I loved the Butthole Surfers because they were two great tastes that tasted great together, Un Chien Andalou meets Blue Oyster Cult. The molten hard rock of BOC, Sabbath and Grand Funk Railroad bubbled up from beneath their absurdist caterwaul, and that was impressive in Austin in 1983. A Buttholes live show was like a bad trip, but unlike LSD, their shows only lasted an hour or so, and you could always go home if it got too scary.
Lots of the photographs above were taken in 1984, when the band was in San Antonio recording what would become their second album, Rembrandt Pussyhorse. After a few years in Austin, the band moved to Athens, GA, where they allegedly stalked R.E.M. When they returned to Texas in 1986, the Butthole Surfers bid me welcome into their home. In their kitchen, I discovered a wind-powered turntable and in the living room, several yards of befouled parachute silk. Gibby Haynes was wearing a Mr. Bubble t-shirt, and he handed me a beer, but nothing stronger, because the band preferred me to be coherent enough to make a picture. To get into that special mood, they turned on their smoke machine and a strobe light. Then they began to lurch and loom at me. I escaped with one of the group shots above, and it is possibly the most wicked negative I've ever produced. To the untrained eye, it is as dense as Jupiter, and utterly black.
Back then, in Texas, we were all certain that the Butthole Surfers would rule the universe one day. (PB)
Butthole Surfers probably were Paul Leary, King Coffey, Gibson Haynes, Teresa Taylor, Jeff Pinkus, Terence Smart, Trevor Malcolm, Kathleen Lynch, Kytha Gernatt, Kramer, Lee Daniel, Luke _____, Mark Farner, Quinn Mathews, Scott Mathews, Bill Jolly, Nathan Calhoun and Johnny Depp. Previous names of the band have included Stuntman Senator, Black Astronaut, Nine Foot Worm Makes Own Food, the Vodka Family Winstons, and the Againsters.
"As their sound developed, so did their ability to judge between right and wrong."
(Butthole Surfers bio, ca. 1983)
“The Butthole Surfers are homeless again. We put all of our stuff in storage in Winterville [Georgia.] We recorded two of the songs [on our next record] in our kitchen. It’s the best sound we’ve ever gotten. You can feel it in your chest.”
Teresa Nervosa (nee Taylor), Butthole Surfers, September 1985, just prior to the release of the band’s EP Cream Corn from the Socket of Davis
Obscenities, perverse humor, chaos, and bad taste are the ingredients for a live performance by this Texas band. Be sure and see them while in Amsterdam!
KLM in-flight magazine, early nineties
“It’s amazing, you light one guy on fire and he’ll follow you all around the country wearing his scorched jacket—try and get backstage and everything.”
Jeff Pinkus, bassist
“I do all our booking. It makes you better about getting the money when you’re getting it for yourself.”
Gibby Haynes, Butthole Surfers, September, 1985
Gibby: “Boy, am I tired.”
Teresa: “C’mon, let’s go.”
Gibby: “Yeah, yeah, we got a gig in Round Rock.”
Reporter: (incredulous) “You’re playing in Round Rock?”
Gibby: (leaving) “No, we’re staying with Teresa’s parents.”
Butthole Surfers, September 1985
“Oh no, no regrets at all. It took her about ten years, but my mom even says it now.”
Paul Leary, on the name of the band
Essential listening:
Hairway to Steven
Butthole Surfers/Live PCPEP/Brown Reason to Live
Further reading:
an Oral History of the Butthole Surfers from 1996 by Joe Nick Patoski and John Morthland