For those who didn't catch the Brown M&Ms reference [0]: the rock group Van Halen had a provision in their standard contract that there had to be M&Ms backstage

For those who didn't catch the Brown M&Ms reference [0]: the rock group Van Halen had a provision in their standard contract that there had to be M&Ms backstage, but all the brown ones had to be removed. Sometimes it was interpreted as them just being "spoiled rock stars", but it had a purpose. Much of the contract specified technical details like how much weight the stage could hold, power capacity, and other things that if done wrong could completely wreck a show. As David Lee Roth said, "if I saw a brown M&M in that bowl... well, line-check the entire production. Guaranteed you're going to arrive at a technical error. They didn't read the contract." In this case, it's not clear whether the writer is trying to evoke the "spoiled rocker" persona or the "make sure you read the contract" one. [0] http://www.snopes.com/music/artists/vanhalen.asp http://www.snopes.com/music/artists/vanhalen.asp