Butthole Surfers
Weird Revolution
(Hollywood / Surfdog)
By: Jeff Leisawitz - ModernRock.com
It may have been a good idea at the time but Butthole Surfers have had to live with their name for a cool twenty years. It just makes you wonder if the guys ever question the choices of their youth.
Anyway, 2001 sees the Surfers ninth long player, Weird Revolution, their very first release on Hollywood / Surfdog. After a messy legal situation with their former employer, vocalist/ madman Gibby Haynes and crew put down some cash on a pile of electronic instruments and a computer system. The resulting record is a genre splitting Texas cocktail that's salty as hell, kinda funny, and a little bit sweet around the edges.
Don't worry, the punk vibe is still alive and kickin' with these characters. Gibby wears a Hanson shirt and a cockeyed smirk on the publicity photo even as the band matures. There are also a few remnants of the big rock phase— mammoth guitars, wicked reverb trails, etc. But this disc largely pushes into fresh electronic territory that's only been touched upon before.
The title cut, "Weird Revolution," crosses a spoken word rant on the beauty of freakdom (and the eternal mission to shake up the mainstream) with an edgy loop method that's bound to make the rave kids nervous.
For the first single, "The Shame of Life," Kid Rock put up some of his special magic. The track immediately buzzed across the airwaves even before the album hit the streets. With its well documented hype and infectious hooks, this single rises as one of the disc's finest moments.
Other songs like "Dracula from Houston" and "Jet Fighter" weld the electro rock with the far corners of Gibby's strange mind. He's a serious wiseguy, and he's pretty twisted. He may not be bustin' bottles and dissin' the fuzz at every corner these days, but he's still got what it takes to piss off the man.
After two decades, Butthole Surfers continue to stir up trouble with Weird Revolution. Always pushing forward into new musical space, these guys are likely to lift off to a whole new level of popular success with this recording.
Viva la revolution!
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