Aside from having one of the best names in music ever, they also recorded a popular song from their first commercially successful album, Electriclarryland, that luckily fits the Halloween theme (kind of!*) while still having been released in the ’90s.
*Diseases are creepy and Halloween is creepy. Long before I could read, Gibby Hall and Paul Leary created a magazine with pictures of diseases and their own smartass descriptions. I wonder if I could find a copy. That would be hilarious.
Okay, Google failed me again but I found a Spin article from 1996 referencing Strange V.D.
Paul Leary – Gibby and I met in college. He was going to be an accountant and I was going to be a stockbroker. Gibby worked at Peat, Marwick & Mitchell for a short period of time–it was the biggest accounting firm in the world. We put out this magazine called Strange V.D. magazine, and Gibby left this picture of wildly mutated genitalia in the office copy machine and got reprimanded by one of the partners and it was downhill from there.
I came about a semester away from a master’s degree in finance. We’d start practicing and Gibby would come in wearing a suit and tie and strip down to his underwear as he was walking through the door and start practicing. It was a cool little routine.Jello Biafra – They really ought to resurrect Strange V.D. It’s the only fanzine I’ve ever seen devoted totally to fictitious diseases. Case number 36, tacoleg. Or blackbag or pinecone butt or several others. And there’d be pictures of people with distended intestines or huge gashes in their leg or whatever, with, of course, their own descriptions. Still one of the weirdest homemade zines I’ve ever seen in my life.
Anything Jello Biafra describes as “one of the weirdest _____ I’ve ever seen,” is something I want to see!
Video and Lyrics after the jump!
Butthole Surfers –Pepper:
Marky got with Sharon
And Sharon got Cherese
She was sharing Sharon’s outlook
On the topic of disease
Mikey had a facial scar
And Bobby was a racist
They were all in love with dyin’
They were doing it in Texas
Tommy played piano
Like a kid out in the rain
Then he lost his leg in Dallas
He was dancing with a train
They were all in love with dyin’
They were drinking from a fountain
That was pouring like an avalanche
Coming down the mountain
I don’t mind the sun sometimes
The images it shows
I can taste you on my lips
And smell you in my clothes
Cinnamon and sugary
And softly spoken lies
You never know just how you look
Through other people’s eyes
Some will die in hot pursuit
And fiery auto crashes
Some will die in hot pursuit
While sifting through my ashes
Some will fall in love with life
And drink it from a fountain
That is pouring like an avalanche
Coming down the mountain
I don’t mind the sun sometimes
The images it shows
I can taste you on my lips
And smell you in my clothes
Cinnamon and sugary
And softly spoken lies
You never know just how you look
Through other people’s eyes
(In Reverse:
I don’t mind the sun sometimes
The images it shows
You never know just how you look
Through other people’s eyes)
Another Mikey took a knife
While arguing in traffic
Flipper died a natural death
He caught a nasty virus
Then there was the ever-present
Football player rapist
They were all in love with dyin’
They were doing it in Texas
Pauly caught a bullet
But it only hit his leg
Well it should have been a better shot
He got him in the head
They were all in love with dyin’
They were drinking from a fountain
That was pouring like an avalanche
Coming down the mountain
I don’t mind the sun sometimes
The images it shows
I can taste you on my lips
And smell you in my clothes
Cinnamon and sugary
And softly spoken lies
You never know just how you look
Through other people’s eyes
This is some good shit right here.
this month is all topsy turvy
yep: AIDS & HERPES are still their problem!!