I’m sorry, I know you are busy so I’ll try not to take up too much of your time.
But I have a question which is as follows:
We all throw the names of bands around during the casual conversation topic:
Which was the best band ever?
But are not the band commonly known as :
The Butthole Surfers
Or, in their Latin form:
The Buttholian Surfesarios
not, in fact, worthy recipients of the aforementioned award?
I don’t know what they’ve done lately, but I really liked their first album. Live they were awesome. I did a hour long interview with them in 1985. Pretty wierd. Nice guys (and a woman). I would ask a question and they would just kinda go free form. Kept interrupting each other. One I remember was:
“we especially like Julio Inglacius”
answered by Gibby “especially when he jacks off in outer spacious.” Usually someone would try to answer the asked question a couple minutes later. Remember they were on tour in a little tiny van that drove 45 mph on the freeway, and had nothing to do but talk to each other during those long drives.
I drove with them to the show that night because they didn’t know the way. Took about an hour. Actually, they were all pretty quiet (or maybe I was boring).
Live the “Surfers”, as their Alternative Tentacles record label used to call 'em, were great. Especially the bullhorn.
Greatest band ever. Well, not sure about that, but worthy of a mention.
I’ve only heard one album of theirs I really liked, Independent Worm Saloon. I REALLY like that one, but I’ve been disappointed with all the rest, they have one or two OK songs and a bunch of annoying filler. IWS had a lot of styles, from slow acoustic ballads (The Wooden Song) to some of the heaviest death metal (Dog Inside Your Body), all of it good.
I am a fairly old BHS fan, and I think Pioughd is where they really went to crap (although the Hurdy Gurdy man cover is quite good.) Independant Worm Saloon had a couple highspots, but was overall quite the disapointment IMO. I haven’t bothered with any of their stuff since then.
My favorite BHS album has to be Rembrant Pussyhorse, with Hairway to Steven being a close second. Locust Abortion Technition is also good, but not great, same with Psychic Powerless…Another Man’s Sac.
Crap, where do you start with those albums? My favorite songs?
Whirling Hall of Knives
Backass
Creep in the Celler
Human Cannonball
Moving To Florida
The Bong Song
John W. Smoke
Jimi
To Parter
Heh, a review of Rembrant… from Amazon says:
Or, maybe it was just the drugs. Who knows? In any case, The Buttholes hold a special place in the area of my brian that is burnt away from too much acid.
Who could possibly forget the classic I Shot the Pope?
Brian is very angry at me for taking all the drugs.
AHEM, “brain”
[sub]Homer: “Me lose brain? Uh-Oh!”[/sub] :o
Upon Preview – MMM…BBQ Pope…
I like both their old and new stuff. I think my favorite songs are Who was in my room last night? and Creep In the Cellar.
I heard a rumor that the lead singer was the son of Mr. Peppermint, who had a childrens show on public TV here in Dallas for many years. Anyone else heard this?
This article from the Dallas Observer seems to agree with you. I never knew that, but then again I have never heard of “Mr Peppermint”, so I’m not surprised I didn’t know this.
Yes, Mr. Peppermint is the lead singer’s father. I heard Mr. Peppermint interviewed on talk radio (KLIF for you Dallas people) back when you still couldn’t say “Butthole Surfers” on a commercial radio station. The question was phrased something along the lines of “Is it true you’re the father of the lead singer of a band I’d just as soon not say on the air?” He chuckled and admitted he was.
Mr. Peppermint was the Mr. Rogers of Dallas kiddie shows, but is unknown outside DFW I’d think.
One question for you fans though: what’s the song that starts out with a father and his child having a heart to heart talk, then ends with the father saying something like, “Oh yes, and tell you mother… SATAN!!!” Someone played that one for me back in junior high school.
The song is called “Sweat Loaf” – it’s the opening track on Locust Abortion Technician.
Yes. It’s a (loose) cover of the Black Sabbath song “Sweet Leaf”.
In concert, they sometimes varied the “SATAN” line.
I’ve heard, “…be sure and tell her SAJAK, SAJAK, SAJAK!”
and “…RAISINS, RAISINS, RAISINS!”
