TOM MORELLO: GUITAR HERO, POLITICAL ACTIVIST… EXOTIC DANCER?

So we read on Metal Insider, who read on Drowned In Sound, who read on nme.com, that Rage Against the Machine’s Tom Morello used to be a stripper. Seriously. Says Morello:

When I graduated from Harvard and moved to Hollywood, I was unemployable. I was literally starving, so I had to work menial labour and, at one point, I even worked as an exotic dancer. ‘Brick House’ [by The Commodores] was my jam! I did bachelorette parties and I’d go down to my boxer shorts. Would I go further? All I can say is thank god it was in the time before YouTube! You could make decent money doing that job – people do what they have to do.

This news surprises me only insofar as while Morello’s not an ugly dude, he doesn’t strike me as someone that women would pay to see naked. Then again, I have no experience whatsoever with male strippers (unless you count that time that Vince got totally wasted and ran around the Mansion naked screaming the lyrics to “Hot for Teacher”), so maybe the chicks who go to see these dudes are like the dudes who go to see female strippers: willing to shove money down just about any available thong.

But I’d wager Morello was pretty good at stripping – I mean, the dude’s playing has a lotta funk, so I could definitely see him getting down.

And now I’ve spent too much time thinking about Tom Morello naked.

-AR