Butthole Surfers: Америкалық рок тобының тарихы

American rock band

Butthole Surfers are an American rock band formed in San Antonio, Texas, by singer Gibby Haynes and guitarist Paul Leary in 1981. The band has had numerous personnel changes, but its core lineup of Haynes, Leary, and drummer King Coffey has been consistent since 1983. Teresa Nervosa served as second drummer from 1983 to 1985, 1986 to 1989, and 2009. The band has also employed a variety of bass players, most notably Jeff Pinkus. Emerging from the 1980s hardcore punk scene, Butthole Surfers quickly became known for their chaotic live shows, black comedy, and a sound that incorporated elements of psychedelia, noise rock, and punk as well as their use of sound manipulation and tape editing. Although they were respected by their peers and attracted a devoted fanbase, Butthole Surfers had little commercial success until 1996's Electriclarryland. The album contained the hit single "Pepper", which climbed to number one on Billboards Modern Rock Tracks chart that year.

Butthole Surfers formed at Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas during the late 1970s, when students Gibson "Gibby" Haynes and Paul Leary Walthall (later just Paul Leary) met for the first time. Though it was their shared taste in non mainstream music that caused them to become friends, both appeared to be headed for very conventional careers. Haynes, as captain of Trinity's basketball team, as well as the school's "Accountant of the Year", soon graduated to a position with a respected Texas accounting firm, while Leary remained in school working on his MBA degree. In 1981, Haynes and Leary published the magazine Strange V. D., which featured photos of abnormal medical ailments, coupled with fictitious, humorous explanations for the diseases. After being caught with one of these pictures at work, Haynes left the accounting firm and moved to Southern California. Leary, at the time one semester shy of his degree, dropped out of college and followed Haynes. After a brief period spent selling homemade clothes and linens emblazoned with Lee Harvey Oswald's image, the pair returned to San Antonio, and launched the band that would eventually become Butthole Surfers.

Haynes and Leary played their debut show at a San Antonio night club, The Bonham Exchange, in 1981; at that time, they had not yet settled on the band name "Butthole Surfers". By 1982, the band was backed by the sibling rhythm section composed of bassist Quinn Mathews and his brother, drummer Scott Mathews. The band did not gain a following in San Antonio, and purchased a van to return to California later that summer. Biafra invited the group to open for Dead Kennedys and T. S. O. L. at the Whisky a Go Go in Los Angeles, and soon made an offer that would launch their recording career; if they could get someone to lend them studio time, Alternative Tentacles would reimburse the studio when the album was complete. The band then returned to San Antonio to record at BOSS Studios (a. k. a. Bob O'Neill's Sound Studios, a. k. a. the Boss). Released on Alternative Tentacles in July 1983, the resulting EP, Butthole Surfers (also known as Brown Reason to Live and Pee Pee the Sailor), offered songs with provocatively absurd titles like "The Shah Sleeps in Lee Harvey's Grave" and "Bar B Q Pope", alternately sung by Haynes and Leary. (Haynes would become the band's primary singer by the time of their first LP.) The album cover, like the many bizarre illustrations that would accompany Surfers' succeeding work, was designed by the band itself. Teeming with humor, Butthole Surfers laid the foundation for what was to come. Cobain later went on to list the album "Pee Pee the Sailor" by Butthole Surfers as one of the fifty most influential albums for Nirvana's sound. Cobain would later meet his wife, Courtney Love of Hole, at a Butthole Surfers/L7 concert in 1991. Soon after the release of Butthole Surfers, the band recruited a second drummer, Teresa Nervosa (born Teresa Taylor), who had played with Coffey in a number of high school marching bands in the Texas' Fort Worth and Austin areas. She and Coffey would drum in unison on separate, stand up kits, adding to the spectacle of Surfers' ever evolving stage show. Though Nervosa and Coffey repeatedly referred to themselves, and were referred to, as siblings, it has since been revealed that the two only presented themselves as such due to their similar appearances, and are not actually related. With her arrival, the band's core "classic lineup"—Haynes, Leary, Coffey, and Nervosa—was in place. With the exception of a number of different bass players and Nervosa's brief sabbatical from late 1985 to 1986, it remained largely unchanged until her final departure in 1989. In 2008, she returned to the band—their website announced 2009 tour dates including "Teresa Taylor". In 1984, the band returned to BOSS Studios to record enough material for two full length albums. Both were originally offered to Alternative Tentacles, with the first being Psychic Powerless Another Man's Sac. Before either album could be released, though, Alternative Tentacles had to acquire the master tapes from Bob O'Neill, BOSS Studios' namesake and owner. He refused to release them until he'd been reimbursed for the sessions, and Alternative Tentacles couldn't immediately afford to pay. After months of waiting, the band issued the concert recording Live PCPPEP on Alternative Tentacles out of financial desperation in September 1984. Mostly made up of live performances of songs from their debut, it prompted some critics and fans to joke that they had released the same album twice.

