was not only alive, but also managed to bite him.

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