Blood, Guts, and Pussy

September 17, 2012 8:24 AM

The Dwarves^NSFW have been playing their variety of shockpunk for more than 25 years. Their stage shows^NSFW and album covers^NSFW are infamous for their nudity, dwarfsploitation, and glorification of violence (though they only manage #8 on the list of 10 most offensive punk rock album covers of all time^{oh so very NSFW}). And yet, despite the fact that sock rock does not traditionally demand much musically, they are really frigging amazing^{SFW, SFW, NSFW}.
posted by 256 (27 comments total)

I have always loved that album cover.
posted by jessamyn at 8:28 AM on September 17, 2012 [1 favorite]

A lot of the links aren't working on my phone, but the ones that do bring back memories.
posted by Forktine at 8:48 AM on September 17, 2012

my pristine vinyl copy of blood guts and pussy is one of my most cherised possessions. i believe it still has the shrink wrap and price sticker from Schoolkids Records in Ann Arbor on it.
posted by spicynuts at 8:51 AM on September 17, 2012 [2 favorites]

FSFW...
posted by Devonian at 8:51 AM on September 17, 2012 [2 favorites]

I was pleasantly surprised that you could get "The Dwarves: FEFU" on Netflix. (Disc only).
posted by Otis at 8:54 AM on September 17, 2012

sock rock
posted by dephlogisticated at 9:09 AM on September 17, 2012

When I was in college and still living at home, I'd been given a subscription to the Sub Pop Singles Club... Receiving Blood Guts and Pussy in the mail was not easy to explain to my family, which even by 1990 saw records as outdated and couldn't understand why I'd want them anyway - nevermind one with blood drenched nudes on the cover.
posted by blaneyphoto at 9:18 AM on September 17, 2012

Vinal Edge, the best record store in Houston, introduced me to the Dwarves. Thanks, Chuck Roast. I'll always appreciate that.
posted by entropos at 9:25 AM on September 17, 2012

Never understood the draw. Every aspect of this band's aesthetic was done better by someone else.
posted by legospaceman at 9:43 AM on September 17, 2012 [3 favorites]

Awesome band and that is the greatest album cover of them all. The t-shirt with that image is a big winner as well with the back reading "Fuck you up and get high".

On a somewhat related tangent, the album at #2 on the list of offensive punk album covers has the terribly under appreciated track "Acting Like Black Sabbath" (@ 1:38), composed entirely of Black Sabbath riffs.
posted by BigSky at 10:10 AM on September 17, 2012

Hobbit Motherfuckers!
posted by J0 at 10:27 AM on September 17, 2012

In 1993, their guitarist faked his own death for several months. This got them dropped from Sub Pop, who were apparently not too happy to have sent out press releases announcing his death, followed by press releases announcing he wasn't actually dead.
posted by zombiedance at 11:03 AM on September 17, 2012

apparently not too happy to have sent out press releases announcing his death, followed by press releases announcing he wasn't actually dead.

I bet!
posted by jessamyn at 11:15 AM on September 17, 2012 [3 favorites]

So, despite being at work (I love sitting with a solid wall behind my back), I looked at the album covers.

And it made me realize how offensive has so many different meanings. The ones with the fetus or the sheep was pretty extreme, but the one that just imitated the cover of a bible? Maybe the Jesus-turds inside were more offensive, but I couldn't see even a very religious person (as I once was) getting upset about that.
posted by jb at 11:18 AM on September 17, 2012

Hah! I have posted this before, but in NME in 1992 I read a review of a Dwarves album that said, "It's as if someone listened to every punk record ever and learned all the wrong things."
posted by wenestvedt at 11:33 AM on September 17, 2012 [3 favorites]

In 1993, their guitarist faked his own death for several months.

All the links on the Dwarves' website in this episode's section of their biography are dead. Here's the Sub Pop press release on the hoax.
posted by BigSky at 12:33 PM on September 17, 2012

In 1993, their guitarist faked his own death for several months. This got them dropped from Sub Pop, who were apparently not too happy to have sent out press releases announcing his death, followed by press releases announcing he wasn't actually dead.

Judging by what I have just seen, he's still dead. What a fucking waste of humanity.
posted by Vibrissae at 1:04 PM on September 17, 2012

For quite a while I had the "Fuck You Up and Get High" button that came with the "Drugstore" single on my jacket. I used to stop at the same bagel place every morning before going to work at the record store and was always helped by the same very sweet woman who called me sugar and wished me a "blessed day" every single time I was there. One day I wore the jacket in without thinking about the button. She lit up when she a button with a saying on it and asked "what does your button say?". She leaned in, read the button, her smile disappeared, and I was never called sugar or wished a blessed day again.
posted by Slack-a-gogo at 1:56 PM on September 17, 2012 [2 favorites]

Every aspect of this band's aesthetic was done better by someone else.

