5 Surprising Opening Acts and Headliners

There's been some unusual opening act/headlining bills throughout classic rock history, so we're looking back at some of the most surprising concert pairs.

Click the button below and check out some of the headliners/opener combos that made us say, “WHAT?!”

That correct!  Fifty years ago, the Jimi Hendrix Experience opened for The Monkees.  Frankly, we still can’t believe this deal was made official, but it is simply one of the strangest bills ever.  Considering most of the crowd was there to see The Monkees and likely not old enough to appreciate Hendrix, the group exited the tour after only seven show, because they were booed every…single…night.

In a similar vein as the Jimi Hendrix Experience/The Monkees, The Who during their first tour of the United States ended up opening for Herman’s Hermits.  Coincidentally, a young Bruce Springsteen attended a stop on this tour which he fondly remembered at the 2015 MusiCares MAP Fund benefit honoring Pete Townshend.  It was the first rock show The Boss had ever attended, and it was a game changer for him.

While just a one-off show, Brenda Lee performance at the Star-Club in Hamburg, Germany now lives in infamy, because of her opening act:  The Beatles.  In an interview with CNN, Lee said after the show, she took a Beatles demo to her label, Decca Records, and tried to score them a record deal.  The label reps told her, “That look will never make it, and that sound will never happen.”

Oh…how those label reps were kicking themselves a year later.

This infamous moment happened in August 1974 at the Schaefer Music Festival in New York City’s Central Park.  While Springsteen’s star was on the rise, Murray was tearing up the singles charts, so it was decided that Murray would headline, and Springsteen would get an opening 80-minute set.

Yeah…big mistake.  Imagine going on after Bruce Springsteen.  We wouldn’t wish that on even our greatest enemies.

Psychedelic rock and southern rock are definitely two genres we can’t imagine together on a double bill, but on select dates of a Strawberry Alarm Clock tour in 1968, Lynyrd Skynyrd provided support.  As history would have it, Ed King, founding member of Strawberry Alarm Clock, would later join Skynyrd in 1972 and play on the band’s first three albums until his departure in 1975.

Erica Banas is a rock/classic rock blogger. The first man she ever loved was Jack Daniel.  (True story.)