Today marks former Extreme lead singer Gary Cherone's 50th year alive. It also marks just about 21 years since anyone really thought a ton about Gary Cherone, because Extreme's megahit acoust-a-ballad, "More Than Words," was released in August of 1990. In honor of the man becoming a half centurion, here is some useless trivia about him to keep you from getting laid and some video highlights from his career.
Gary's aforementioned fraternal twin also pursues a career as a musician and is not afraid to braid.
Here we find Gary performing with Queen and Black Sabbath's Tony Iommi. Gary's great vocals aside, the real star of this performance is his and Brian May's dueling hair and the pants he received in the auction of MC Hammer's assets.
"Fire in the Hole" was used in the Lethal Weapon 4 soundtrack. This is a
really fine example of how a lack of chemistry can still impede some of
the best musicians in the world from becoming one of the best bands in
the world.
Here we see Gary in another post-late-'80s hair guy cliché, playing the
role of Jesus in Jesus Christ Superstar à la Skid Row's
Sebastian Bach. The role of a lifetime for any aging rock 'n' roll
refugee with vocal chops and an ego.
And yes, the song you've all been waiting for, the cassette most likely to be found in the boombox you were blasting at a would-be girlfriend's window in 1990, "More Than Words." A touching song, the background music to countless sappy television retrospective montage pieces, it's as sappy as ever in 2011.
Finally, as I feel it is a true honor and one of the ultimate forms of flattery for any musician, we present Weird Al Yankovic's interpretation of "More Than Words," titled "You Don't Love Me Anymore." Brilliant.
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