Pontius Pirate

Every so often I go through a phase where I’m listening to a lot of pre-Independent Wormhole Saloon era Butthole Surfers. Such was the case when this 17-song slab-o-wax landed in my mailbox via Food Fortunata, the genius behind Ear of Corn fanzine. I promptly ripped this to MP3s so that I could listen to it while riding my bicycle. Wouldn’t you know it, it popped on one day and I was like, cool, Butthole Surfers, that should get me a few extra miles. A couple songs into it and I was like, wait, what is this again? Turns out it’s a trio of dudes—Poopy Necroponde, Teeth Aquariums and Food himself—known collectively as Pontius Pirate.

This is quite good; growing on me with each listen. Much like Pestilent Endeavors there’s a heavy dose of humor in the lyricism. And lot of the time the song lyrics are just straight-up narrations with little regard for the longstanding tradition of making sure the words rhyme. Other times the words rhyme but make absolutely no sense. Take the song “Wise Man” for instance: “I somehow caught AIDS from a pork chop and made my dad giggle and twitch but only Pete Marovich can get away with calling me a son of a bitch.”

They also clown on black metal with the song “What Would Black Metal Do?” which I love because, with the exception of maybe two bands, contemporary black metal is pretty goddamn boring.

7.0 / 10 — Nathan G. O'Brien