DEVO + Johnny Rotten? Branson 2 stoned

Here's a fun little story from Blender:I once heard from some punk that Johnny Rotten was supposed to sing for Devo. Any truth to this?
Patrick Day, Lynchburg, VA

Weirdly, yes. It was January 1978, and the Sex Pistols had just broken up. The band scattered to England and Brazil, but frontman Johnny Rotten was stranded in L.A. with no money and no way home. Desperate, he called his friend Richard Branson, the owner of Virgin Records, who agreed to fly Rotten to Jamaica, where he was vacationing.

Branson hatched a plan and invited nerdy post-punkers Devo down to Jamaica as well. Having procured a bushel of the island’s finest herb, he proceeded to get the band insanely high and make his pitch. As Devo’s Mark Mothers­baugh recalled: “[Branson] says, ‘We have Johnny Rotten in the next room, and he wants to be the new lead singer for Devo. We have the press from England here, and they’re ready to take photos and do articles.’” The band was flattered, but politely declined. “We were stoned, so it made it even worse,” Mothersbaugh said. “We started laughing … until tears were coming out of our eyes.” Keyboardist Gerald Casale was even more blunt: “It was an absolutely stupid idea.”

What was Branson thinking? He must have been stoned outta his skull? DEVO and Rotten are from two different solar systems, besides DEVO had a lead singer already, who was what set DEVO apart.

Here's a fantastic little video from DEVO on Letterman from 1982. Imagine I was in high school in Michigan that year, could have seen it...