10 times musicians were rejected by their heroes
Rejection is never pleasant, no matter the explanation. However, the hardest pill to swallow is when the setback comes from somebody you greatly admire or even idolise. Working with your hero is the ultimate dream for most artists, but it does come with the horrifying risk of rejection from a figure like David Bowie.
While most artists mentioned below are stars in their own right, they still felt inferior compared to their idols. However, unfortunately for some, the meeting didn’t go as planned, and they were left to stew on being rejected by someone they greatly respect. Meanwhile, others saw the funny side and laughed off the unfortunate event.
In the music industry, rejection is unavoidable, and most artists will face it multiple times throughout their careers. In the beginning, they will face it from countless record labels and radio stations unless they are incredibly lucky, and as a result, they become immune to hearing “No”.
However, facing rejection from a record label is incomparable with the hurt of being rebuffed by the person who is partly responsible for making them become an artist. As the famous phrase goes, never meet your heroes, and if you want proof of that epitaph, see the list below.
10 times musicians were rejected by their heroes
George Harrison and Phil Collins
Phil Collins grew up an admirer of The Beatles, and he was extremely grateful for the opportunity to later work with George Harrison after the ‘Fab Four’ split. Collins was drafted in to play the drums as a session musician on ‘All Things Must Pass’, which was a dream come true. When the album was released, he excitedly bought a copy from the record store and quickly discovered his contribution was cut from the LP.
Collins recalled: “A few months later, I buy the album from my local record shop, look at the sleeve notes, and I’m not there. And I’m thinking, ‘There must be some mistake!’ But it’s a different version of the song, and I’m not on it.” Decades later, the pair met again at an F1 event and fortunately saw the funny side of the whole incident.
Paul McCartney and Phil Collins
Unfortunately for Phil Collins, it wasn’t only George Harrison from The Beatles who rejected him. While he later became friendly with Harrison, Collins’ relationship with McCartney is still frosty after an incident at Buckingham Palace in 2002. The Genesis founder knew Macca would also be in attendance and came prepared but felt belittled by the Liverpudlian.
In 2016, he told The Sunday Times: “I met him when I was working at the Buckingham Palace party back in 2002. McCartney came up with Heather Mills and I had a first edition of The Beatles, by Hunter Davies, and I said, ‘Hey, Paul, do you mind signing this for me?’ And he said, ‘Oh, Heather, our little Phil’s a bit of a Beatles fan’. And I thought, ‘You fuck, you fuck’. Never forgot it.”
Collins added: “He has this thing when he’s talking to you, where he makes you feel [like], ‘I know this must be hard for you because I’m a Beatle. I’m Paul McCartney and it must be very hard for you to actually be holding a conversation with me.'”
Joni Mitchell and Prince
Prince grew up idolising Joni Mitchell, attending her concerts and regularly writing to the singer-songwriter. After he became famous, he made it his mission to pen a song for her, but, unfortunately, she rejected his offering of ‘Emotional Pump’.
“I said why didn’t he build me a track,” Mitchell later explained to the Auckland Sun, “so he sent a song with him singing ‘Emotional pump, you’re my emotional pump, You make my body jump.’ I called him back and said that I could not do the song.” She continued: “‘I can’t sing this; I’d have to jump around in a black teddy. You think I should be jumping around in a black teddy?’ He said, ‘Oh Joni, we don’t do that anymore!'”
Prince and Pharrell Williams
Although Prince was rejected by his hero, Joni Mitchell, he also gave Pharrell Williams the same treatment after the hitmaker wrote, ‘Frontin’ with him in mind. In a conversation with Clash Music in 2018, Williams made the revelation about the track, which charted at five in the United States.
“All of my biggest songs were songs that I did with or for other people. Collaboration has always been part of my DNA,” he explained. “And, to be clear and to be honest, songs that I ended up putting out by myself were always songs that I wrote for other people. I made ‘Frontin’ for Prince, and even ‘Happy,’ I wrote that for CeeLo.”
David Bowie and Red Hot Chili Peppers
Working with David Bowie was the ultimate career goal for Red Hot Chilli Peppers. Sadly for them, he wasn’t interested in the opportunity when presented with the chance to act as their producer. Nevertheless, despite the rejection, Chili’s frontman Anthony Kiedis still holds Bowie in the highest regard and adores his work.
Following Bowie’s death, Kiedis said: “Every record we ever made, we had the band discussion: ‘Who should we get to produce this record?’ ‘I don’t know, we have to try someone new. Let’s get David Bowie!”
