Customer Reviews

Weird Revolution

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

How could the Butthole Surfers, the greatest post modern punk band in existance not change? Electric Larryland was the tolling funeral bell for the old Butthole Surfers sound. That album was inconsistant and scattershot, the Surfers obviously didn't know where to go. "Should we write songs with the old punk rock esthetic in mind, should we do pop music, WHAT!?!?" After all, how many ironic gross out guerilla punk songs with distorted gibbytron vocals can you do? How many times can you redo Psychic Powerless... or Locust Abortion Technician? At the time of Electric Larryland the Buttholes sounded bored with their old sound and clueless as to what direction they should take. And who wouldn't be? They'd taken their sound as far as they could and were obviously losing interest. So they took some time off, recorded an unreleased album, got kicked off their label and went back in the studio to record this, one of their most oddly accessible and forward looking albums in a decade. This is a Butthole surfers album to be sure, there's that Gibby sensibility to the oddball lyrics, there's still that Paul Leary guitar. But the music is not punk rock or rock anymore, rather the Buttholes are making semi-accesible electronic pop all the while subverting it to their own ends. The music is an ironic look at modern rock, contemporary conventions and a good humored swipe at electronica. Check out the ridiculous lyrics and twilight zone guitar on Intelligent Guy and tell me these guys want to be taken as "serious" pop musicians a la Britney Spears. Or on Get Down: "I mean get down get down get down get down, yee haw!" These guys are masters of the humorous and ironic piss-take. The idea of a band with the name of Butthole Surfers "selling out" is in itself ironic isn't it?

If they had continued to do the same thing as on Electric Larryland or Rembrant Pussyhorse they would have stagnated and it would have been false to the aesthetic the Butthole Surfers have always been about, which is to follow their own muse and subversive direction, fans are welcome along for the ride, or be damned. Personally I find the new direction to be refreshing and Weird Revolution to be the best thing they've done since Independent Worm Saloon. The one thing I can say about the Butthole Surfers is that they rarely been boring and they've never stood still. Only time will tell whether the Surfers have found a legitimate new direction for their music or an aesthetic dead end and I'll be there to find out.

In my mind there will always be at least two incarnations of the Butthole Surfers. The first is the twisted, drug-soaked noise rock of their earlier works, where Gibby's electronically altered voice was complemented by the frenetic guitar work of Paul Leary, joining together in a cacophony guaranteed to make even the most grounded curl up in the corner in a fetal position. This is the Butthole Surfers from the days of Rembrandt Pussyhorse, Psychic Powerless ... Another Man's Sac, or better yet, Locust Abortion Technician.

Then there's the newer Butthole Surfers, with Gibby rapping his now understandable lyrics over a highly electronic background, followed by a little guitar weirdness from Paul and a catchy chorus. This is the Butthole Surfers of Independent Worm Saloon, Electric Larryland, and, somewhat regrettably, Weird Revolution.

There's nothing innately wrong with the music on this new album. It's alternately catchy, fun, and humorous. However, it's lacking the very quality touted in the title--weirdness. At times it's easy to forget you're listening to those acid sweating guys from Texas whose live shows were as violently scary as they were fun to watch. Some songs on this CD could easily be confused with other alterna-rockers like (sorry Gibby) the Bloodhound Gang, who specialize in frat-boy rap-rock and, while clever, don't necessarily break any new ground.

If you've never listened to the Butthole Surfers and enjoy what passes as "alternative" music these days, you'll enjoy this album. It's got just enough edge to annoy your parents, enough rock to distinguish it from N'Sync, and enough electronics to make it danceable. If, however, you teethed on the Buttholes' more psychotic earlier offering, Weird Revolution is going to do nothing for you other than make you wish it were still 1985 (and that's a sad, sad thing to wish).

Gibby, Paul, Butt-heads like myself still have faith in you. Please, please take some more drugs and get back in the studio! We're jonesing!

