The Truth About Devo Dan

Marcus Danforth Brigatti was born on August 27, 1952 to an average suburban family in Youngstown, OH. Few details are known about Dan's childhood, but in rare interviews he has claimed to have been deeply influenced at the age of 12 by a trip to the New Jersey shore with his parents and twin older sisters Jonee and Josie. During that vacation, Dan was intrigued by a ranting character shunned as a madman by most. The disheveled boardwalk dweller preached the gospel of Undercreationism, and Dan was all ears.

The theory of Undercreationism states that the earth is now (in 2009) 6,127 years old. The first earth creatures were designed by the one Creator in the Year 3, when He finally got around to it. The Creator took His time forming living beings from clay and chlorophyll, along what was to be a 7-year timeline. Though humankind was slated by the Original Divine Plan to be created in Year 7, the Creator wanted to be done with it and brought forth people quickly in Year 6 instead. Thus, we are all the product of shoddy craftsmanship-and from that fateful moment in history spring all our foibles and imperfections. Essentially, we were created in God's image - sort of. The strongest adherents of the theory have pointed to Undercreationism to explain an array of phenomena including poverty, random mutation, reality television, and The Bay City Rollers.

As a teenager, Dan was awed by the historic Apollo 11 moon mission. The sight of Neil Armstrong taking that "giant leap for mankind" helped scientific exploration begin to carry more weight for Dan than the sun-faded pamphlets he'd picked up from "Boardwalk Bob" years earlier. With science on his mind, he turned away from his Undercreationist convictions and went on to study conventional biology, earning a Bachelor of Science from William and Mary in 1973.

But what about the music? As fate would have it, during his first year of college, Dan, while taking a break from pursuing a certain Boston-born co-ed of which he had grown obsessively fond, happened upon a group of guys at the student center. They were members of an avant garde rock band known as The Solar Explosion, and they had just fired their lead vocalist and principal songwriter. Dan, armed with a decent enough voice and a few piano lessons, offered to audition. It wasn't long until bassist Walter Regan, guitarist John "Squirrel" Nixon, and drummer "Yet-Another-Bob" Castleton brought Dan into the group. Having been recently intrigued by the first rumblings of the theory of De-evolution (which basically states that humans evolved but it all went wrong so now we are devolving so that we may start over), he, and eventually the group itself, came to be known as Devo Dan.

In June 1978, Devo Dan's most popular album was released. Remembering back to "Boardwalk Bob's" habit of speaking of himself in the plural and a childhood love for playing cowboy, Dan suggested the unlikely album title: Q: Are We Not Dan? A: We Are Gaucho! He and "Yet-Another-Bob" penned the hit song "Hey Homo," which peaked at #12 on the Billboard Pop Singles chart in November of that same year. The song fused the best of Dan's peculiar de-evolutionary lyrics and the group's growing interest in jazz pop. "Hey Homo" caused its share of controversy with the LGBTQQIA communities, but the band maintains that the title refers to a term of endearment used to call "Squirrel" Nixon's cat, and not a slur against same-sex orientation.

Devo Dan toured and recorded diligently through the late 1970s before taking a brief Hawaiian vacation - which came to last just over 20 years. A reunion tour and a new recording were the inevitable results, as well as renewed public interest in music from the height of Devo Dan's fame. A remastered version of "Hey Homo" is included on Not Necessarily Beautiful But Mutated, Volume 8 (Compilation CD release date August 29, 2009).

Devo Dan Discography

Naked Lunch was (only) The Beginning - EP 1975

Pretzels Now for the Future 1977

Q: Are We Not Dan? A: We Are Gaucho! 1978

Freedom of Ecstasy 1980

Everything Must Go Total Devo 2003

Fine Print:

"Hey Homo" by Devo Dan- Robin Renée - Vocals, Eric Zoeckler - Guitars, Jack Walker - Keyboards, Bass, Drums

Engineer: Jack Walker , Recorded June 18-19, 2009 at Closet Monster Studios, Wilmington, DE
"Hey Nineteen" music by Walter Becker and Donald Fagen © 1980 MCA Records, Inc.
"Jocko Homo" lyrics by Gerald Casale and Mark Mothersbaugh © 1978 Warner Bros.