The Roots of Spinal Tap

December 21st, 2007

This is Spinal Tap, as we all know, is the funniest movie ever made. What I didn’t know was that Christopher Guest, who played Nigel Tufnel, had experimented with rock parody before. Here’s a page, complete with soundclips, of Guest tweaking prog rock for The National Lampoon in 1975. Behold, the glory of “The Art Rock Suite.” Also, it turns out that the 1979 Lenny and the Squigtones LP, with Michael McKean and David Lander reprising their Lenny and Squiggy roles from the TV show Laverne and Shirley, featured Guest playing guitar and credited as Nigel Tufnel a few years before Spinal Tap was formed. If the next issue of the Fretboard Journal is delayed, it’s because I’ve been spending too much time looking stuff like this up on the Web.-MJS

Entry Filed under: Guitar, Recordings