Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

What fun's money if you can't act like a rock star?

By SHARON FINK
Published November 28, 2005

One way that we of modest financial means like to make ourselves feel superior to the rich and famous is to look at their absurd expenditures and say, "I'd never do anything that stupid."

But money changes people. Can we really say that if we could, we wouldn't spend $3,000 on a pair of imported Japanese scissors to give our hair that perfect cut? Or $1,700 on a figurine to feed our Star Wars obsession? Or $4,000 to put a Starbucks literally in our back yard?

Those actual examples were considered stupid enough by Blender to make the magazine's list of the 50 dumbest rock star extravagances.

"We love pop stars at this magazine," writer Clark Collis told New York's Daily News. "But it is clear that in many ways they are complete idiots."

Yeah, we know what you're really thinking: I'd like to be rich enough to be that idiotic.

ELVIS, THE SANDWICH KING: No. 1 on the list, compiled by Blender reporters from interviews with stars' managers, is Elvis Presley. His crowning achievement: One day in 1976 he chose to satisfy a craving for his favorite peanut butter, jelly and bacon sandwich by rounding up several friends and flying to Denver for a bunch of them.

Cost: $3,387.28.

It's not the biggest money outlay on the list, but "he spent it on sandwiches, so hats off to him," Collis told USA Today.

YOU THINK BONO IS ABNORMALLY ATTACHED TO HIS SUNGLASSES? The U2 singer feels even more passionately about his favorite hat. In 2003, he ended up in Italy without it and paid $1,700 to have it flown - in the cockpit - from London for a benefit concert with Luciano Pavarotti.

AND ALL HIS FELLOW PASSENGERS THANKED HIM FOR SPARING THEM FROM ANOTHER WHINING CHILD: Otherwise, this would surpass Bono's hat as the most egregious use of air travel: John Lennon spent $13,000 to book all the first-class seats on a plane so his son Sean could set up his train set.

FEEDING THEIR ADDICTIONS: Proving he can be as geeky as he looks, John Mayer is the one who plunked down $1,700 for the Star Wars figurine.

Queen singer Freddie Mercury was so enamored with fish that he spent $1.5-million on his collection.

There's "just say no" to drugs, and then there's Mick Fleetwood. He estimates that in his drug-doing days, he ingested $8-million worth of cocaine.

THEY'RE JUST LOOKING OUT FOR THE RESALE VALUE: Rod Stewart's well-known passion for soccer and his favorite team, Celtic in his native Scotland, moved him to spend $100,000 to build a soccer field and dressing rooms modeled on Celtic's at his Epping, England, mansion.

In an ultimately futile show of affection for then-wife Pamela Anderson, Tommy Lee paid $4,000 in 1999 for that Starbucks franchise at his home.

Ron Wood of the Rolling Stones put out $66,000 to replicate a British pub.

Kanye West commissioned an artist to recreate the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in his Los Angeles home. Price: $350,000. "It's gonna have over 50 cherubs and saints," he told Q magazine during the planning stage.

IT COSTS A LOT TO LOOK LIKE YOU DON'T SPEND ANY TIME ON YOUR HAIR: Britney Spears is the importer of the $3,000 Japanese hair-styling scissors.

ACCESSORIES ARE ALWAYS A GOOD INVESTMENT: Nelly is the proud owner of a $395,000 mink-lined Rolls-Royce.

-- Sharon Fink can be reached at 727 893-8525 or fink@sptimes.com

[Last modified November 28, 2005, 01:04:15]