Bands are a lot like family, and families don't always get along. But it's not everyday
someone throws a plate of chicken at a person they're supposed to be close with.
In 1999 the California pop punk band Blink-182 was riding high. They had
a hit single with "All the Small Things" and were all over MTV. But as the band progressed,
there was a beef among members. On one side of the infighting stood bassist and singer Mark
Hoppus and drummer Travis Barker; on the other, guitarist and singer Tom DeLonge.
Things got nasty in 2015 when Hoppus and Barker replaced DeLonge with Matt
Skiba of the band Alkaline Trio, saying that DeLonge had left the band "indefinitely." But
DeLonge released a statement on Instagram denying he ever walked away. Both Hoppus
and Barker responded in a Rolling Stone interview, in which Hoppus explained:
"We booked January 5th to go into the studio. On December 30th, we get an e-mail from Tom’s
manager saying that he has no interest in recording and that he wants to do his other,
non-musical stuff. [...] Every single thing that we’ve heard from his camp [...] was,
'Tom is out indefinitely. For the foreseeable future, Tom is done.'"
When asked about their reaction to DeLonge's Instagram post, Barker said:
"Mark and I were finally honest. We always covered up for him before. [...] It's
hard to cover for someone who's disrespectful and ungrateful."
"I mean I can't really speak for him, except that, you know,
people grow apart, and when they do, you know, it's no longer healthy."
They finally seemed to put aside their differences, however, in 2022. In October
of that year, Blink-182 announced they would be reuniting for a new tour in 2023.
Choreographer Robin Antin turned The Pussycat Dolls into a successful pop group after they
were a burlesque act, which isn't seen in the music world every day. Right off the bat, the
group scored a hit with "Don't Cha" in 2005, and other popular songs followed. Nicole Scherzinger,
who first came to fame on the show "Popstars," stood front and center of The Pussycat Dolls.
In fact, she contributed lead vocals to 95 percent of the songs… at least,
according to what she said on "Behind the Music" in 2012. Scherzinger explained:
"I'll never forget I finished the album 'PCD,' and Ron [Fair] brought the girls in the studio,
and we played it for them. This is the first time they've ever heard the music."
It was a claim that Fair, who produced the album, backed up:
he said Scherzinger sang just about everything.
Pussycat Doll member Kaya Jones later confirmed that Scherzinger did all of the heavy lifting in
the studio, but only because the other women weren't given a choice. She told TMZ in 2012:
"There was a lot more going on behind the scenes. Nicole was always someone who wanted to be in the
spotlight and would do pretty much anything to get it. To call the other girls in the Pussycat Dolls
'window dressings' is a bit farfetched... every girl in the group was talented."
It was a combination of substance abuse, refusing to sing, and pulling disappearing acts that
got Ozzy Osbourne kicked out of Black Sabbath. After the band's 1978 album "Never Say Die!" was
received poorly by critics, they rented a house in Los Angeles to work on a new LP. But once things
got underway, Osbourne would vanish for long periods of time. Tony Iommi, the band's guitarist,
gave details about terminating the singer in the book "Louder Than Hell: The Definitive Oral
History of Metal." According to Iommi, Osbourne was busy clubbing all night instead of working.
When the LA house was rented, the band had trouble getting Osbourne to sing. He lacked confidence
after the bad reviews of "Never Say Die!" came out, and he turned to drugs and alcohol even more.
"I was so fed up with it all. The truth of the matter was, I wasn't into Sabbath anymore."
It's been said that Iommi is the one who wanted Osbourne gone,
but as he wrote in his book "Iron Man," he was just the vocal one in the band.
Of course, Iommi and the other band members weren't exactly sober either,
which Osbourne took issue with after being fired. He wrote in his book, "I Am Ozzy":
"Firing me for being f---ed up was hypocritical bulls---. We were all f---ed up. If you're stoned,
and I'm stoned, and you're telling me that I'm fired because I'm stoned,
how can that be? Because I'm slightly more stoned than you are?"
Cheryl "Salt" James and Sandra "Pepa" Denton of the rap group Salt-N-Pepa were never accused of
failing to show up or hurling a piece of chicken at anyone. But based on what their former DJ
Deidra "Spinderella" Roper said, they failed to pay her hundreds of thousands of dollars.