Compared to other old-school BHS albums, I'd have to agree with the other reviews- that Weird Revolution is nowhere near as weird as Rembrandt Pussyhorse, or even Hairway to Steven. However, compared to the current grotesque crop of clone-heavy 98N'StreetBackSyncBoysOnTheBlock/BrittneyAguilera/etcAdInfinitum bubblepop that gets overplayed on every major US radio station, these guys are still the acknowledged masters of weird. Yes, they've traded in their hard grunginess for a little more techno polish- a trend that arguably started somewhere around Pioughd. However, they don't seem to have lost weirdness as much as gained technical sophistication. The main reason I'm writing this review is in response to that Bloodhound Gang comment. That was the cruelest cut of all, and for the record, the Bloodhound Gang wishes that they had as much creativity and style as Gibby & Co. I've been a Surfers fan for many many years- I even still have my original Cream Corn on vinyl! (Yes, kids- VINYL!)- and I was not disappointed by this album. Like any/every band, they have evolved throughout their long career- every album has been slightly more polished and produced than the last, and this latest is no exception.

YES, it's true that the Butthole Surfers never really took themselves seriously -- so why do people find it so hard to believe that they didn't take "Weird Revolution" seriously either?
The same goof-ball lyrics are still in place,just with a different sound to back them up. Honestly, I think the BH Surfers wear their techno/dance suit very well, especially considering that this album was released at the height of some of the worst pop music ever created (do I need to give names?). The BH Surfers keep it "weird", and try to break some new ground to boot...and it's really quite refreshing, especially when considering that some of the newest rock acts out there don't have this much originality by a long shot. So what are people complaining about?

If you like the BH Surfers, and you don't mind some electronic music, then by all means give this disc a shot. Don't expect the world of it, especially when compared to other Butthole Surfers releases, and then you'll certainly find yourself to be quite content with the outcome.

By the way,the major musical highlight on this album for me definitely has to be "The Shame of Life", a cool little ditty with some heavy guitars.

Electriclarryland was refreshing for me, because I was going through changes of my own that were somehow parallel to it. I've been a drummer in strange bands for over 20 years, but I've kept with music times, and really enjoy newer forms of music - namely electronically produced work.

With that album I was a little dismayed not to hear what I had been used to hearing from them, but I was very pleased after only a few listens. I've come to realize that you either change, or you stagnate. This too is change; fresh and dripping with another juicy placenta. good stuff.

People should face the facts: BHS hit their creative peak in the 80s with "Locust Abortion" and "Rembrandt Pussyhorse". It's a miracle none of them died of a drug overdose or wound up comatose vegetables and you can only run as fast and as hard as they did for so long before you tire out. It's unrealistic to expect a band as groundbreaking as BHS to keep breaking new ground again and again and again. with "Weird Revolution" they were trying something new and I respect them for that.

So what if this doesn't have the scary, nightmare vibe of their early stuff. I wish it did too, believe me. But I think that was a product of the chaotic, drug-induced flavor of the band at that time, and the guys are middle-aged now. Leary is mostly producing and the BHS went through years of exhausting lawsuits. You can't expect them to do the carnival-style concerts and Gibbytronix stuff forever.

I really don't like techno at all, but I do like this CD a lot. It's got a feel to it. It's far and away better than the wretched "Electric Larryland" and feels like it has the BHS stamp on it. The songs have a nice texture. Admittedly, the lyrics are silly in places, but lyrics have never been a BHS strong point. with their early stuff you usually could never even UNDERSTAND the lyrics because Gibby was mumbling them through a megaphone.

This is good stuff and it has some real beauty and seems to represent a more mellowed out Surfer period. Some of the stuff is pleasingly weird even though the CD has no real menace to it. But I think the menace came from the Surfers being young and insane. They're not so young anymore.

Back in the 1970s the brilliant LP-format comedy team Firesign Theatre ("Don't Crush that Dwarf, Hand me the Pliers", "How Can you be in Two Places at Once When You're not Anywhere at All", and "Waiting for the Electrician (or Someone Like Him)" all highly recommended, densely packed riffs on the times) released an album titled "Not Insane". Unfortunately, it wasn't, and the album was packed with bizarre noise and disjointed bits rather than being the virtually seamless constructions that had gone before. This signalled a general decline in their group's standards, though they did have at least one more ace up their sleeves in the 1990s with "Give Me Immortality or Give Me Death".