With some members working as dishwashers, the group was unhappy about the album being released on Ward 9. Terry Tolkin, a friend and their East Coast booking agent, signed the band to Corey Rusk's then nascent Touch and Go Records in Detroit. Psychic Powerless Another Man's Sac was released in 1984. Building on their first EP, the band made psychedelia a much bigger part of their sound on this release, which made full use of the tape editing, non traditional instrumentation, and sound modulation that came to define their studio recordings. Smart quit after falling in love with a friend of the band, and Trevor Malcolm, a young Canadian musician recommended by Touch and Go, replaced him on bass. Word was spreading about the band's bizarre stage show by the time they hit the road again, resulting in ever larger audiences at their concerts. A friend of the band's from Athens, Juan Molina, was brought in for a brief U. S. tour, but was not interested in becoming a full time member. While waiting, the band released the four song Cream Corn from the Socket of Davis EP on Touch and Go in late 1985. Once Alternative Tentacles finally declined, the group went back into Kramer's Noise New York studio to record two new tracks to replace "To Parter" and "Tornadoes", which were originally intended for Rembrandt before appearing on the Cream Corn EP's B side. She was replaced by another female drummer, Kytha Gernatt, who was dubbed Cabbage Gomez Jr. in the press soon after joining the band. Cabbage had previously performed with Kathleen Lynch (a. k. a. Kathleen, a. k. a. Ta Da the Shit Lady) in the band Easturn Stars; Lynch gained fame as Butthole Surfers' infamous naked dancer from 1986 to 1989. Kramer also left during this period and was replaced by Jeff Pinkus, who gave the band's bass position its longest period of stability by staying until 1994. Their second LP was finally issued as Rembrandt Pussyhorse on Touch and Go in April 1986. Coming out some two years after the original sessions, it featured a different mix and song selection than Alternative Tentacles' unreleased version. Released in March 1987, Locust Abortion Technician is one of the heaviest Butthole Surfers albums, and it is often considered their finest to date. Harnessing aspects of punk, heavy metal, and psychedelia, its unique sound produced a number of grinding, slower paced songs, arguably making it an early precursor of grunge. The band opted to follow this album's blueprint on future projects. In contrast, songs on their earlier recordings had undergone far more in studio development and experimentation. Pinkus has expressed the opinion that the later, better organized sessions stifled much of the spontaneous creativity that had propelled their earlier releases. Hairway to Steven was issued in April, and marked a midway point between the band's experimental roots, and the more accessible recordings that would follow. While half of the material is as extreme sounding as their earlier work, other songs are more conventional. This was the first Butthole Surfers album to make extensive use of acoustic guitar. Hairway to Steven did not have song titles when first released, and instead represented each track with an absurdist, often scatological, cartoon. While touring during the winter of 1988, Butthole Surfers used a portable DAT recorder to tape various concerts. The strongest of these recordings were packaged as Double Live, a limited edition double album released on vinyl and cassette in 1989, and on CD the following year. This was the first release on the band's Latino Buggerveil label. Although the album, as of spring 2007, is out of print, its songs are available as free MP3 downloads on the band's official website. Issued in response to widespread, for profit bootlegging of their live shows, it contained performances of songs from all of their previous studio albums and EPs. Double Live was to be the last Butthole Surfers album to feature Nervosa, who left early in 1989. Shortly after leaving, she was diagnosed with an aneurysm, and was forced to undergo brain surgery. She further began to suffer from strobe light induced seizures. Butthole Surfers did not seek to replace her at the time, and opted to continue as a quartet. Following a final EP for Touch and Go—1989's Widowermaker—the band left their longtime recording partners to sign with longtime supporter Terry Tolkin at Rough Trade Records who had also brought them to Touch and Go, for a reportedly generous one album deal. Prior to the new LP's debut, Rough Trade talked the band into first releasing 1990's The Hurdy Gurdy Man, which previewed material from the coming release. The same year, Rough Trade issued Digital Dump by The Jackofficers, Haynes and Pinkus's psychedelic house music side project. piouhgd (pronounced "p. o. ed", as in "pissed off") was the band's fifth full length studio album, and their first for Rough Trade. Released in April 1991, it featured more electronic instrumentation, but was largely viewed as a disappointment in comparison to past recordings. Both Haynes and Leary have since expressed displeasure with the album. Regardless, the band was invited to be part of that summer's inaugural Lollapalooza tour. Around this time, Haynes collaborated with Ministry, contributing vocals on their 1991 single "Jesus Built My Hotrod", which was later included on 1992's Psalm 69: The Way to Succeed and the Way to Suck Eggs.