And yeah, they’ve got my vote, if not for the Best Band Ever, at least one of the top 10.
Remember when they had that crazy naked dancing chick?
Oh, yes—one of the high points of my teenage life: I got to light the cigarette of the female drummer after a show!
I also had a bit of a problem with piougd until I realised that Lonesome Bulldog is one of the most hysterically funny songs ever penned.
I think thats what I like about them - everything they do is informed with a wicked sense of humour eg:
The Naked Song
I saw an X-Ray of a girl passing gas
Who Was In My Room Last Night
and yet the songs are also fiendishly good at the same time.
On the double live album, the Sweat Leaf Satan thing is as follows:
"Sooo I came to the room where my father was and I looked at his circumcised penis then I walked on down the hall
then I came to the room where my mother was and I saw that she had shaved her pussy just for the occasion
and I walked on down the hall
then I came to the room where my sister was and I inserted my forefinger into her vagina proper and my thumb into her anus cavity
then I walked on down the hall
then I came to the room where my father was again and he looked at me deep down into my green eyes and he said to me:
“Son, SATAN, SATAN, SATAN”
This is what Gibby was talking about, China Guy:
Julio Iglesias
Jacked off in outer-spacias
Did 69 with the pope in the butthole
Rammed that sucker head down that throat now
Julio he had a mole
Went to the doctor with a fiery pole
Saw the nurse what did he see
Loved to watch his sister pee
Oh baby baby rock and roll sock it to me
Ah, poetry, sheer poetry. But my favorite is:
Ten foot tall and the nurse stuck a needle in my arm
Well Uncle Doc’s nurse use a needle with ungodly charm
Walkin’ down the hall the dentist LOOMED through the door
I saw an X-Ray of a girl passing gas
The one shot theory got a query things got rolling at last
Hey, HEY hey daddy, why die in the war
Jesus Hitler Buddha Santa Mary Klaus Barbie (twice more?)
Well Ben got arrested and the sky was the ocean that day
Words got twisted and history didn’t know what to say
God dog sex death life and I don’t need it anymore
These images were conjured up by talking on the telephone
I saw an X-Ray of a girl passing gas
[breakdown]
Oh my God it seems like just the other day
But it might have been one hundred years before
And I know there is no other way
We only have to wonder what it’s for
My favorite band in the whole world, next to Marginal Man. Jesse Jackson is reputedly a Buttholes fan, too.
Yes. I love them. I went to see them once in Austin, and a riot ensued, so they didn’t play.
I did get to see them in Tulsa, and once in Memphis.
When did this come out? What albumn or song? Perhaps I was there at the beginning of the creative process (it was either late '84 or early '85). They all autographed the first albumn for me too, and Gibby made these wierd drawings.
Other gems I remember was Gibby saying: I want to see real pornography. I want to see helicopters flying out of vaginas.
They also did a radio station ID, which eventually turned out really well and may still be on the air at KDVS. one part of it was “eat your vegetables, do your homework, and kill your parents with a dull butter knife.”
The song is called “Julio Iglesias”, on the Hairway to Steven album (1988)
Remember? When I was 15 I had a transendental experience watching her and the band do Sweat Loaf, with those Kung Fu kicks (you know what I mean if you’ve seen it.) It was beautiful.
Oh yeah, and a couple of years later I slept with a guy who had slept with the naked dancing chick. No, really.
Favorite song not yet mentioned? Sea Ferring:
“like a house wife, like a rapist, like a tea cup, like a cold sore, like a bed pan, like an old friend…”
Just thought I’d put in my vote for the Buttholes as, at least, one of those bands who at their best are as good as anyone (although they drop the standard too often).
My favourite record by a mile is ‘The Hole Truth and Nothing Butt’, which is worth the price of entry just for the amazing interview at the end, where they cover ‘The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald’, as a joke, but still with a tonne of heart, which is not common.
They just came to town and I had to miss them, but I hear they were awesome, still playing bizarre movies behind them, and going beserk.
Does anyone know where there’s a cheap copy of the double live record?