There are some splendid supporting roles - the man at the hotel who says in a shaky voice "I'm just as God made me Sir" after being insulted by Ian.

Also, the Air Force man in uniform with his good-natured banter that is rudely unreciprocated. I have unwittingly adopted his "I'm joking, of course" line.

And if memory serves the DVD commentary, by the original cast, in character as Spinal Tap 20 years on was almost as good as the film. They were stitched up by the filmmakers at every turn apparently.

I saw it at the cinema when it came out and have never laughed so much in my life. To be in a room with a couple of hundred other people, none of whom knew any of the lines or the gags and just hear the sound of uproarious laughter... it was brilliant.

4 Strings on each neck. Wonderful.

As well all the other wonderful things about it, what always astounds me is how spot on the American actors' English accents are. No one's done it better...

Nigel's innocent question following the news that their album 'Smell the Glove' won't be released due to it's sexist cover - absolute class, watch it tonight!

is money.

Rock and Roll...

"How much more black could this be? The answer is none, none more black."

"It's like looking in a black mirror"

It's one louder !

Which I recall was a Q spinal message once, plus "hope you like our new direction" (gets a mention whenever something goes wrong at a rehearsal/gig) and "we've got two visionaries in the band, they're like fire and ice. I see my role as something in the middle...like lukewarm water." The return of spinal tap has some decent stuff on it too, though nothing quite like the original.

We had to apologise for him with our set...

Yeah, they were still booing him when we came on

it just says Shit Sandwich

"This ponderous collection of Rock Psalms begs the question, which day did God create Spinal Tap and couldn't he of rested on that day too"

"The albums mixed wrong - you can't do Heavy Metal in DOBLY"

Consistently good - can be revisited many times without familiarity or boredom

and of course, the beautiful romantic ballad - 'Lick My Love Pump'.

Priceless!

Saucy Jack

One effect of Tap has been that I can never again watch true "rockumentaries" with a straight face. I'm sure Pink Floyd's Live at Pompeii inspired many Tap lines. I cite as evidence:

Mason: I'd like some pie and not the crust!
Waters: I... I don't care what bit I get.
Mason: One without crust!

Waters: [after failed recording take of David's guitar, over studio intercom] Um, feedback Dave.
Gilmour: Don't worry about that. Christ. What would rock and roll be without feedback?

Waters: I like to think that oysters transcend national barriers.

I rest my case.

"Certainly, in the topsy-turvy world of heavy rock, having a good solid piece of wood in your hand is often useful"

...and I'm too well hung but (tonight) I'm gonna rock you (tonight)"

"It's a kind of totemistic thing, you know"

delicate.

"Lovely Lads"
Can I also pitch in with a few words for Bad News? A lot of nob gags, but some stone cold classics (and didn't it come out before Tap?)
The original count in "1,2,3,4,5,6,7..."
Interviewer - "What's that playing on the tape recorder Vim"?
Vim - "A Tape"

Vim - "I could play Stairway To Heaven when I was 12. Jimmy Page didn't actually write it until he was 22. I think that says quite a lot".

Den - "Oh I get it, Alan's called Vim and your Mum's dead".

Standing at Elvis' grave at Graceland some years ago, this was all that I could think of to say. Followed by "it's a bit raga... it doesn't want to be raga..."

Mrs Underpants looked at me in that way she sometimes does.

"... and certainly not one who looks like an Australian hairdresser's nightmare".

The true inheritors of Monty Python's blessing/curse of having countless people being able to quote whole chunks of your material verbatim!

look, look who’s in here? No one! And then in here there’s
a little guy, look! So it’s, it’s a complete catastrophe!"

What's wrong with bein' sexy?
Saint Hubbins: The patron saint of quality footwear.

Oops...someone's already done that one

but don't worry, it's not a big college town.

"As long as there was sex and drugs, I could do without the rock n' roll."

"It's like a Mach piece, really."

Wonderful.

The look Ian gives her when she says "money talks and bullshit walks" is priceless

The outtakes are pretty good too

-Bruno Kirby getting stoned and singing 'All the Way' in his pants
-The Beatles a like press conference
"How do you find the women in America?"
"Turn left at the men"
-Derek finding out Lady Smalls has taken out a full page ad in the NME slagging him and detailing their divorce.

I think I'm on my 3rd DVD copy : got the Criterion with different commentries, the last special edition and the new 'This Goes to 11' edition.

Derek Smalls...he wrote this...

David St. Hubbins: "It's like, six months from now I can't see myself missing Nig any more than, I might miss a Ross MacLochness or a Ronnie Pudding or a Denny Apum or a Danny Schindlerin, any of those..."
Marty: "I can't believe that. I can't believe that, you know, you're lumping Nigel in with these people you've played with for short periods of time."

I still love these two songs though...

the documentary on the dvd of 'from dusk till dawn' pays homage to spinal tap-tarantino & clooney getting lost back stage

my friends and I use this to denote that something isn't a big deal. Confusion for everyone else.

Artie Fufkin, surely the greatest rock'n'roll name? And very reminiscent of Paul Simon's "acting" in "Annie Hall".

the actual Stonehenge at the Experience Music Project in Seattle. It is every bit as awesome as you would expect.

"Do you have any artificial plates or limbs?"
"Not really, no."

"So you're saying you feel like a preserved moose on stage?"

And the little arm raise and grimace of triumph he gives at the end of "Rock and Roll Creation" as the pod closes around his other arm.

cosmically my life was in chaos.

if I wasn't under such heavy sedation.

Nigel Tufnel: Well, I suppose I could, uh, work in a shop of some kind, or... or do, uh, freelance, uh, selling of some sort of, uh, product. You know...
Marty DiBergi: A salesman?
Nigel Tufnel: A salesman, like maybe in a, uh, haberdasher, or maybe like a, uh, um... a chapeau shop or something. You know, like, "Would you... what size do you wear, sir?" And then you answer me.
Marty DiBergi: Uh... seven and a quarter.
Nigel Tufnel: "I think we have that." See, something like that I could do.

The hotel after they have just bumped into Duke; it's the booing line that does me.

NIGEL: He’s got this much talent — this much if he’s lucky.
DAVID: We carried him. We had to apologize for him with our set.
DEREK: That’s right.
MICK: That’s right, yeah.
DAVID: People were still booing him when we were on. It’s all hype. It’s all hype. It’s all bought.

was showing someone Spinal Tap for the first time. Having hung out with musicians for quite some time in a social capacity, suddenly a whole lot of their casual conversation now apparently made sense. "Oh....'who's in here? No-one...'" was apparently a major leap forward.
The only time I've heard of anything similar was a friend whose girlfriend had never heard Abbey Road.

Marty Di Berg interviewed for the special edition DVD:

"The band were impressed by my experience in film making. For example, I directed Kramer vs Kramer (pause) vs Godzilla."

occured some years ago when a local cinema put on a double of "Spinal Tap" followed by "The Song Remains The Same". Tap got a great reaction, but the laughter that greeted certain moments of Led Zeppelin's cinematic masterpiece was a joy to behold.

Not sure whose idea it was, but Well Done, That Man!

...I rolled in reasonably wasted at about 11.30pm and Tap was on the TV, about 10 minutes into it. It took an unfeasibly long time for me to realise it wasn't a documentary. I think it was the zuchini/cucumber wrapped in tin foil that might have tripped my ale-marinated synapses. Admissions of stupidity.

"I do not, for one, think that the problem was that the band was down. I think that the problem may have been, that there was a Stonehenge monument on the stage that was in danger of being crushed by a dwarf!"