He continued: “So in the beginning, we would call him, and he would say no, respectfully. Then, later, we would write long e-mails explaining everything and why it was time for us to really get our ships on—and he always respectfully declined… For two minutes, I was heartbroken, and then I would hear Chad Smith play drums, and I’d be like, ‘We’re good, we can go do something else’.” The singer added: “We asked him to produce By the Way, as we were writing By the Way, and then we asked him again for our next record, which was Stadium [Arcadium].”
David Bowie and Dave Grohl
As the last entry shows, David Bowie was selective when he picked his projects. Any collaboration needed to be on his terms, such as when he agreed to perform backing vocals for Arcade Fire, but Dave Grohl was rejected when he tried to convince Bowie to work with him.
The two figures performed together in 1997 and kept in communication, with Grohl reaching out about collaborating in 2014. The Foo Fighters frontman had been asked to create a soundtrack for a blockbuster film and attempted to get Bowie on board, who said it was “not his thing” before jokingly saying, “All right, now that’s settled, then fuck off.”
Grohl later reflected: “With every muscle in my body loosening from the crippling anxiety of the past few minutes, I sunk back into my living room chair, born again. Hallelujah! I could finally breathe knowing that David Bowie did not actually wish me to ‘fuck off’ (or maybe he did, but in the nicest way possible, and even that was an honour).”
Lou Reed and MGMT
While making their second album, MGMT contacted Lou Reed to provide a spoken-word section to their song, ‘Lady Dada’s Nightmare’. While he accepted their offer of breakfast, “he pretty much said it didn’t need it,” according to the band’s Andrew VanWyngarden explained in 2018 during an appearance on The Best Show podcast.
Before leaving the breakfast, Reed offered MGMT some unsolicited advice, making the situation even more awkward. VanWyngarden recalled how the musician told the group “how we didn’t need managers” despite “our managers” being in attendance.
Despite Reed having no interest in working alongside MGMT, it was still a pleasant experience for the group. VanWyngarden conceded: “But at least we got to meet him”. Fortunately, they enjoyed another encounter before Reed’s passing and later saw him at the Westminster Dog Show in New York.
John Lennon and Bob Dylan
Discovering Bob Dylan changed John Lennon’s outlook on his music and permanently altered his approach to songwriting. Dylan didn’t appreciate Lennon’s love and instead decided to fire back at him by parodying him on ‘Fourth Time Around’, a song which arrived as a snide take on the Dylan-influenced, ‘Norwegian Wood’.
On the Blonde On Blonde track ‘Fourth Time Around’, Dylan sings, “I never asked for your crutch, Now don’t ask for mine.” Lennon later said of the track: “I was very paranoid about that. I remember he played it to me when he was in London. He said, what do you think? I said, ‘I don’t like it.’ I didn’t like it, and I was very paranoid. Just didn’t like what I felt I was feeling – I thought it was an out-and-out skit, you know, but it wasn’t. It was great. I mean, he wasn’t playing any tricks on me. I was just going through the bit.”
Bob Dylan and Counting Crows
Counting Crows supported Bob Dylan on a series of dates, and while their frontman, Adam Duritz, is a great admirer of the legendary singer-songwriter, they didn’t get friendly on tour. He deliberately stayed out of Dylan’s way, which turned out to be a fine decision after his hero’s opinion of him later came to light.
César Díaz, Dylan’s former touring guitarist, recalled an interaction where Duritz came up in conversation. “I would go … ‘Bob, the guy from the Counting Crows, he wants to be you,'” Díaz said, as reported in Vulture. “And that was before they did that ‘Mr. Jones’ thing, you know.” Dylan reportedly agreed with Díaz’s assertion and brutally said: “He goes, ‘Yeah, look at them. What a piece of shit.'”
George Harrison and Oasis
Oasis always wore their influence on their sleeve and never shied away from their love of The Beatles. However, George Harrison wasn’t a fan of the band and scathingly said in 1996, “The music lacks depth, and the singer Liam is a pain, the rest of the band don’t need him”.
Understandably, after hearing these comments, Liam Gallagher reacted angrily and lashed out during an interview with MTV: “If any of them old farts have got a problem with me, then they should leave their Zimmer frames at home, and I’ll hold them up with a good right hook.” He added: “I still love the Beatles, and I still love George Harrison as a songwriter in the Beatles, but as a person, I think he’s a fucking nipple. And if I ever meet him, I’ll fucking tell him. And if you’re watching — nipple!”
