Mojo Nixon, the psychobilly singer-songwriter who – along with his collaborator Skid Roper – first came to semi-mainstream fame in 1987 through his single “Elvis is Everywhere,” has died at the age of 66.
Nixon, who in recent years had hosted a radio show on Sirius XM (Loon in the Afternoon), died from cardiac arrest while on the Outlaw Country Cruise, on which he had performed only the night before.
The cover art for Mojo Nixon and Skid Roper's 'Bo-Day-Shus!!!'
Born Neill Kirby McMillan, Jr. on August 2, 1957 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and raised in Danville, Virginia, Nixon didn't actually start his music career until moving to Denver, Colorado, where he played in a punk band called Zebra 123. When that band came to a conclusion, he moved to California, where he met the aforementioned Skid Roper, and by 1985 they had released their self-titled debut album as a duo on Enigma Records, the label which would remain their home until its dissolution in 1991.
Although Nixon and Roper found some cult success with their next two releases – the Get Out of My Way! EP and the full-length Frenzy, both released in 1986 – it was their third album, 1987’s Bo-Day-Shus!!!, that provided them with their first taste of semi-mainstream success. The video for the single “Elvis is Everywhere” quickly broke out of its original spot on MTV’s college-rock showcase, 120 Minutes, and found its way into regular rotation on the network, resulting in enough buzz to take Bo-Day-Shus!!! Into the lower reaches of the Billboard 200, climbing to No. 189.
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By the time the twosome released their 1989 album Root Hog or Die, they had become enough of a known quantity to secure some notable names for the album’s videos: the ridiculously-titled “Debbie Gibson Is Pregnant with My Two-Headed Love Child” starred Winona Ryder as Gibson, while “(619) 239-KING,” the title of which was a number for Elvis Presley to call if he was indeed still alive, featured appearances from Kris Kristofferson, the Beat Farmers, and the duo’s labelmates the Dead Milkmen. The former single hit No. 16 on Billboard’s newly-created Modern Rock chart, but the album itself failed to chart.
By 1990, Nixon had split from Roper, releasing his solo debut, Otis, which provided him with another successful single: “Don Henley Must Die,” which hit No. 20 on the Modern Rock chart. A few years later – on Nixon’s 35th birthday, to be specific – Henley showed up at a Mojo Nixon and the Toadliquors gig in Austin, Texas and jumped onstage to join in on the chorus: “Don Henley must die / Don’t let him get back together with Glenn Frey.”
Nixon recalled the incident several years later:
"There I was, the king of bullsh*t, completely flabbergasted. I took my guitar off, put it back on, did that like three times, then got on the mic and said, 'Don, do you want to debate? Do you want to fist fight?' He was sh*t-faced and he goes, 'I want to sing that song, especially the part about not getting together with Glenn Frey!' He was beltin' that sh*t out, screaming like he was Johnny f***in' Rotten. I was surprised he was so magnanimous and that he didn't punch me. That stage is so tiny, he could have knocked me out at any moment."
Nixon recorded with the Toadliquors as his backing band throughout much of the ‘90s, releasing a Christmas album (1992’s Horny Holidays!), a collaborative album with former Dead Kennedys frontman Jello Biafra (1994’s Prairie Home Invasion), and 1999’s The Real Sock Ray Blue! Somewhere in the middle of all of that, he also released a solo album, 1995’s Whereabouts Unknown, but even then the Toadliquors played with him when he toured behind it.
Throughout the ‘80s and ‘90s, Nixon also flirted with an acting career, starting with the 1989 Jerry Lee Lewis biopic Great Balls of Fire! From there, he appeared in the subpar sequel Rock ‘n’ Roll High School Forever, playing the Spirit of Rock ‘n’ Roll, and a few years later popped up in Super Mario Brothers and the big-screen adaptation of the ‘60s sitcom Car 54, Where Are You? He also provided the voice for Sheriff Lester T. Hobbes in the computer game Redneck Rampage, contributing a couple of songs to its soundtrack.
Although Nixon ostensibly retired from music in 2004, shifting his focus to DJing for Sirius XM, where at one point he was hosting three different shows, he did a show in support of Kinky Friedman’s 2006 bid to become governor of Texas and then returned to recording in 2009 with the release of his album Whiskey Rebellion. In an extremely Mojo-esque move, he briefly made the album – along with a good chunk of his back catalog – available free for download, a decision he explained in a press release:
“Can't wait for Washington to fix the economy. We must take bold action now. If I make the new album free and my entire catalog free it will stimulate the economy. It might even over-stimulate the economy. History has shown than when people listen to my music, money tends to flow to bartenders, race tracks, late night greasy spoons, bail bondsman, go kart tracks, tractor pulls, football games, peep shows and several black market vices. My music causes itches that it usually takes some money to scratch.”
[This was a move that was not nearly as surprising to anyone who’d heard Nixon discuss the topic of file-sharing onstage several years earlier, where he said that he didn’t care if people downloaded his then-new album The Real Sock Ray Blue! on Napster “because I’m not an a**hole like Metallica.”]
Although Nixon never released any further new albums from that point onward, he did – as noted above – continue to serve as a Sirius XM DJ, hosting Loon in the Afternoon up until his death. In addition, he was the subject of the long-in-the-works documentary The Mojo Manifesto: The Life and Times of Mojo Nixon, which debuted at the 2022 SXSW festival.
On the official Facebook page for the documentary, the following farewell was posted as the announcement of Nixon's passing:
Mojo Nixon
How you live is
how you should die.
Mojo Nixon was full-tilt, wide-open
rock hard, root hog, corner on two wheels + on fire…
Passing after a blazing show, a raging night, closing the bar, taking no prisoners+ a good breakfast with bandmates and friends.
A cardiac event on the Outlaw Country Cruise is about right… & that’s just how he did it.
Mojo has left the building
Since Elvis is everywhere, we know he was waiting for him in the alley out back.
Heaven help us all.
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