Famous People Playing "Under the Radar" On Other Bands' Hits

John Sebastian playing the autoharp on Randy VanWarmer's "Just When I Needed You Most".

 

A favorite of mine: Mick Fleetwood and John McVie on "Werewolves Of London"

 

Axl Rose on Don Henley's "I Will Not Go Quietly", off of End of The Innocence.

 

George Harrison: Slide guitar on "Leave a Light On" by Belinda Carlisle

Mick Jagger: Backing vocal on "You're So Vain" by Carly Simon

Billy Joel: Piano on either "Remember (Walkin' in the Sand)" or "Leader of the Pack" by the Shangri-Las, but probably not both [sources differ]

Elton John: Piano on "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother" by the Hollies

Brian Jones: Saxophone on "You Know My Name (Look Up the Number)" by the Beatles

Phil Spector: Guitar on "On Broadway" by the Drifters

Ray Stevens: Handclaps on "Sugar, Sugar" by the Archies

 

I heard fairly recently that Jimmy Page played on The Who's "I Can't Explain".

Is that true?

Stephen Stills played percussion on Bee Gees' "You Should Be Dancing"

Didn't Hendrix play on a song from Stephen Stills first solo album?

Roger Taylor/John Deacon played on Elton John's "Too Young"

Stevie Wonder played Harmonica on EJ's "I Guess That's Why They Call It The Blues".

Dave Mason played acoustic guitar on Hendrix's version of "All Along The Watchtower".

Helen Ready, Donna Summer, Cher, Bob Segar, Joe Perry and Katey "Peg Bundy" Segal - all performed on Gene Simmons' first solo album.

Peter Cetera and Donnie Daucus sang backup on Billy Joel's "My Life".

 

I was suprised to learn that at one point Michael Jackson was going to record "Bad" as a duet with Prince.

Same thing for "State of Shock" - Freddie Mercury was planned to duet with Michael Jackson - but due to schedule conflicts, Mick Jagger lent his voice instead. There is a "rough vocal" by FM floating somewhere on YT.

 

Wasn't Donovan also on that track singing the outro chorus?

 

Linda Ronstadt did background vocals on a few James Taylor tracks - notably "Bartender's Blues" from "JT" and "One Morning In May" off of "One Man Dog"

 

Stevie Ray Vaughn played guitar on David's Bowie's Let's Dance.

 

James Taylor playing banjo on Neil Young's "Old Man".




Dan

 

Steve Windwood (Organ and keyboards) on David Gilmour's About Face

A_L

 

Rhythm guitar, yes.

 

David Gilmour on Pete Townshend's "White City Fighting"
Donovan sharing vocals on Alice Cooper's "Billion Dollar Babies"

 

Yeah that one was really "under the radar"!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Bang a Gong (Get It On) by T. Rex features Flo & Eddie (Mark Volman and Howard Kaylen) on backup vocals.

 

The duo also sings backup on Bruce Springsteen's 'Hungry Heart'

 

Maybe someone can help here (I hope this isn't too much of a stray from the thread topic).

When talking about Dinosaur Jr last night, a friend of mine said he was up late watching "Rage" and a filmclip came on of a rock band with a chick singer dressed up like a goth, and singing into a knife (which he said was terrible) but he said half way through the song J Mascis steps out from a wardrobe and plays a solo! Anyone know what song this is?

 

And sang backup with Linda Ronstadt (as well as on "Heart of Gold").

 

That would be Johnny Depp playing slide guitar on Oasis's The Girl In The Dirty Shirt off of Be Here Now.

 

He actually plays on "Fade In/Out" from that album, but yes, great track and Johnny's slide guitar is understated and a breath of humanity in a bloated mess of an album (I still love it though!)

My favorite "under the radar" guest spot has to be Donovan's vocals on the title track of Alice Cooper's "Billion Dollar Babies". It was years before I realized it was Donovan! I'm usually a pretty thorough liner notes reader...guess I missed that one!

 

Tina Turner (and the Ikettes) singing background vocals on Frank Zappa and The Mothers' "Dinah-Moe Humm".

 

Because it was such a clash of eras, I loved it when Ian Anderson played the flute solo under Love & Rockets 80's hit "No New Tale To Tell".

 

Richard Marx sang backing vocals on some of Billy Joel's Stormfront album.

 

The Bangles sing backing vocals on Waiting for Tonight by Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers.

Roger Taylor (Duran Duran) plays percussion on the Power Station singles, I believe.

Lindsey Buckingham sings backing vocals on two Petty/Heartbreakers songs: Walls and The Man Who Loves Women.

Phil Collins plays and sings on No One is to Blame by Howard Jones.

Phil Collins on drums and Eric Clapton on guitar for Paul McCartney's Angry.

Phil Collins on drums for Paul McCartney's It's Not True.

Dave Stewart, sitar on Don't Come Around Here No More by Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers.

Dave Gilmour, guitar on We Got Married by Paul McCartney.

 

Paul Butterfield on harmonica on "Under the Falling Sky" on Bonnie Raitt's "Give It Up" album.