"It just wasn't my thing man!" The celebratory/memorial 'left just before they became famous" roll of honour...

2. Pete Best out of the Beatles

3. Everyone apart from Adam out of the original Adam & The Ants (aka everyone except Annabella out of the original Bow Wow Wow.

4. Approx. 75% of The Thompson Twins

5. That guy who sang on the early My Bloody Valentine records.

Oh yeah - Dave something or other.

6. Warwick Nightingale from the Pistols.
7. James Maker from the Smiths.

8. David Marks (Beach Boys).

9. Stu Sutcliffe RIP of course.

10. Her from Luscious Jackson that was originally in the Beastie Boys

11. Heidi Range out of Atomic Kitten

12. The drum machine from Echo and the Bunnymen

13. Marsh & Ware of the Human League (aka Marsh & Ware of Heaven 17)

"The drum machine from Echo and the Bunnymen" aka Mr Echo iirc.

xpost, I think you're right. And in a similar vein.

14. Winston the tape recorder from OMD

15. Richard Hell out of Television
16. Richard Hell out of The Heartbreakers

17. OK!'S KERRY KATONA

Billy Idol and Tony James out of Chelsea.

Oh yeah, Johnny Borrell out of the Libertines.

21. David Thomas & Peter Laughner out of Rocket From The Tombs (aka David Thomas & Peter Laughner out of Pere Ubu)
22. Stiv Bators, Cheetah Chrome & Johnny Blitz out of Rocket From The Tombs (aka Stiv Bators, Cheetah Chrome & Johnny Blitz out of The Dead Boys)

And in a more Pete Best way:

Paul Dufour out of the Libertines.

When Pete D quit the libs, he made some initial demos back with him, but they fell out after Paul tried to release some early film of the original Libertines playing a gig. So, also:

Paul Dufour out of Babyshambles

Sorry, that was 23 and 24.

25. Sid Vicious, Billy Idol & Marco Perroni out of Suzy (sic) & The Banshees

26. Howard Devoto out of Buzzcocks

27. Klaus Röder - Kraftwerk

28. Ry Cooder out of Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band

Carlos Perón out of Yello

30. George Gill out of Wire (aka George Gill out of The Bears)

31. Vince Clarke out of Depeche Mode

To be fair Depeche had already had three hit singles and a top ten album before Vince left.

32. Doug Sandom out of The Who

teh fguc OF I DONTHE GIV E A FUCK

33

just say no, kids.

seeeriously

34. Everyone except Vini Reilly out of the Durutti Column (after "A Factory Sample" anyway)

35. Michelle Stephenson out of the Spice Girls.
36. Lora Logic out of X-Ray Spex.
37. Steve Brookes out of The Jam.

dave conway you so-called mbv fans

"To be fair Depeche had already had three hit singles and a top ten album before Vince left."

That was sort of tongue in cheek - although I'd still humbly suggest that the success that Vince Clark & Depeche Mode enjoyed together kind of pales into insignificance compared with the success that both Vince / Yazoo and Depeche Mode (who would still have struggled to get arrested in the US when he left the band in '81!) had subsequently....

I think Vince might've been prepared to swap being good for being a stadium goth band.

(Would I be pushing my luck too far to suggest Brian Eno out of Roxy Music? How about Syd Barrett out of Pink Floyd?)

Er, no.

And you can't have Brian Poole out of Brian Poole and the Tremeloes either.

"Er, yes" that should have been, viz. you would be pushing your luck.

Will Sinnott out of the Shamen! Poor guy, filming the video for their final breakthrough version of "Move any mountain"

Which when he was alive was called "Pro-Gen."

quite.

How about: Peter Giles, who left Giles Giles & Fripp thus obliging his brother Michael and band-mate Robert to start looking around for new band members and a new name...?

Barry Andrews out of XTC?

John Foxx out of Ultravox! ?

Daevid Allen being banned from coming back into the UK and having to leave Soft Machine before their first album.

Brian James out of the Damned?

Nice one - can we make a case for Kevin Ayers too?

(x-post)

Ben Gunn out of Sisters Of Mercy?

"Brian James out of the Damned?"

Surprisingly enough this did cross my mind, although I discounted it on the basis that having released the first UK punk single was probably their largest claim to fame. If we're going for commercial success 'though we could probably make a reasonable case for Captain Sensible too....

(x-post)

Boy George out of Bow Wow Wow (Lieutenant Lush IIRC).

Bob Welch out of the second coming of Fleetwood Mac

Andre Cymone out of Prince's touring band

John Rutsey out of Rush

I don't believe George was ever made a member of the band - although Malcolm was apparently making all sorts of promises to him at the time, so who knows? (fwiw I actually witnessed one of what I believe were only 2 appearances by "Lieutenant Lush" with the band)

(x-post)

Henry Gross out of Sha Na Na

George was definitely there when Bow Wow Wow played the Rainbow in '81 (with the rollercoaster etc. - one of the best gigs I've ever been to).

Bob "The Bear" Hite out of The Horrors

Chad Channing and Jason Everman from Nirvana.

Dave Mustaine out of Metallica

Dick Taylor out of the Rolling Stones
Jimmy Winston out of the Small Faces

Eric Bell-Thin Lizzy
Dennis Stratton-Iron Maiden

richey manic

"George was definitely there when Bow Wow Wow played the Rainbow in '81 (with the rollercoaster etc. - one of the best gigs I've ever been to)."

I was there too! (Can't say I was all that impressed 'though!)

Billy Idol and Tony James out of Chelsea.

I'd say that Generation X -- to say nothing of solo Idol -- handily eclipses Chelsea at their most popular.

What you've got to ask is, would these bands have been as successful with their original line ups? Maybe it's no coincidence that they blew up after a certain member left.

Elaine Adamedes out of Throwing Muses

xposts:

OK, Gene October out of Chelsea that was more Generation X.

I still haven;t added the one that prompted this whole ting:

Rado "bob" Klose, out of Pink Floyd.

Keeps getting asked, "If you knew PF were going to be as big, would you have stayed?" and his answer was "Yes, but that would have been a wrong decision" as he moved into photography and did more things that were more his thing, man.

Larry Wallis-Motorhead

Annette Zilinskas out of the Bangles.

Jeff Holdsworth out of Phish.

Hillel Slovak out of Red Hot Chili Peppers

Chris Watson of Cabaret Voltaire

Desmond Simmons of Wire

Billy Murcia - New York Dolls
David Sancious and Ernest "Boom" Carter - the E Street Band

CHEVY FUCKIN CHASE out of STEELY FUCKIN DAN

US out of Iraq

Henry Padovani out of the Police.

Manheim of Mayhem
Dag Nilsen of Darkthrone
Doug Sampson of Iron Maiden

Dead of Mayhem also, obviously.

Jason Cropper out of weezer.

hewhocannotbenamed out of bandthatcannotberemembered

Stephen Duffy out of Duran Duran

Um, Sonny Curtis and Buddy Holly. Sonny left to go on tour with Slim Whitman before Buddy made it big. I think he was in Buddy's pre-Crickets band and was in the Crickets later- now, in fact- but wasn't on any of the records when Buddy was around.

Justine Frishmann out of Suede