I believe that the person in the photos that Vox identifies as Drumbo, was in fact the Mascara Snake (i.e. the late Victor Hayden). I thought Drumbo was deliberately omitted from the credits (and photos) due to some sort of dispute (and/or punitive measure). (I didn’t watch the entire 1 hr. 45 min. interview in the 2nd video, so for all I know they addressed this one way or the other.)
IIRC the backing track from “The Blimp” is The Mothers, not The Magic Band, but they overlaid the phone call and used the track on TMR.
I bought Trout Mask on CD when I was 20. (EDIT: @garethb2, this was not long after I got a copy of Going Gaga, FWIW.) I grew up listening to some pretty weird music (for example), but I wasn’t ready for this – I “appreciated” it right off the bat (the lyrics alone were worth the price of admission) but it was another three years before I could really say that I enjoyed it.
The one event that put it all together for me was watching Hominybob, an Austin band (or, a mostly Knoxvillian band that came together in Austin). What they were doing reminded me of Trout Mask; I went home and listened to it again and that was the “Eureka!” moment. Later on when I made friends with the vocalist, I was surprised to learn he had no idea what Trout Mask Replica was (he was into Tom Waits (whose 80s stuff is a lot like The Captain’s), while their two-axes-at-once guitarist was more of a King Crimson guy). Here’s a taste; they were wearing thrift-store drag when I first saw 'em:
I had read that Trout Mask Replica was supposed to have been a big influence on Public Image, Ltd. After my aforementioned “Eureka!” moment, when I got to “Dali’s Car” I thought “Holy crap, there’s the blueprint for Metal Box right there.”
ETA:
And speaking of bands that influenced PiL, Can’s Damo Suzuki turns 70 today. (Sadly three of the people in this video are no longer with us)
