Arguably one of the most notoriously named bands in rock history, Butthole Surfers made a career out of upending the establishment and irritating the easily annoyed. Their albums were abrasive yet tuneful, much like their live performances. Rising to the challenge of bottling these audible antics, Sunset Blvd. is prepping the release of Butthole Surfer’s third live album, ‘Live at the Leather Fly’ on May 9th, 2025. Unearthed in the archives of Butthole history, the 21-track performance’s origins are shrouded in mystery. The “where” or “when” it was recorded is debatable, but the band have created a mythos surrounding it. “Back in the ‘80s, Gibby Haynes, vocalist/guitarist used to fantasize about a nightclub called ‘The Leather Fly’. He wanted it to have a stuffed leather fly hanging in front of it,” reminisces Paul Leary about the illusory venue that this show was recorded.
The first single released from the set is the appropriately titled ‘The Annoying Song’. Premiered by Brooklyn Vegan, the song is a gritty and rhythmic banger, fueled by Gibby’s droll and distorted vocals, fed through a toy megaphone. Remembers Paul about the origins of the song, “We were invited to participate in the first Lollapalooza Festival in 1991. At some point of the tour Gibby got a hold of a toy battery-powered small megaphone that pitched his voice up,” he laughs. “He was annoying everyone within earshot backstage, speaking through it in a rhythmic manner. I found it hysterical enough to write music to it. That became ‘The Annoying Song’.”
Unpredictable, brash and, in typical Butthole Surfers’ fashion, so in-your-face that it penetrates your skull, their live performances pummel with the tight rhythm section of Jeff Pinkus’ pounding bass and King Coffey’s hale and hearty drums, Paul’s searing guitarwork, and Gibby’s frenetic and eccentric vocal stylings. Deeply gonzo and often psychedelic, their hallucinogenic-soaked punk rock is sludgy yet melodic, like a fudgesicle made of sewer mud and Belgian chocolate. It’s this gritty scuzz-rock that defined them and propelled their legacy far beyond the underground, even dabbling with Top 40.
But they never lost sight of what made them notorious. UK’s The Guardian described their live shows as “Nudity, raging fires, belching smoke, blinding strobes, nightmare-inducing surgical videos, fights and firearms: these are some of the things you may have encountered at a Butthole Surfers show while being pummeled by a squealing cacophony of acid-fried psychedelic noise-rock, as a man tripping wildly in his underpants screams at you through a megaphone.”
‘Live At The Leather Fly’ captures that grittiness, which The San Antonio Current likens to a “potent fusion of post-punk, performance art, Texas psych and theater of the absurd, cementing it as one of the era’s most enigmatic and compelling musical ensembles” and Rolling Stone hails as “the American underground’s most notorious live act, a nomadic carnival of terror.”
Kicking off with ‘Graveyard’ and its spooky guitar effects that launches into a sludgefest with Paul’s piercing guitars, slicing holes through the song’s heavy corduroy textures, ‘Live At The Leather Fly’ never lets up. From the Texas-punk stylings of ‘Gary Floyd’ to the discordant cacophony of ‘Bong Song’, to the fan favorite ‘P.S.Y.’, the 21 tracks of ‘Live At The Leather Fly’ is a perfect encapsulation of what made Butthole Surfers important in the first place: Grade A Texas-Sourced punk.
‘Live at the Leather Fly’ live album tracklist:
01. Graveyard
02. Dust Devil
03. Gary Floyd
04. 1401
05. Alcohol
06. Hey
07. Negro Observer
08. Human Cannonball
09. You Don’t Know Me
10. Some Dispute Over T-Shirt Sales
11. Bong Song
12. Blindman
13. Nee Nee
14. Too Parter
15. Dancing Fool
16. PSY
17. Booze, Tobacco, Dope, Pussy, Cars
18. Ghandi
19. Edgar
20. Fast Song
21. The Annoying Song
