The Brian Jonestown Massacre is a psychedelic rock band founded in San Francisco, California in the early 1990s, led by Anton Newcombe. They are now most famous for their role in the 2004 documentary DiG!, which details their explosive onstage antics and their feud with fellow '60's psych-rock revivalists the Dandy Warhols. The band is currently based in New York City.
Over its decade-long history, the band has undergone a large number of personnel changes. Multi-instrumentalist and main songwriter Anton Newcombe is the only member who has stayed with the Brian Jonestown Massacre since its beginning, when it was founded by Newcombe, tambourine player Joel Gion (who has stayed with him the longest), and guitarist/bassist/vocalist Matt Hollywood. There are at least two dozen musicians who have been in the BJM at one point or another.
Ex-members include: Matt Hollywood, a founding member of Portland band The Out Crowd; Peter Hayes, founding member of San Francisco rock trio the Black Rebel Motorcycle Club; Joel Gion, a founding member of San Francisco band, The Dilettantes; Rob Campanella, a Los Angeles producer and engineer who has worked with the Tyde, Beachwood Sparks, Dead Meadow, Mia Doi Todd, Frausdots,and Scarling; Bobby Hecksher, founding member of Los Angeles band the Warlocks; solo recording artist Miranda Lee Richards. Ricky Rene Maymi was recently replaced by Irina Yalkowsky.
Current long-term members include Collin Hegna and Frankie Teardrop.
Much has been made of the fact that Newcombe is an uncompromising control freak who is impossible to work with. However, many of the musicians who quit his band have stayed in his orbit and continued working with him in some capacity. Newcombe was, at one point, a drummer in Hecksher's Warlocks. Campanella produces or engineers many of the records on Newcombe's record label, the Committee to Keep Music Evil. Gion is forever showing back up shaking the tambourine at BJM shows, Even the Dandy Warhols appear to have buried the hatchet with Newcombe, as he joined them onstage at Lollapalooza in July of 2005.