Van Halen was having some fun with their extensive contract rider back in 1980 and included many demands regarding stage setup, technical detail, lighting, and other specifications. However, the rock band also had one peculiar demand. They wanted to have a bowl of M&M’s in which all the brown candies were removed.
Van Halen and Brown M&M’s
The demands of Van Halen regarding M&M’s are considered a legend that first appeared in news reports in 1980 after they had a concert in Wisconsin. There, the stage manager reportedly removed all the brown M&M’s from the bowl of candies. The story quickly got the attention of the fans, becoming a symbol of celebrity demands and rock music excess. All this gained popularity over time, and rumors suggested that Van Halen even went so far as to trash a room because their M&M’s demands weren’t met.
The M&M contract rider was verified after a look at the original document, and in the late 1990s, David Lee Roth, the lead singer of the band, explained the reason for the demand. According to him, the M&M’s request was just a way to check if a venue had read the contract thoroughly. This meant that the demand was not made out of arrogance but out of ingenuity and attention to detail. The intriguing situation has become an anecdote that is often used in self-help books as an example of embracing failure for success and making better choices.
The M&M’s Demand Was a Test
The way people were fascinated with contract riders and the preferences of celebrities in the ’70s grew when music journalism expanded. It was something that started from how fans got parasocial relationships with celebrities and wanted to know more about their personal lives. This led to an interest in the personal, mundane details found in contract riders.
While some bands disliked their riders becoming public, others embraced it, knowing that their riders would end up viewed by their fans. The Van Halen M&M’s test was never meant to become public, and once it became known, it lost its purpose as a test.
While Van Halen’s rider was quite extensive, and multiple people handled different aspects of the concert, the accuracy of backstage snacks was rather irrelevant to safety onstage, so some people believe the excuse for the M&M’s test was not true. The most plausible other explanation that people came up with was that the test was a way for Van Halen to convey their image as hard rock bad boys. Whether it was a clever test or marketing tactic, it certainly allowed them to show off in an authentic manner.