Crosby Loggins
Kristin Burns/Jive Records
1. He recorded at the Village in L.A., which is like a clean frat house for musicians: "It was pretty cool – Weezer was downstairs, Seal was down the hall, Mayer was next door," says the singer-songwriter, named for Bing Crosby. "And Ben Harper left me a note once, saying, 'Sorry dude, we drank all your beer.' It was really fratty – except for the grossness."
2. John Travolta was a family friend: Thanks to his dad, Loggins grew up around other celebrities and knew Travolta as "Pilot Johnny." Jokes Loggins, "I didn't have Santa, I had Michael McDonald."
3. A ska band once kicked him out for being 'too reggae': Back when he rocked purple dreads, "I joined a pop-punk outfit that played a-bunch-of-electric-guitars-and-a-trumpet ska," he says. "I liked early Bob Marley and at rehearsals I'd say, 'You guys don't get it.' They were like, 'Reggae sucks, get your own band.' " His wild hair didn't stop there: Loggins once dyed his hair using drink mix. "My mother hated that because I'd get pink Kool Aid on my pillow."
4. He has a chicken named Hot Donna: At his home in Santa Barbara, Calif., Loggins and his girlfriend look after Donna, who survived a November fire and recently escaped a raccoon attack. "A really gnarly and huge raccoon cased my coop for over a week, then grabbed another chicken from the coop," he says. "There were feathers out in the street. But Hot Donna, who's old and slow, somehow lived. She's a gangster!"
5. He once built houses in Hawaii: "I put off college for a couple years to see what blue collar life was about," he says of becoming a carpenter on the Big Island from 1999 to 2001. He's since rebuilt wooden bridges on his parents' property and has plans for a bigger project down the road. "I'd really like to build a house by hand when I get married," says Loggins. "It's a romantic idea – whether I follow through with it remains to be seen."
