John Linnell

In a People magazine online poll – "The Most Beautiful People of 1998" – John Linnell finished ninth (with 4,189 votes, eight ahead of Sarah Michelle Gellar, and 1,038 behind Madonna). He responded to the curious poll results with an op-ed piece in The New York Times:

Linnell provided the singing voice for the Other Father character in the 2009 film Coraline, for which They Might Be Giants wrote the "Other Father Song", included on the film's soundtrack.

In December 2005, the band began to produce a twice-monthly podcast. Early on, Linnell frequently contributed humorous spoken-word pieces to the program.

Other side-projects include the limited-release House of Mayors EP in 1996 through the Hello CD of the Month Club and in 1997 a flexi disc of the song "Olive the Other Reindeer" accompanying promotional copies of the children's books, Olive, the Other Reindeer. Linnell has also appeared as a guest musician – often as an accordionist – on a number of musical efforts by other artists, including Suzanne Vega's Days of Open Hand and David Byrne's Grown Backwards.

Linnell described his role in the group during an interview for Splatter Effect in 1994:

Since 1994, Linnell has done some solo work: in that year he released the State Songs EP, which he expanded to a full-length album in 1999. The concept of the State Songs project is intentionally misleading: U.S. states feature prominently in the title and chorus of each song, but have very little to do with their actual narratives. "Montana", for instance, is about the insane ramblings of somebody who is about to die; "Idaho" explores a famous rock story in which John Lennon, having consumed hallucinogenic drugs, believed he could drive his house; "South Carolina" is about getting rich as a result of a bicycle accident.

Linnell co-founded They Might Be Giants in 1982 with high school friend John Flansburgh. While the two split singing and songwriting duties roughly in half, Linnell's songs enjoyed the most commercial success in their early years: singles like "Don't Let's Start" and "Ana Ng" introduced the band to college radio, and they made waves on the Billboard charts in 1990 with "Birdhouse in Your Soul". John Linnell generally writes songs, sings, plays accordion, keyboards, and various woodwind instruments for the band.

John Sidney Linnell (born June 12, 1959) is an American musician, known primarily as one half of the Brooklyn-based alternative rock band They Might Be Giants. In addition to singing and songwriting, he plays accordion, baritone and bass saxophone, clarinet, and keyboards for the group.