What a fucking waste of humanity.

Heh.Your distaste just makes The Dwarves stronger.

And they're spreading their sickness to your children.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 3:09 PM on September 17, 2012 [3 favorites]

I was most offended by the Dwarves when I went to one of their shows and realized they had practiced.

Spectacular band none the less.
posted by I love you more when I eat paint chips at 7:29 PM on September 17, 2012 [2 favorites]

Thanks for this introduction, 256! Off to listen...
posted by IAmBroom at 8:24 PM on September 17, 2012

The time Dwarves played Call The Office in London Ontario, c. 1991, is the weirdest gig I've ever seen. I didn't know who the hell these guys were, and it was a weeknight and hardly anyone was there - 20-30 people standing around. Midwinter. Still, pretty much right away the singer dude, 'He Who Must Not Be Named', who was as freakishly white and hairless as a marble statue, had stripped completely naked. Maybe 20 minutes into the set, after some kind of back and forth heckling between the band and the crowd, HWMNBN threw the beer bottle he'd just drained at the bare brick arch above the mosh pit, where it shattered sending glass shards all over the room. And this long-haired guy at the front, I don't know who he was, picked up a piece of glass - I think it was one of those heavy chunks from the base - and just whipped it right back, where by some fluke it hit HWMNBN square in the neck. At first he was like, Yeahhh!, and they played on for a while but it soon became obvious that this wasn't just a nick - there was blood streaming down all over his chalky white body. So with like a 'Fuck Youuu, London' they disappeared to the Green Room upstairs. He must have had to go and get a bunch of stitches, but I don't remember seeing them leave. Anyway, that was some unforgettable, GG Allin type shit.
posted by Flashman at 8:36 PM on September 17, 2012

Incidentally the friend who persuaded me to come see the Dwarves that night had bought 'Frankenchrist' back when we were in Grade 10 in 1987; then he went and lent the poster to this Grade 12 girl who, iirc, never gave it back. I bet he's pissed, now that it's some sort of collector's item.
And No. 2 on that list, Feed Us A Foetus by Victoria BC's Dayglo Abortions is a actually pretty solid album. I even bothered to re-buy it when it came out on CD back in the 90s.
posted by Flashman at 8:52 PM on September 17, 2012

He Who etc was actually the guitarist- singer was Blag (Dahlia/Jesus/maybe other surnames.)

I knew them a little when I lived in SF in the early 90's, and have mentioned it before mainly to find some way to insinuate that Blag was a dick, which is pretty much obviously true. But they were actually pretty hardcore, in terms of being committed to going on tour, doing every drug available, and playing up-to-20-minute-long gigs (in which they'd maybe play up to 20 songs), which they considered to be successful mainly if cops/EMS/the crowd assaulting them or vice-versa were involved.

And I saw them at the 2010 FunFunFun fest, and they rocked the house! The songs are, as noted above, way better than they have to be, the band (of which I think maybe Blag is the only remaining member from when I knew them) were tight. There were all these like 14-year-olds crowdsurfing and stuff, which made me happy to see. It was a really fun show. Even though nobody ended up maimed :(
posted by hap_hazard at 11:03 PM on September 17, 2012

And the one positively heartwarming thing I can say about the Dwarves, is that a few of them lived in the same place, and the refrigerator was decorated w/ fan letters - some of them in pencil, probably written during detention or something- from kids who'd be like "I'm 13 and you guys, the Dicks, and the Queers are all I ever listen to! You guys are great!"

Always thought it was sweet that they were so proud of that.
posted by hap_hazard at 11:06 PM on September 17, 2012 [3 favorites]

Long careers nullify bands like this. Two albums, some singles, and then outta here. BG&P is just about perfectly offensive and catchy, as is much of what they did within a year or two of it. That they hang on in some form or another makes dilutes the magnificent shithead peak.
posted by bendybendy at 4:36 AM on September 18, 2012

I remember as a teen, drinking beers in the garden of my friends flat, listening to the dwarves, maybe a bit too loud. When the coolest neighbor ever, popped his head over the fence & asked if we could turn it down because his kids were playing on the trampoline.

We turned it down.
posted by Packed Lunch at 6:31 AM on September 18, 2012