THE DUKE WATCHES
GG ALLIN & THE MURDER JUNKIES
"TERROR IN AMERICA"
GG ALLIN & THE MURDER JUNKIES
"TERROR IN AMERICA"
Happens to us all, man, each and every one. At some point in the
day-to-day, for whatever reason, everyone gets to feeling like
they're fed the fuck up, truth be told.
Maybe a fella’s been ignored a few more times than usual by the
lasses all gathered round the fag-machine. Maybe his jokes been
getting even fewer laughs. Maybe the woman he’s been busy falling
in love with just up’s and off’s and skidaddles out his life by way
of the American Idol voting public.
Look at him there, all weepin’. “She didn’t even get to finish her
song.”
Maybe work’s been suckin’ the colour out his balls and nobody gives
a rancid wank about some book he’s been writing on his breaks from
yonder labour.
Maybe he’s got Jenny Lewis in the ear-holes, those words all a-
quiver with frustration and resignation.
Maybe he’s sat on a park-bench watching the neon spray all
whisperin’ from twixt the legs of some bar cross the city, some red-
lit revue all sophisticated decadence, some slosh-fest he’ll never
be part of.
And he’s thinking; What I oughta do, what would make me feel alive
again, if only for a second, y’unnerstann, if only for half a
moment, what I oughta do is just take a big shit and then grab the
shit in my fist and then throw the shit at the face of some surfer
just happened to be there at the time.
Maybe I’ll wrap a flag round my nuts and then take it off my nuts
and then, and only then, take yonder flag and shove it right up my
arsehole till the fabric’s ticklin’ my liver.
Maybe I’ll sing a song about Bite It You Scum to the hoo-hah of a
lady all gothed-up and high on the filth-fumes round about.
Or fuck it, maybe I’ll just grab Terror In America – G.G Allin &
The Murder Junkies Live 1993, maybe I’ll just fling that in the ol’
discy-spinner-boxeroo and watch as G.G does all that so I don’t
have to.
He’ll be a tad disappointed, our hypothetical friend, he’ll be
mumblin’ himself to sleep all about “he didn’t shit even once” and
“not a drop fell out from G.G’s anus!”
Who knows why, who knows what crazy maniacal concepts led to the
decision, but for whatever reason, not once during the three shows
collected on Terror In America, flung shelve-wards by the wondrous
folks at MVD, not for a second does G.G decide to squat for a bit
and take a big ol’ cack right off the stage.
He’s also got a beer-gut could fell a council estate, s’no use
tellin’ us he ain’t got nothin’ wortha shittin’.
Sometimes he bends over like he might shit, but then no, teasing
you is all, like when Radiohead play the first few bars of Creep
and then plough into some insufferable tripe off of the last record
instead.
But look at that terrifying rage in the furthest corners of his eye-
holes. Think ye not that a shitless stage means a tame ol’ G.G.
When our pal wakes up from out his shallow slumber, when he danders
downstairs and, finding nothing better to do, flings on Terror In
America again, knowing what he knows about the absence of dung,
poop, messy, he’ll find himself staring with unfettered glee into
the very gaping willy-hole of pure nihilistic abandon.
Show One – Angry G.G
Asbury Park, NJ
Bruce Springsteen made a fine ol’ debut album all about Asbury
Park. Greetings From Asbury Park, he mumbled, telling us bout how
he “burst like a supernova” and “combed my hair, it was just
right.” G.G Allin, fresh out prison and playing live with the
Murder Junkies for the first time in 15 months, he ain’t got no
time to worry ‘bout hair or collapsing stars. Stalking the stage
with what looks like a surgical coat covering his white y-fronts /
thong get-up, he gets to quoting from a magazine article, some
observations on G.G from out Mondo 2000; “If you are a young gun
waiting to go off” he hollers, “G.G Allin will help you take aim
and fire. So that’s what I say to you. Take aim and fire.”
