I've occasionally been thinking back to this thread. I had fun researching and writing these pieces. I don't know if I will begin doing regular write-ups again, but there's one thing that had been bugging me a little, call it unfinished business maybe, but there was this exchange on the first page:
Speaking of the 90's and the Butthole Surfers, I love that song "Pepper".
That one might come up sooner or later. 
How about later?
I was going through Butthole Surfers discography recently and this one sort of wrote itself for a large part. Most of it will be admittedly about their early days, but they have had fittingly weird career arc from bad taste noisemakers to hip hit artist and hopefully this write-up is an entertaining, albeit brief look into their story.
Here we go:
BUTTHOLE SURFERS
PEPPER
1996
Butthole Surfers was formed in San Antonio in 1981 by vocalist Gibby Haynes and guitarist Paul Leary. Despite the bands crazy reputation, both of the men had actually academic background, Haynes having a degree in accounting and working in an accounting firm at the time and Leary being close to completing his MBA as well. Instead of white-collar careers they ended up serving the world some of the noisiest and freakiest rock music ever put on tape, and later getting signed on a major label, having an album produced by Led Zeppelin bassist John Paul Jones and making the biggest alternative hit of the year 1996.
The band did not initially have a set name and they changed it from show to show, with titles as imaginative as Vodka Family Winstons, Nine Foot Worm Makes Own Food and The Inalienable Right to Eat Fred Astaire’s Asshole. The name Butthole Surfers stuck kind of accidentally; Butthole Surfer was one of their song titles and at one of their early shows they were introduced as Butthole Surfers. The name caused some issues after the band was signed to Capitol Records and at least one of their album was issued with alternative cover with the band name altered to B***H*** Surfers.
The band has had some lineup changes, but Haynes and Leary have been constant members, and drummer King Coffey, who joined around the recording of their 1983 self-titled EP (sometimes also known as Brown Reason to Live and Pee-Pee the Sailor) has also been in the band since.
Aside from their music, perhaps even more than that, the band was famous for two things: their unquenchable appetite for psychedelic drugs and their intense live shows. The band was pretty much constantly high on LSD for the duration of 1980s and it is reflected on their music and weird antics.
At their peak the live shows were an assault on senses. Crazy music blaring way over the healthy decibel parameters, heavy strobe lighting, two drummers (King and Teresa Nervosa) banging standing up and on unison on see-through drumkits filled with lights, bald naked woman (Kathleen Turner) dancing with the music, Gibby Haynes screaming on megaphone or through various effects known as Gibbytronix and on top of that band projecting video material behind the stage that ranged from gruesome images from drivers education films and penis reconstruction surgeries to completely random like episode of Charlie’s Angels shown in color negative (I remember reading from some source it was upside down and backwards, who knows when it comes to Butthole Surfers). I recently read a quote by famous English radio DJ John Peel that probably summarises the live experience quite well:
“Perfectly extraordinary. I mean, excellent. But if you said you enjoyed it, I should be seriously concerned about you as a human being. But very well worth seeing and hearing.”
Their eighties music is delightfully weird. Their sound changes a little from record to record, but it is generally defined by thumping repetitive drum beats, Leary’s guitar work which is oftentimes noisy, chaotic and effect-laden but occasionally catchy and even beautiful and Gibby’s vocals, which many times are run through effects so heavily that any lyrics are indistinguishable. Whenever you can make sense of the lyrics, they are often dadaistic stream-of-consciousness rants with sexual and scatological references. They are definitely not everyone’s thing and certainly require a certain level of interest in absurd and a sense of humour. As I said, each of their 1980s albums have bit of a distinct feel to them, from synth-heavy Rembrandt Pussyhorse on which they discovered the joys of tape editing to Hairway to Steven which is based more on 1960s and 70s psychedelic rock and has Leary playing acoustic guitar for the first time in their discography. But I personally recommend their debut EP which shows their punky beginnings and 1987s Locust Abortion Technician, which is their noisiest and heaviest album, very experimental and unconventional, even disturbing, completely bonkers record.
While the band spent 1980s touring America, deeply underground with no hopes of mainstream success, they steadily gained following and respect. One of the disciples of the Surfers was Kurt Cobain, and Nirvana’s overnight success might have opened major label doors for them and bunch of other bands while the big companies were tripping over themselves trying to sign the next indie rock hit band. While some bands stuck firm to their indie cred, Butthole Surfers did not share the idealism say, Fugazi, and accepted Capitol’s record deal. They didn’t come completely out of nowhere; the video of their cover version of Donovan’s Hurdy Gurdy Man (in which the original’s Leslie effect is turned to the max) had had some exposure on MTV already.
Their first album on major label, 1993’s Independent Worm Saloon, was a minor success, with Who Was in My Room Last Night? gaining airplay on MTV and the album charting at 154 in Billboard 200. The album was co-produced by John Paul Jones of Led Zeppelin fame. The band toned down their experimentation in their 1990s and reimagined themselves as mildly psychedelic alternative/hard rock band. While not all fans of their old material do not approve them ‘selling-out’, I do think they still remained quite good. Especially Paul Leary had grown into a legitimately good songwriter and I do enjoy Haynes’s drawled baritone singing even without all the effects.
