The True Story of “The Lost Boys”’ Sax Man
April 14, 2020 4:22 PM Subscribe
I've seen that movie a bunch of times and have no memory of him in that scene.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 4:40 PM on April 14, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by The Underpants Monster at 4:40 PM on April 14, 2020 [1 favorite]
That's one of the few scenes I remember, and occasionally the phrase "why is the sax man oiled up" appears in my mind, and since seeing the movie I fear sax players like I do clowns, especially sax players with the wireless transmitter so they can roam around the seafood restaurant and play right in your face
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 4:53 PM on April 14, 2020 [19 favorites]
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 4:53 PM on April 14, 2020 [19 favorites]
Oh this story is great. This scene is so great. Top of list of ridiculous sleazy sax guy moments in 80s film (though let's not forget this classic)
posted by thivaia at 4:54 PM on April 14, 2020 [4 favorites]
posted by thivaia at 4:54 PM on April 14, 2020 [4 favorites]
Now pushing 65 years old, he’s still not completely sure of how or why his performance in The Lost Boys, which amounts to barely a minute of actual screentime, exploded the way it did (our best guess: the internet)Mmmm, not that much internet in 1987. I'm pondering how long it would take to share a file of his minute-long appearance through my phone line at 300 baud.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 4:57 PM on April 14, 2020 [2 favorites]
lost boys might be the gayest movie ever made and that's at least half its charm
posted by entropicamericana at 5:29 PM on April 14, 2020 [10 favorites]
posted by entropicamericana at 5:29 PM on April 14, 2020 [10 favorites]
About a year ago, I watched The Lost Boys for the first time. Somehow I’d never seen it, and I’d never heard of oily sax man.
I paused the movie to look him up. It’s the most amazingly batshit thing to see there and I had to figure it out. It’s no wonder he’s famous for that scene.
Good on him for getting to do what he loves his whole life.
posted by uncleozzy at 5:53 PM on April 14, 2020 [14 favorites]
I paused the movie to look him up. It’s the most amazingly batshit thing to see there and I had to figure it out. It’s no wonder he’s famous for that scene.
Good on him for getting to do what he loves his whole life.
posted by uncleozzy at 5:53 PM on April 14, 2020 [14 favorites]
lost boys might be the gayest movie ever made and that's at least half its charm
Gayer than Batman and Robin? ( Also by Schumacher naturally )
I remember the scene well from seeing Lost Boys when it came out. And the INXS video after I think. It was remarkably ridiculous even then.
posted by Liquidwolf at 5:56 PM on April 14, 2020 [3 favorites]
Not INXS. Cappello did the track for the soundtrack. The original was by The Call.
posted by hippybear at 6:11 PM on April 14, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by hippybear at 6:11 PM on April 14, 2020 [1 favorite]
INXS had a track on the soundtrack.
posted by dobbs at 6:14 PM on April 14, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by dobbs at 6:14 PM on April 14, 2020 [1 favorite]
Proof of INXS in The Lost Boys.
I was actually a Tina Turner fan in high school, and at the time recognized Cappello as "Hey cool it's Tina Turner's sax player!" The person I didn't recognize, amazingly, was Jamison Newlander - with whom I had an entire semester-long class in college without once realizing that he was one of the g-damn Frog Brothers.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:33 PM on April 14, 2020 [9 favorites]
I was actually a Tina Turner fan in high school, and at the time recognized Cappello as "Hey cool it's Tina Turner's sax player!" The person I didn't recognize, amazingly, was Jamison Newlander - with whom I had an entire semester-long class in college without once realizing that he was one of the g-damn Frog Brothers.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:33 PM on April 14, 2020 [9 favorites]
I've seen the film more than once, possibly more times than can be counted on one hand, yet I had no memory of Sax Man. Goes to show how much attention I pay to dudes covered in oil.
posted by betweenthebars at 6:49 PM on April 14, 2020
posted by betweenthebars at 6:49 PM on April 14, 2020
I remember noticing "awesome 80s sax dude" the first time I saw that film. My teenager, who loves 80s films, will occasionally see a certain style of buff guy and whisper, "awesome 80s sax dude".
posted by j_curiouser at 6:57 PM on April 14, 2020 [5 favorites]
posted by j_curiouser at 6:57 PM on April 14, 2020 [5 favorites]
INXS had a track on the soundtrack.
That soundtrack was a critical document for me. Actually, that movie was sort of a critical document for me. It's possible the last time I ever actually prayed was (at aged twelve) to ask God to make me come of puberty looking like Jami Gertz in "The Lost Boys."
