It was performed by a local band in the SF Bay Area. (East Bay)
This was in the early 1980s, before the infamous Pepsi Paloma rape and murder.
The band was a large band, with a guy who did lead vocals, two female backup singers and the full complement of musicians IIRC.
It’s driving me crazy trying to remember!
A Google search mentions the song Spolarium by Eraserheads. Maybe that can point you in the right direction.
I’ve been doing some searching in relation to the OP (the name “Pepsi Paloma” intrigued me) and it does not appear that the song “Spolarium” by the Eraserheads is what brujaja is looking for.
The song was part of an album of theirs from 1996 or so. According to a band member, it is an urban legend that the song has anything to do with Pepsi Paloma’s rape. Instead it was about a roadie and a fan of the band’s, who were the two people mentioned in the song that others construed to be 2 of the perpetrators of the rape. The rape happened in the Philippines in 1982 or so.
I take the OP at his word that the song he is remembering is not related to the softcore, underage actress’ stage name, but it seems an unlikely combination of words to have arisen separately. I’ll continue looking, but the rape charges and her subsequent suicide is really swamping any other instance of the name.
jimbuff314: Exactly. I know it was a bona fide song with that specific title because I auditioned for the band as a replacement for one of the chick singers. (I would have got the job, too, if I’d been willing to sing and dance at the same time. But since I have always had all I can do just to walk and chew gum, I had to decline.)
I keep thinking it was maybe the Freaky Executives, but I’m pretty sure that those guys were the OTHER large show-band around at the time.
Very likely the horribleness of the crime overshadowed the song, which was I swear a minor local hit on the club scene; and probably rendered any further reference to the song in bad taste.
(Especially since the chorus went: “Pepsi, Pepsi Paloma, she’ll love you right into a coma…”)
Oh, PS, it was definitely not eraserhead.
Pepsi Paloma was a minor Philippine starlet of the early 1980s, whose alleged rape and suicide/murder overshadowed anything else she did. I am somewhat bemused that anyone outside of the Philippines has actually heard of her, let alone having a song named after her.
The Eraserheads were the biggest and most influential band of the Philippines in the 1990s. Their songs sometimes included sly social commentary, but for the most part were just these fun tunes. Their song “Spolarium” was released more than a decade after the Pepsi Paloma’s death, long after she had been mostly forgotten. There’s nothing in the lyrics of the song that speaks to the case, unless that’s what you really, really, really want them to mean.