Come 1996 however and the band suddenly struck gold. The first single of their 1996 album Electriclarryland, named Pepper, became a surprise hit, topping the Modern Tracks chart and even reaching 26 on the Hot 100 singles.
Pepper is quite unique song in their oeuvre, I’d say it does not really remind anything they’ve done before. They had incorporated electronic beats very scarcely before this chilled and restrained jam that’s based mostly on one guitar chord. Gone are the screamed and looped vocals, here Gibby basically narrates the verses spoken word-style, backed mostly by a drum beat. Paul’s guitar doesn’t do wild feedback screeches or fast blues licks but mostly plays one psychedelic melody. While the song was undoubtedly a hit, I think it was also another example of their experimental nature which was getting less focus during the 1990s. The lyrics are fairly abstract but nowhere near as cryptic as in the past, telling short tales of unfortunate fates of some people who “were in love with dying and doing it in Texas”. The chorus, although quite catchy and memorable, doesn’t seem to have much to do with the rest of the song. Anybody buying the album on the back of the song would probably be surprised, since it has very little electronic music influence and is mostly hard rocking alt rock with tinges of psychedelia and even southern/country rock. I personally think it is one of their best albums, it’s not as weird as their older material but it is just a good solid rock record.
The title “Pepper” makes no sense either, since the word does not appear in the lyrics at all. That is not unusual for the band however, most of their song titles are nonsense. In fact, the original pressing of the album Hairway to Steven had no song titles at all! Each track was instead represented by absurd illustration. The commonly used names for those songs come from how they were written in setlists.
The music video features black and white footage that I suppose is made to resemble some kind of TV coverage of a hostage situation, alternating with the band performing in colour in a gaudy 1960/70s style set. They are three piece in the video since long-time bassist Jeff Pinkus left the band after the tour for Independent Worm Saloon finished. I personally like how the spoken word in verses is sometimes incorporated in the video as Gibby talking on a microphone to a TV journalist. It’s not quite as wonderfully chaotic as the video for
Who Was in My Room Last Night?, but they are very different songs in nature and a slower paced video works better on Pepper’s case.
Why was it a such a hit then? I am not sure. What I have figured is that it falls into a certain era of rock music, between grunge and nu metal. If you look at alternative hits from 1996 to 1999, there doesn’t seem to be such a unifying thread, other than rock hits were getting lighter, more positive sounding and major key after all the doom and gloom of the grunge era. Such unlikely genres as ska punk, swing revival and jam band rock were having their day in the sun. One reason that has been thrown around is that the song is somewhat reminiscent in tone to Beck’s 1994 hit Loser, both incorporating programmed percussion and spoken word delivery, but according to King Coffey the band was more inspired by trip hop acts such as Massive Attack and Tricky. Another hit song from the same era that’s a little similar in style is Primitive Radio Gods’ brilliantly named
Standing Outside a Broken Phone Booth With Money in My Hand. I don’t particularly care for that one, but it also seems to be fairly fondly remembered when it comes to 90s one hit wonders.
The rest of the 1990s weren’t as rosy for the band. Their follow-up album, tentatively titled After the Astronaut, went unreleased, the band was dropped by Capitol and was mired in legal trouble for a while. In 2001 they released Weird Revolution, which was mostly based on material meant for After the Astronaut. On it the band has lost most of their identity and sound mostly like Kid Rock or Smash Mouth, in fact Kid Rock wrote the hook to the lead single The Shame of Life. It has been the last Butthole Surfers album so far, with the band playing only sporadic shows since, last time in 2017. Paul Leary has gone on record to say he hates touring so it is unlikely the band ever reunites for a longer period of time. However, they have left a weird and wonderful legacy and have had one of the oddest career arcs in the history of rock music. If you are interested to learn more about them, I recommend Michael Azerrad’s book Our Band Could Be Your Life, which profiles various American indie bands from the 1980s, not only for Butthole Surfers, but it covers many interesting bands of that era and paints the picture of the DIY nature and unending touring cycles of the underground rock scene.
One funny extra: at the height of their success, they even got referenced in The Simpsons. In the eighth season episode Hurricane Neddy, first aired in December 1996 (side note: IMO one of the best episodes of the show) Ned Flanders’ house gets destroyed by a hurricane. While his family temporarily resides at the church,
the family sons proudly come presenting the new second-hand clothes they have got from the church. Todd Flanders gleely exclaims: “I’m a surfer!” while wearing a Butthole Surfers tee. This gag got caught by Fox censors, who did not allow the full band name to be broadcast, so the shirt is shown from an angle that makes it read “Buttho Surfers”. Now I don’t know about you, but to my mind that is not any less vulgar.
Topic: Ruba's 90s Extravaganza v. I don't mind the sun sometimes (Read 4124 times)