Suffice it to say, I'm an atheist.
posted by thivaia at 7:05 PM on April 14, 2020 [7 favorites]
That soundtrack was a critical document for me. Actually, that movie was sort of a critical document for me. It's possible the last time I ever actually prayed was (at aged twelve) to ask God to make me come of puberty looking like Jami Gertz in "The Lost Boys."
Suffice it to say, I'm an atheist.
posted by thivaia at 7:05 PM on April 14, 2020 [7 favorites]
His first solo album came out in 2018, but it'll take you right to the 80s.
posted by bluefrog at 7:05 PM on April 14, 2020
posted by bluefrog at 7:05 PM on April 14, 2020
I still believe.
posted by paladin at 7:59 PM on April 14, 2020 [12 favorites]
posted by paladin at 7:59 PM on April 14, 2020 [12 favorites]
There’s gotta be something wrong about anything that you do, otherwise it’s just plain old cliché.
Words to take to heart.
You were wearing a flesh shirt that was shiny
Maybe not these. Then again, if you can pull it off…
posted by rodlymight at 8:30 PM on April 14, 2020 [2 favorites]
Words to take to heart.
You were wearing a flesh shirt that was shiny
Maybe not these. Then again, if you can pull it off…
posted by rodlymight at 8:30 PM on April 14, 2020 [2 favorites]
This is the best sexy sax time for Michael and Sam.
posted by meehawl at 8:37 PM on April 14, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by meehawl at 8:37 PM on April 14, 2020 [1 favorite]
This may come as a shock, but I was a weird kid, with assorted random kid hangups. As a child coming of age in the 80s, man, I was a complete prude (I imagine the 80s fucked up a lot of kids like that), to the point that hearing swearing in music was at first a shock, then exhilarating, until finally, I just got used to it and moved on.
But sleazy 80s sax music... That shit poisoned me against the saxophone for years. I honestly couldn't connect the saxophone in my mind to anything other than the music that would start up before a cringey "sex scene" (and for the 80s, they were pretty much all cringey), and I'd love to believe that part of the reason I disliked it was just how obvious, how un-subtle it was. But yeah, at least part of that was the weird little proto-puritan I was in elementary school. I don't think I really got over my inherent, Maude-Flanders-esque dislike of the saxophone until I discovered ska in the nineties.
Sleazy sax, though, man, I still hate that shit (for the obviousness cliche of it)
But the Lost Boys soundtrack is a treasure, a thing of goddamn beauty
posted by Ghidorah at 9:07 PM on April 14, 2020 [4 favorites]
But sleazy 80s sax music... That shit poisoned me against the saxophone for years. I honestly couldn't connect the saxophone in my mind to anything other than the music that would start up before a cringey "sex scene" (and for the 80s, they were pretty much all cringey), and I'd love to believe that part of the reason I disliked it was just how obvious, how un-subtle it was. But yeah, at least part of that was the weird little proto-puritan I was in elementary school. I don't think I really got over my inherent, Maude-Flanders-esque dislike of the saxophone until I discovered ska in the nineties.
Sleazy sax, though, man, I still hate that shit (for the obviousness cliche of it)
But the Lost Boys soundtrack is a treasure, a thing of goddamn beauty
posted by Ghidorah at 9:07 PM on April 14, 2020 [4 favorites]
I'm partial to Epic Sax Guy from Eurovision 2012 myself.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gy1B3agGNxw
posted by PennD at 9:07 PM on April 14, 2020 [2 favorites]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gy1B3agGNxw
posted by PennD at 9:07 PM on April 14, 2020 [2 favorites]
Then again, if you can pull it off…
please don't try and pull off a flesh shirt...
posted by Jon_Evil at 9:21 PM on April 14, 2020 [2 favorites]
please don't try and pull off a flesh shirt...
posted by Jon_Evil at 9:21 PM on April 14, 2020 [2 favorites]
Huh. While looking up info on the guy, I discovered that Lost Boys was much later turned into a series of movies featuring the Frog brothers?
posted by tavella at 9:26 PM on April 14, 2020
posted by tavella at 9:26 PM on April 14, 2020
The person I didn't recognize, amazingly, was Jamison Newlander - with whom I had an entire semester-long class in college without once realizing that he was one of the g-damn Frog Brothers.
Huh. I think I have not seen it since 1987* but up until three minutes ago I would have wagered that the Frog Brothers were played by the two Coreys.