Take aim and fire. At what? At G.G, seems to be the crux of the
crowd’s understanding.
Still, ain’t no crowd in the here or there could mess with G.G any
worse or with any more vehemence than G.G messes with G.G.
Throughout Bite It You Scum, Look Into My Eyes And Hate Me, Take
Aim & Fire and Outlaw Scumfuc, G.G slices his chest with a crushed
can, smacks said aluminium off his head a couple dozen times,
climbs the speaker stacks, hangs from the rafters and head-butts
the very damn roof.
Blood gushes from the wounds in his scalp, horrible black globs
trickling down his jaws.
The audience applaud every thud of the microphone ‘gainst teeth.
G.G just glares, those eyes burning holes in that carved-up skull.
What’s going on in that carved up skull, a fella gets to thinking?
Even with the slashing and battering and the flailing, see, even
with the hollering and barking on ‘bout “I fuck all the prostitutes
I know / They tell me I smell like raw sewage”, even still, G.G
seems oddly restrained. Maybe that time in prison done shook him up
a tad with regards the old “action / reaction” shindig. Maybe he’s
contemplating the legal consequences of a kick to the face of a
stranger or a gobfull o’ shite spat at a lady down front.
Even Tiny G.G has remained behind that fetching undergarment, save
for a brief flash of pube (a fairly distressing development,
considering how clean-shaven Tiny G.G usually appears).
For a moment, just before Terror In America, G.G pauses, scans the
crowd. Who are these people, these folks who’ve braved any number
of Princes, Paupers and Beggars all hugging the streets of Asbury
Park for to make it here, to the Fast Lane, a tiny venue snuggled
‘midst those “flags of piracy”, that “countryside burning with
wolfmen fairies”?
“Everyone’s wrecked on main street from drinkin’ unholy blood”
Bruce had observed. These folks here, are they wrecked on the
unholy blood?
G.G leans over and punches a fella in a leather-jacket right the
fuck upside the teeth.
The crowd erupt with orgasmic euphoria. “Yeah!!!!”
Cause it’s just not a G.G Allin show if he’s the only one choking
on blood. Damn place spasms and shakes, all that tension, all those
verses that went past with not a solitary slap to a gig-goer’s
chops, they just served to make this one swift blow all the sweeter.
Look at them there, clamberin’ over one another in a frenzied lunge
t’wards G.G’s knuckles. C’mon then, y’big slab o’ toss, come swing
your fists o’er here, see what you get. What you’ll get’ll be a
kick in the lungs.
This delirious give and take ‘tween G.G and Audience, it lasts for
much of the reminder of the show.
Every now and then some brave soul’ll race for the stage,
testosterone bubblin’ in the hairs ‘tween the teeth, they got fists
raised and eyeballs clenched and heads throbbin’ with tension.
They'll aim a punch at G.G’s side, or arm, or arse, then sprint off
to the far wall before the mad fucker turns back to face them.
Most likely he’ll get them anyroad, most likely those feet gon’ hit
that fucker sometime or other before show’s end, most likely that
smug yap gon’ get fisted at some point.
Throughout the set a strange bond seems to develop between G.G and
a surfer-type stood at the front of the stage. Surfer Lad sometimes
participates in the shenanigans round about. Sometimes he’ll punch
or get punched, sometimes he’ll shove someone or yell about
“motherfucker”, but whatever he’s doing, Surfer Lad rarely leaves
his spot, even when everyone else has sensibly scarpered to fuck
since look there, that mad bastard’s comin’ at us with the fuckin’
drum-kit!
Surfer Lad looks like whatever’s going on in his head, it involves
him and G.G and nobody else. The only time he seems unsure of
himself is when G.G gallivants off on one of his occasional
dalliances to the furthest corners of the venue, kicking and
spitting and roaring at folks thought they’d be safe back here, way
over here by the exits in groups of twelve or twenty. During these
spells, Surfer Lad takes to head-butting the monitor in front of
him, again and again and again.
