if only this existed back in Van Halen's heyday

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Halen#Contract_riders

"This American Life" did a great segment explaining (as does your wikipedia link) why the M&M's were a legit safety concern--and not just a prima-donna move by self-indulgent rock stars:

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/386/t...

IIRC, the reason they have strange requests is so they know the crew actually went through the list and fulfilled all requests. Asking for only red M&M sounds silly but if you see a bowl of red M&Ms in your trailer, you know the crew was more likely to be diligent with the other requests. Those other requests being sound equipment and safty measures.

The point wasn't to have red M&Ms, though they taste good, it was a test to see how well the crew followed instructions.

Came in here to see if someone would mention it. Glad to see I was not let down ;)

I first heard the story as an urban-legend-style tale about the crazy foibles of famous people, but I love that it was driven by practical considerations.

Smoking gun is more ad riddled than I remember it, but they post a fair number of concert riders.

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/backstage