*To be fair, it was the second-best vampire movie of the year.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 9:40 PM on April 14, 2020 [3 favorites]
Huh. I think I have not seen it since 1987* but up until three minutes ago I would have wagered that the Frog Brothers were played by the two Coreys.
*To be fair, it was the second-best vampire movie of the year.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 9:40 PM on April 14, 2020 [3 favorites]
why was he so lubricated
posted by poffin boffin at 9:52 PM on April 14, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by poffin boffin at 9:52 PM on April 14, 2020 [1 favorite]
the article does not address the lubrication question to my satisfaction
posted by poffin boffin at 9:52 PM on April 14, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by poffin boffin at 9:52 PM on April 14, 2020 [3 favorites]
It'd be cool if he did a project with the Fury Road flamethrower guitar guyThat would be award-winning Australian performer and vocalist iOTA, who has a significant stage and live music career of his own, and deserves a heck of a lot better than 'Fury Road flamethrower guitar guy'.
posted by prismatic7 at 9:55 PM on April 14, 2020 [2 favorites]
*To be fair, it was the second-best vampire movie of the year.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 11:40 PM on April 14 [+] [!]
after Near Dark!
posted by djseafood at 9:57 PM on April 14, 2020 [9 favorites]
posted by ricochet biscuit at 11:40 PM on April 14 [+] [!]
after Near Dark!
posted by djseafood at 9:57 PM on April 14, 2020 [9 favorites]
the article does not address the lubrication question to my satisfaction
He's a California muscle guy on a beach. If you've ever walked the beach path from Santa Monica to Marina del Rey, you'd walk by 2, maybe 3 beachside muscle gyms, and man, those guys are all WELL lubricated.
It's rare they come out at night though. But this is a vampire movie. Maybe he's a muscle beach vampire?
And why is that not already a movie?
posted by hippybear at 10:19 PM on April 14, 2020 [6 favorites]
He's a California muscle guy on a beach. If you've ever walked the beach path from Santa Monica to Marina del Rey, you'd walk by 2, maybe 3 beachside muscle gyms, and man, those guys are all WELL lubricated.
It's rare they come out at night though. But this is a vampire movie. Maybe he's a muscle beach vampire?
And why is that not already a movie?
posted by hippybear at 10:19 PM on April 14, 2020 [6 favorites]
I recognized him in the movie as being the same guy from the video of "One of the Living", and I wasn't at all surprised to see him in the movie, so eighties it was--the Coreys, Kiefer (who was already starting to get noticed even though he'd only done a few movies up to that point), just the way the vampires were dressed, etc. Bodybuilder playing a sax? Hey, why not. In the eighties, I used to have this poster that was a painting of a woman wearing not a lot of clothes and holding a sax, as if, should I open my window on a sultry summer night, I could hear her sweet solo wafting over the not-great neighborhood in my midwestern college town. It was like the painting on the side of the van that I didn't own and was out of style anyway. Capello is basically the male version of that.
posted by Halloween Jack at 11:51 PM on April 14, 2020 [5 favorites]
posted by Halloween Jack at 11:51 PM on April 14, 2020 [5 favorites]
i met him a few years ago at a horror convention in north carolina. seemed like a decent enough guy.
posted by Bwentman at 12:27 AM on April 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by Bwentman at 12:27 AM on April 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Single mom moves with offspring to fictional bucolic California seaside town, offspring discovers town is infested with vampires (who, notably, look entirely human much of the time but change to hideous visages just before they feed). The adults are mostly oblivious, so it's up to a small group of younger folks to rid the town of the supernatural infestation.
Wait, remind me: is Buffy the one with the muscly sax guy or no?
posted by ricochet biscuit at 12:56 AM on April 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
Wait, remind me: is Buffy the one with the muscly sax guy or no?
posted by ricochet biscuit at 12:56 AM on April 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
That was likely my first horror movie I saw. Dad rented it on VHS (I'd have been 11 when it came out, so let's say 12 or 13 (88/89) when I saw it). That scene was awesome... like - wow! kids could stay out after dark without their parents? I had the sound track well into high school, and I remember driving rural roads at speeds I'd never tell my parents about listening to that song.