In 2019, Roper filed a lawsuit against James and Denton, claiming she was promised one-third of the
royalties from a 1999 Salt-N-Pepa greatest hits album. According to the veteran DJ,
she was supposed to receive $125,000 for the project but never did. She further claimed to
have been excluded from the production of a VH1 show about the group. Add to that,
Roper said that over the previous 10 years, her ex-groupmates were paid
over $600,000 in royalties, and she didn't receive any of those profits.
James and Denton responded to the lawsuit, and they accused Roper of running a smear campaign
against them. In the end, a settlement was reached, but it didn't heal all of Roper's wounds.
She told Billboard in 2021 that she still hopes for some form of mediation, along with an apology.
"The legacy is always what it's been,
is to uplift women. But how are we gonna uplift women, if we can't uplift each other?"
Before Slash was hired as the guitarist for Guns N' Roses, the position was held by Tracii Guns. He
left the band in 1985, two years before the release of their debut album, "Appetite for
Destruction," because of lead singer Axl Rose, who Guns said became impossible to deal with.
In 2019, he spoke with SiriusXM's Eddie Trunk about quitting the band
and placed the blame on Rose, saying that after disappearing for a week,
the singer had shown up to soundcheck a different person. According to Guns:
"Me and Izzy [Stradlin] were just looking at each other from across the stage like,
'This is weird…' All of a sudden, we weren't connected to Axl. You know,
like he had taken over his space and was really talking a lot, and we weren't playing a lot."
In 2017, Guns told Ultimate Guitar that being in Guns N' Roses wasn't
fun anymore due to Rose's behavior. He recalled:
"I was 19 when I left, and it was a very long time ago. At the time,
Axl was kind of going through something because I had never
seen him angry. [...] Between him and I, we had a really great, best friendship."
Guns went on to explain that because of the "bad vibes," he skipped rehearsal,
at which point the band wasted no time in bringing Slash in to replace him. He
doesn't hold a grudge though. He told Ultimate Guitar that had he stayed,
he thinks Guns N' Roses would not have had the "mass appeal" they did.
Like his late father Scott Weiland, who was fired from Stone Temple Pilots in 2013, Noah Weiland
did not last long as the lead singer of his own band, Suspect208. The band was initially formed in
2020 and consisted of Weiland, Tye Trujillo, the son of Metallica's Rob Trujillo, London Hudson,
the son of Guns N' Roses' Slash, and Niko Tsangaris. But in 2021, it was reported that
Suspect208 had fired Noah for substance abuse. The band released a statement that said, in part:
"Noah was not writing lyrics or lifting his weight in the band for two months before we
let him go. He was heading down a dark path of drug use that got in the way of our friendship
as well as the band. [...] We wish him the best, and we deeply care about him. "
Weiland, however, has claimed that it wasn't until after he was fired
that he turned to drugs. In a 2023 interview with iHeartRadio, he said:
"I didn’t get addicted to stuff until months after. That’s what made me so mad."
Suspect208 didn't stay together very long after firing Weiland. They disbanded in May of 2021.
The first time many probably heard of Naturi Naughton was when she was in the singing group
3LW, which also consisted of Adrienne Bailon and Kiely Williams. Naughton was able to carve out a
successful acting career for herself after they disbanded, starring in series like "The Playboy
Club," "Power," and "Queens." But during her 3LW days, she felt like an outsider in
the group. Specifically, Naughton said both Bailon and Williams wanted her out of 3LW.
Their grievances ultimately escalated to assault. In a 2019 interview for
TV One's "Uncensored," Naughton claimed that Williams once threw
a plate of food at her inside of a vehicle. According to Naughton:
"Kiely and Adrienne are sitting in the middle aisle, and I was in the back by myself. I said,
'I'm not the one who's trying to kick me out [of]
the group. Don't be mad that [...] the news is out, 'cause it's true.'"
"She turned around, Kiely, threw the plate of food, mashed potatoes,
chicken, whatever else was in there, in my face."
Naughton said she got out of the vehicle after that,
which drove off and left her standing there. Williams at first denied the
chicken claim but seemingly admitted to it in a 2021 tweet that said:
"Somebody bring me a two piece. She talking crazy again."