Similarly, "Weird Revolution" is simply not weird, no matter what the lyrics on the astonishingly juvenile first track may claim. And I don't know what could possibly be revolutionary about it, at least in any positive way.

I'm not one who takes issue with the band's experimentation with new styles over the last couple of releases, because bands that just keep putting out the same thing over and over again after twenty years are just one-notes in the final analysis (Kansas, the Eagles--who wants to be in that company?); however, there is a difference between what the band does with various styles on Electriclarryland, which is one of my favorite albums of the 1990s, and the horribly disappointing but mercifully brief effort that is Weird Revolution.

Whatever one may want to say about their previous two albums, both of them rocked damned hard when they meant to, and both even had interesting, melodic songs in a more contemplative vein. "Weird Revolution", on the other hand, is just a pretty bad album if you're a ...Surfers fan, and we can only hope it was done for reasons of some contractual obligation and that they'll start taking care of business again soon. Other reviewers' words to the effect that it's still better than 99 percent of what's out there these days are no excuse. Let's just hope this release doesn't signal a general decline to come...

I love the Butthole Surfers. I hate this album. It has almost no personality and every song sounds like a cynical attempt at radio airplay. Just because they had a freak hit with "Pepper", there is no need to put out a whole album of similar songs.
Even the packaging and website associated with this album are bland and tasteless. Please come back Buttholes. I will still buy your next album.

In this desolate landscape of overly commercialized young adult entertainment, which contemporary popular music has fallen into, this album rises above the rest.
OK so it is not the surreal, scatological, hard rocking redneck meets duchamp of the hey day of alternative music. But it comes close. that was then, this is now. We have a new Bush (Intelligent guy?)and the NASDAQ sank. MBAs are the new heros of the world, and artists and free thinkers follow the model of Hannibal the Cannibal, unless they get shot + run over in Genoa.
Anyway , before there was an indie scene or an alternative scene, there was hardcore and a weird band called PIL never officially released the album 'The Commercial Zone'.15 years later the Butthole Surfers have released their version of it.
As a reviewer said back then, music for dancing on your grave.
After many legal difficulties with Music Labels they let it out.
This is a brilliant pseudo sell out. The maintain their edge while moving forward in the post-electric-guitar-centered alternative scene. The best thing about it is that the wall of sound they used to create the old fashioned electric guitar + bass way, they do now with a variety of electronic sounds. They still overlay their (Gibbys voice)disdainful, ironic, sarcastic, cynical, sardonic, sick, filthy, funny, dissonant, noisy, hi tek, and musical tapestry of americanas underside. They got some great hooks, and undercurrents ranging from ZZTops late 80s guitar boogie to Becks sample collages. It reminds mostly of the widowmaker EP. Mexico, Get down, They came in, Inteligent guy are classics BSurfers. These guys are leaders, not followers. A lot of hard boiled old fans will cry out treason, but these guys are moving forward.

The Weird Revolution is the most recent/criticized studio album of the Butthole Surfers. I love the Butthole Surfers; they are my favorite band. I enjoy all their albums (except most of Pioughd) and love all the varieties of music that they make. It's easy to see why so many people have dismissed WR as being a sellout record, but it's not. In order for BHS to truly "sellout", they would have to change their name. And if you check out recent bootlegs, or went to a show, you would see that most of what they play is their old songs like Cherub. I've read an interview with them and they've said that ever since the early 90's they have always wanted to make a record called "The Butthole Surfers Buy a Computer". Well my friends, they made two of those (not counting the Jackofficers Side Project).

Unfortunately only one of them (WR) is available for everyone to buy. The original version of it was titled After the Astronaut on Capital Records back in 1998. Right before the album was about to be put into production Capital refused to release it because there were no "Peppers" on it. ATA could be considered the Rembrandt Pussyhorse art record of the 90's era in that it contains songs similar to Waiting for Jimmy to Kick and Strangers Die Everyday. ATA is only available in Promo Cassette form and rarely pops up on eBay. Fortunately I was able to find them all online and can now tell you the difference between WR and ATA.

