Trivia / Dr. Demento

• Channel Hop:
  • The radio show changed syndicators several times over the years, before he finally just distributed it himself.
  • His 1975 novelty song compilation Dr. Demento's Delights was released by his then-employer Warner (Bros.) Records, but the label reportedly refused to promote it. 1980's Dementia Royale started his long association with Rhino Records.
• Colbert Bump: In general, lots of old novelty songs have gotten boosts of popularity after being featured on his show. Benny Bell's obscure 1946 song "Shaving Cream" became a Top 40 hit in 1975 because of Demento's airplay. And of course there's "Weird Al" Yankovic...
• Fan Community Nicknames: He regularly refers to the listeners as "dementites and dementoids".
• He Also Did: He has a Master's in musicology, is a highly regarded expert in early blues and gospel recordings, assembled and wrote liner notes for numerous compilation albums, was an early reviewer for Rolling Stone and other magazines, and worked as a roadie for 60s bands like Spirit and Canned Heat.
  • A lot of the artists who hit it big on the show also count—
    • Bill Mumy is half of Barnes & Barnes.
    • Barry Bookbinder, leader of Barry & The Bookbinders, is a successful Los Angeles attorney.
    • Tim Cavanagh was a teacher at a Catholic high school before he started his comedy career.
    • Randy "Dr. Rock" Hanzlick, who did "I'd Rather Have a Bottle in Front of Me (Than a Frontal Lobotomy)", became the Chief Medical Examiner for Fulton County, Georgia.
    • Krypton ("Hangover", "Let's Blow Up The Tow Truck"), now records religious music under his real name, T.R. Post.
    • Darrell Hammond ("Wappin' ", with Christopher Snell) and Ana Gasteyer (part of The Lemon Sisters, who sang "In My Country") both had hits on the show before they joined the cast of Saturday Night Live.
    • Wally Wingert got a lot of spins on the show with his song parodies before establishing himself as a voice actor. His biggest hit was "Adam West", a Batman tribute to the tune of "Wild, Wild West" by The Escape Club.
    • Another popular song parodist on the show, Bud LaTour, went on to have a #1 hit on the Billboard Dance chart in 1991 with "People Are Still Having Sex".
    • A 1975 Newsweek article noted that the Doctor played songs by five different cartoonists who also dabbled in music: Robert Crumb, Shel Silverstein, Al Capp, Walt Kelly, and Gilbert Shelton.
    • Under his real name, Jerry Samuels, Napoleon XIV wrote the 1963 hit Sammy Davis Jr. ballad "The Shelter of Your Arms".
• In Memoriam: He'll often note the passing of an artist whose music he's played, often by playing some of their music on the next show after their death. The January 2, 1994 show was a two-hour tribute to Frank Zappa. On March 11, 2023 he did a double tribute to Robert Haimer of Barnes & Barnes and Napoleon XIV (Jerry Samuels), who both died in the week leading up to the show.
• No-Hit Wonder: Not Demento himself, but many of the bands he plays; Da Yoopers are a prime example.
• Screwed by the Network: Around 1984 or so, his syndicator Westwood One (which started distributing the show in 1978) apparently started being more restrictive on the lyrical content of the songs he played on his national show (he could be looser on his local LA show), especially targeting drugs, sex and offensive humor. A result is that some of the most popular material from the show's first decade-and-a-half basically disappeared from the national show between about 1984 and 1994, like Shel Silverstein's "The Smoke-Off", Ogden Edsl's "Kinko the Clown" and Jef Jaisun's "Friendly Neighborhood Narco Agent" (though it did get a couple of spins nationally in that period, suggesting that Dr. D just felt it was dated). He took over syndication from Westwood One in 1992, and started loosening the restrictions after a while.

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