Butthole Surfers

[clarq...@gmail.com]

We saw the Butthole Surfers the other night at Asbury Lanes bowling
alley in NJ and it was amazing. This was the first show with Gibby,
Paul Leary, Jeff Pinkus, King Coffey, and Teresa in 17 years, so as a
huge fan I was absolutely thrilled. I saw them in Florida years
ago, at Jannus Landing in St.Pete and then at the first Lollapalooza
tour, but this thing we saw the other night was something else all
together - so, so bizarre, even for them. They had like 30
teenagers playing with them, rotating on and off the whole time -
multiple guitarists, bassist, keyboardists and drummers in different
combinations. The set list was pretty much what I'd have picked had
I been consulted - "22 Going on 23" with a interpretive-dancing
teenage girl smearing chocolate on her face, "I Saw an Xray of a Girl
Passing Gas", "To Parder" augmented by many several extra teen
guitarists, "Graveyard", "Sweat Loaf", that song on "Hairway to
Steven" with the bowling sounds (which was killer because they were
playing in a bowling alley with people actually bowling on either side
of the stage), "Moving to Florida", and much more. It concluded with
"The Shah Sleeps in Lee Harvey's Grave", at which time the whole
Greyhound-busload of kids were on stage, totally freaking out,
violently wrenching the strings from their guitars, knocking the gear
over, wrestling each other to the ground, screaming at the top of
their lungs, taunting the audience, stage diving, and pretty much
losing their shit for like 20 minutes while Gibby stood in the middle
of the stage, taking it all in, laughing his ass off). Quite a
spectacle. We were blown away. One of the moms we talked to told us
the kids were worried that die-hard B-hole fans would be pissed that
they were there, but for us it really enhanced the whole thing.
Wonderful and weird.
Here's a video of Gibby and the kids at Asbury Lanes without the other
B-holes earlier this year:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKDaX6UiqQQ
There were people at the show with video cameras, so hopefully some of
the show we saw the other night will be online soon. They are about
to go over to europe but then they'll be back in the States for some
east coast shows. If you are a big B.Surfers fan I'd say it'd be
worth the drive to Philly or wherever to see this show in person.
Remember, it's better to regret something you have done than to regret
something you haven't done. And by the way, if you see your mom this
weekend, would you be sure and tell her, SATAN!

[carlos]

Nice to hear that. I think. I saw the BS probably 15 times between
84 and 94 while living in texas, and they were really something to see
with that lineup. I had my mind blown over and over again by those
shows, especially when they were running the sex change operation
library films in the background. Never before nor since have i since
such a case of mass vomiting in an audience. closest thing to a brown
note i've experienced. now what i'd like to know is, did they push
and deconstruct the songs beyond all recognition like they used to? or
did they play them fairly straight from the record (as much as that's
possible with the BH)?

[clarq...@gmail.com]

The addition of the kids was the big X-factor in the arrangement of
the songs. Some of the overdubed parts from the records that were
left out for live shows in the past were played by the extra kids,
including some guitar harmony parts that I think were actually just
pitch shifted or harmonizers on the record. They also let the kids
rip a lot of solos, which were amazingly Leary-esque. We were really
impressed. The intensity of having that many guitars or whatever at
once was also a really cool effect.

[waxandwane]

here's a video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_mZeE4PJzs