Philip Adrian Booth, 1960-2026

Philip Adrian Booth, one half of the musician-and-filmmaker duo behind the viral lostwave song “Ulterior Motives,” has died. He was 66 years old. Philip’s death was announced on social media by his twin brother and creative partner Christopher Saint Booth.

The Booth brothers have a long history in music and film, going back to the 1970s, when Christopher replaced soon-to-be-superstar Bryan Adams as vocalist in the band Sweeney Todd. The Booths’ older brother John was already the drummer in the band, and Philip played guitar.

Philip and Christopher’s creative partnership would continue for another fifty years, doing pop music, motion picture scores, documentaries and even feature films. The pair have long been a regular presence at horror conventions, but their fandom took a strange turn in 2024, when a song they recorded in 1986 went viral on social media.

During their time as the pop duo Who’s Who — so called because Phil and Chris were twin brothers, so people used to ask them “who’s who?” — they recorded a number of songs that were ultimately used in adult films in the 1980s. One of those songs, “Ulterior Motives,” became a popular online mystery after a snippet of it was uploaded to the website WatZatSong. For years, the artists — an even real title — of the song fans called “Everyone Knows That” was a mystery. Then, in April 2024, two Reddit users found the song in the adult film Angels of Passion. In its credits were Philip Adrian Booth and Christopher Saint Booth, and within days, the brothers had tens of thousands of new fans.

By the 2020s, Who’s Who had disbanded, although the Booth brothers continued making music — mostly for the paranormal documentaries and low-budget horror movies they directed. After “Ulterior Motives” was discovered, the duo embraced their new fans and released a number of “lost album” CDs of music they recorded in the 1980s and ‘90s.

All that time, the original master tape of “Ulterior Motives” was partially lost. The single they released in 2024 featured newly-recorded vocals and some new guitar. It wasn’t until just a few weeks ago that the original master was fully found.

“Ulterior Motives” will see an official physical release in July, on CD along with a DVD documentary centering on the story of its rediscovery.

In addition to their music career, the Booths have worked on a number of films, often focusing on paranormal phenomena. Christopher released a memoir, Paranoia, which centered on his experiences with the supernatural. They also worked together on narrative films like Never Blink, Death Tunnel, The Exorcist File, and Wine Thief.

On a personal note, I interviewed the Booths after “Ulterior Motives” was dicovered and a couple of times after that. I found them to be incredibly kind and funny, and I was thrilled that they used one of my interviews in their Ulterior Motives Picture Book. Getting to know them has been one of the great thrills of the last few years, and I’m so glad that “Ulterior Motives” was discovered before we lost Philip, so that he could experience all the love that the internet had for them.