The Bloodhound Gang
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- This page is about the musical group. For information on the detective segment from 3-2-1 Contact see Bloodhound Gang (TV).
The Bloodhound Gang are an American post-grunge rock-and-roll band, originally from King of Prussia, Pennsylvania. The group formed in 1994 (see 1994 in music) and currently consists of Jimmy Pop Ali (born James Franks), DJ Q-Ball, Evil Jared Hasselhoff, Lüpüs Thünder and Willie the New Guy. Spanky G left in 1998.
Known for humorous, obscene, and often offensive, perhaps even zappaesque lyrics, the Bloodhound Gang is not afraid to make quips about taboo subjects from ethnicities to child abductions and incest in bizarre, stream-of-consciousness hip-hop influenced lyrics. A common theme in the band's lyrics are elaborate pop culture references, metaphors, similes and puns such as:
- "You came twice last year like a Sears catalogue"
- "Times New Roman, you know the type"
- "Like the Jim Jones cult, I'll take you out with one punch"
- "Let's do it like they do on the Discovery Channel"
Perhaps the group's best known hit is "Fire Water Burn" which contained the memorable chorus of "The roof/The roof/The roof is on fire/We don't need no water/Let the motherfucker burn/Burn motherfucker burn." (This lyric was not original to the group, but was borrowed from the 1985 hit "The Roof is On Fire" by Rock Master Scott and the Dynamic Three.) In 2004 it was featured in the film Fahrenheit 9/11 anecdotally as a song popular with American soldiers fighting in Iraq.
The band formed in 1994 and released the Dingleberry Haze EP, then signed to Columbia Records for the full length debut, Use Your Fingers. The album was a flop and the group lost their record contract but then signed to Geffen and released 1996's One Fierce Beer Coaster. "Fire Water Burn" became a major hit and enabled the band to record a successful follow-up, Hooray for Boobies in 1999. Hooray for Boobies included the hit single "The Bad Touch" which featured the chorus "You and me baby ain't nothing but mammals, so let's do it like they do on the Discovery Channel." Due to its happy melody and instrumentation the song is one of the most played songs in German Adult contemporary radio stations. Another popular song from the album is Mope, contemplating infinite boredom (and featuring a quirky middle cameo by a crack-smoking Pac-Man), and The Ballad of Chasey Lain chronicles a desire to perform anilingus on the porn star in question.
One more noteworthy song is Right Turn Clyde, that lifted/parodied the chorus from Pink Floyd's Another Brick in the Wall, Part Two and was omitted from the earliest pressings of the CD due to the band not getting clearance to use the refrain. Before the final song of the album (Along Comes Mary, which officially isn't about smoking pot) is a song titled A Lapdance is So Much Better When the Stripper is Crying, which amusingly parodies country music with a tale of a very perverse truck driver, set to an extremely primitive synthesized aural backdrop.
Because of the albums arguably sexually explicit content, two alternate versions were released. Both were simply titled "Hooray", and the album artwork was changed to that of a close-up of cow udders. On one version only the artwork was changed; on the other, all potentially offensive content was removed from the songs. This results in almost twenty full minutes of altered audio content.
The band was brought under fire by GLAAD after the release of the single "The Bad Touch" due to the accompanying video. The video depicted two effeminate Frenchmen feeding each other French fries, only to be knocked unconcious by the band members (using a loaf of French bread.) Detractors asserted that this image made light of homophobia and gay bashing. The band vehementantly denied that this was their intent, saying that "if anything, the video makes fun of the French."
In 2003, the band released a DVD entitled One Fierce Beer Run, which chronicles their One Fierce Beer Coaster tour of 1997. The band's next album, Hefty Fine, is due for release on September 13th. Its original title, Heavy Flow, was scrapped when it was noticed that fellow musician Moby had a song with the same name.
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Members
- Jimmy Pop Ali - vocals, programming
- DJ Q-Ball - turntables, vocals
- Evil Jared Hasselhoff - bass, backing vocals
- Lüpüs Thünder - guitars, backing vocals
- Willie the New Guy - drums
Former members
- Spanky G - drums
- Daddy Long Legs - vocals
- M.S.G.
- Skip O'Pot2Mus
- Tard-E-Tard
Discography
External link
- Official site (http://www.bloodhoundgang.com/)
- Lyrics Schmyrics page on BloodhoundGang.com (http://www.bloodhoundgang.com/lyricsschmyrics.html)