That is a scene / song that juxtaposes against the rest of the movie - doesnt *quite fit in* but it is just - perfect because of it. I mean... I can't think of a single movie where a band plays music in the movie that well - and is as featured as they are - where the main character isn't in the band, or doesn't need to meet up with the band later for some kind of information... There is nothing pivotal about the band being in the movie besides kicking ass .
posted by Nanukthedog at 5:05 AM on April 15, 2020 [6 favorites]
That is a scene / song that juxtaposes against the rest of the movie - doesnt *quite fit in* but it is just - perfect because of it. I mean... I can't think of a single movie where a band plays music in the movie that well - and is as featured as they are - where the main character isn't in the band, or doesn't need to meet up with the band later for some kind of information... There is nothing pivotal about the band being in the movie besides kicking ass .
posted by Nanukthedog at 5:05 AM on April 15, 2020 [6 favorites]
Single mom moves with offspring to fictional bucolic California seaside town,
A bit of trivia: Lost Boys’s Santa Carla wasn’t meant to be a fictional town, it was Santa Cruz in the script, and it was filmed in Santa Cruz. The city of Santa Cruz made changing the name a condition for shooting permissions because they didn’t want to be associated with vampires and killings.
posted by rodlymight at 6:00 AM on April 15, 2020 [9 favorites]
A bit of trivia: Lost Boys’s Santa Carla wasn’t meant to be a fictional town, it was Santa Cruz in the script, and it was filmed in Santa Cruz. The city of Santa Cruz made changing the name a condition for shooting permissions because they didn’t want to be associated with vampires and killings.
posted by rodlymight at 6:00 AM on April 15, 2020 [9 favorites]
I loved The Lost Boys album. Even apart from the Epic Sax Guy, just about every other track features at least one sax solo. We used to joke that it was that it was the soundtrack to Saxophone:The Movie. I STILL BELIEVE
posted by AndrewStephens at 6:51 AM on April 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by AndrewStephens at 6:51 AM on April 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
I saw this movie for the first time when I was 15 or so, and my cousin (who was mostly interested in Kiefer Sutherland and Jason Patric) made a big deal of this scene. I'm pretty sure my dad made a joke about it. So when years later people began to make references to the Sexy Sax Man, I knew immediately who they were talking about.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 7:05 AM on April 15, 2020
posted by kittens for breakfast at 7:05 AM on April 15, 2020
Kiefer (who was already starting to get noticed even though he'd only done a few movies up to that point)
I attended school with Kiefer in grade 6. He was a star of track and field and the fastest person I'd ever seen up to that point. He literally lapped the other kids in the 1500m while my whole school chanted, "Kiefer! Kiefer!" as he raced around the track.
When we first met him, none of us believed he was Donald's son. I forgot all about him until a few years later while seeing Stand By Me in the theatre. I burst out laughing when he appeared on screen as the bad guy.
posted by dobbs at 8:01 AM on April 15, 2020 [12 favorites]
I attended school with Kiefer in grade 6. He was a star of track and field and the fastest person I'd ever seen up to that point. He literally lapped the other kids in the 1500m while my whole school chanted, "Kiefer! Kiefer!" as he raced around the track.
When we first met him, none of us believed he was Donald's son. I forgot all about him until a few years later while seeing Stand By Me in the theatre. I burst out laughing when he appeared on screen as the bad guy.
posted by dobbs at 8:01 AM on April 15, 2020 [12 favorites]
I've mentioned this before here, but I played saxophone in a local garage band not far from Santa Cruz from 1986-1990.
IT WAS EXACTLY LIKE THIS
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 8:09 AM on April 15, 2020 [16 favorites]
IT WAS EXACTLY LIKE THIS
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 8:09 AM on April 15, 2020 [16 favorites]
pics or it didnt happen
posted by entropicamericana at 8:40 AM on April 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by entropicamericana at 8:40 AM on April 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
I've mentioned this before here, but I played saxophone in a local garage band not far from Santa Cruz from 1986-1990.
IT WAS EXACTLY LIKE THIS
posted by Slarty Bartfast
But in this case, it’s my guess the well lubricated state was achieved through alcohol.
posted by skyscraper at 8:55 AM on April 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
IT WAS EXACTLY LIKE THIS
posted by Slarty Bartfast
But in this case, it’s my guess the well lubricated state was achieved through alcohol.
posted by skyscraper at 8:55 AM on April 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
I miss the 80s, even the awful parts.
posted by Beholder at 10:58 AM on April 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by Beholder at 10:58 AM on April 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
I don't remember that scene but one of my favorite bands GUNSHIP, has a song featuring Capello playing sax. He is in essentially the same role and dress as in Lost Boys and the video is even about slaying vampires attacking the concert. Great song - and video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60ruvzfXQoE
posted by zwemer at 3:51 PM on April 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60ruvzfXQoE
posted by zwemer at 3:51 PM on April 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
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