After Capital denied the release of ATA, the BHS sued them for an "early release" from their contract and for the rights to the songs. BHS then moved to Hollywood/Surfdog Records, re-recorded 8/12 songs and recorded 4 new songs. They re-titled it WR and released it in 2001. ATA's version of the song The Weird Revolution was originally a Malcom X speech that replaced Black with Weird. Unfortunately Mrs. X didn't care much for the song and they needed her permission in order to get the song passed. The Surfers kept the idea of the song and redid the lyrics on The WR.

The Weird Revolution
1. The Weird Revolution 8/10: a goofy song/Intro.
2. The Shame of Life 9/10: I hate Kid Rock and he wrote about 3/8 of the lyrics. But the song is funny and is the only BHS song like this, so just listen and enjoy.
3. Dracula from Houston 9/10: People give this song crap all the time, but I think it's pretty good. Sure it's a pop song but they didn't sell out with this song or Pepper by making pop songs. Remember the song Hey? That was a Pop song too.
4. Venus 8/10: A strange techno driven pop acid song that is rather cherry.
5. S*** Like That 7/10: an acidy song that is humorous.
6. Mexico 6/10: A weird interlude song with bizarre lyrics.
7. Intelligent Guy 10/10: A really cool song, one of the heavier songs on the album.
8. Get Down 8/10: A really funky dance song. It's a bit relaxing.
9. Jet Fighter 8/10: A short song about a Pilot in the Gulf War. The end it pretty funny.
10. The Last Astronaut ?/10: Gibby pretends to be an astronaut in space who witnesses the destruction of Earth. Once again more of an interlude type song.
11. Yentle 2/10: what the hell is this? Boring Buddha techno music that makes me fall asleep. I practically skip it every time.
12. They Came In 10/10: This song is awesome. It contains a lot of layers. The actual song is exactly four minutes, but there is a small hidden thing at the end of the CD making it 22:21 minutes in length.

After the Astronaut
1. The Weird Revolution 8/10: Music-wise it's virtually it's the same except for slight differences and a flute at the end of the song. Vocal-wise; the lyrics are very different, it's the Malcolm X Speech and the voice also sounds noticeably different as if on a loudspeaker.
2. Intelligent Guy 8/10: change the overall sound a bit, remove the chorus and add acid guitar solos instead.
3. Jet Fighter: a clear difference, they redid the music for WR.
4. Imbuya 8/10: A very strange song, energetic, loud, weird Gibby lyrics, weird everything,
5. Mexico 6/10: I think that there is a very slight, noticeable difference. I think the WR version was remastered.
6. Venus 7/10: There are a few things different on this version than on the redone version.
7. The Last Astronaut ?/10: exactly the same except it has the hidden part from WR's They Came In as the end of the song.
8. Yentle 3/10: it's exactly the same just with the volume lowered. This one seems to fit more with the album which explains its rating difference.
9. Junky Jenny in Gay Town 4/10: a Rembrandt Pussyhorse filler type song. I think it's some French woman singing her name repeatedly. It's similar to Yentle.
10. They Came In 9/10: this song is very awesome, but it gets repetitive after a while. There is a version of this song on the Mission Impossible 2 Soundtrack that is 20 seconds shorter. It's very different.
11. I don't have a Problem 4/10: it's very similar to Strangers Die Everyday from Rembrandt Pussyhorse. All it is a few audio segments with a woman saying "I don't have a problem with any of it" and a guy saying "these girls, they got knives" and so forth. Accompanied with what sounds like acid bubbles and sound effects in the background.
12. Turkey and Dressing 10/10: Awesome punk song. A Great and unexpected way to close the album.

Artwork for ATA was paintings of Indians and Aliens. Since the Surfers left Capital, Capital stole the artwork and actually gave it to the band Marcy Playground for their Shapeshifter album.

Thatistheweirdrevolutionandaftertheastronaut. Iamtypinglikethisbecauseihavereachedmywordlimit. WRisnottheBHSbestalbum,bustenjoyitanyways,itwasanexperiment. ifyoucanfindthesongsfromATAthengoaheadandgetthemonthespot. Hopedthisreviewhelped.