G.G and Surfer Lad got a weird connection goin’ on. Sometimes the
Messiah anoints the Disciple’s face with The Red, shoving his
bloodied scalp into the enraptured reveller’s yap. Sometimes G.G
punches him, and Surfer Lad retaliates, but it’s more flirtation
than anything else, a thread carried to some sort of conclusion
when the two passionately kiss for a moment, G.G then grabbing his
bud’s hair tween his teeth and tugging at it like a wolf tearing
the bollocks out a dead bull’s scrotum.
But for all the biting and kicking and punching, G.G has no desire
to hurt these people. Make them bleed and poke their eyes,
certainly, who wouldn’t? But without these folks he’s just that
gabblin’ hillbilly stood front that town hall audience way back
when, as can be viewed in Todd Phillip’s blindingly brilliant Hated
– G.G Allin And The Murder Junkies. Back then, nobody gave much of
a gypsy’s wank about this lunatic, this deranged schizo spouting on
‘bout “You cunt!” and “Fuck you!” and so on and so forth, there was
nothing dangerous about him, or at least no more danger than a man
might find in the actions of coked-up preacher stood naked in your
kitchen with a knife the size o’ Venus in his grip.
Here, though, with the likes of Surfer Lad and Leather Jacket Man
hangin’ on his every obscene sprawl, G.G means something. The whole
violent parade, it’s like sex-crazed stags butting heads ‘gainst
one another. For sure, they’re ramming skulls, but they’re the
same, those stags. They both got the same goal.
The audience shout “Fuck you!”, but they’ll also shout “You’re God!”
He’ll ask them to hate him, but he’s not beyond making a wee quip
now and again for to give them a chuckle.
“Jesus sucks dick!” one fella shouts.
“Well he fucked me in the ass, so you’re lucky” comes the click-
clack response from the stage.
G.G’s on the verge of taking whatever it is he does that bit closer
to the throb of popular culture. He tells the crowd all about how
they’ll be hearing a lot from him in the next few months, how he’s
gonna be on Jerry Springer soon.
(The Jerry Springer episode in question would’ve been a glorious
addition to this release, but, alas, no. The sight of Springer
chastising G.G for calling the audience “cunts” remains one of the
finest moments in all televisual history.)
This sense of purpose in his every shambling thrust, this sense of
anticipation, of something about to occur, it rises in sheets from
the gashes in his chest and has a man forgetting that G.G didn’t
even take a shit.
Who can notice anything of the sort, when our man’s all yacking off
along the lines of “This is not Lollapalooza!” and “This is the
real Rock N Roll underground! Not the frauds, not the phonies, not
the majors. This is a small crowd but we’re all winners cause no-
one else had the balls to come.”
G.G, however, has balls. Or one, at least, as is evidenced when he
starts tugging at the thong through Kill The Police and a nut gets
tangled up in the fabric.
G.G even comes back for two encores. “It’s against my better
judgement” he says, “But it is our first show in fifteen months.”
He gives an a-cappella version of I Live To Be Hated. “The band’s
not here, who the fuck cares?” Not these folks, that’s for damn
sure. Still, The Murder Junkies return to do it properly, G.G
flashes Tiny G.G a time or two, everyone cheers.
“We all stand as one!” someone announces.
“Will we” G.G muses. “I wonder…”
After all, weren’t none of these fools sat in that prison cell.
Show Two – Randy G.G
Atlanta, GA
In 1970, Kate Millet produced a piece of art called The American
Dream Goes To Pot. What it consisted of, you’ll be aware, was a
cage housing a toilet, which in turn played host to an American
flag. Millet was angry and disgusted and saddened by what she saw
going on round about her, and did what any sane individual would
do. She flung a flag in a toilet.
In 1993, G.G Allin was thinkin’ much along the same lines. He
arrives onstage wearing nothing save for a bandana and an American
flag draped over Tiny G.G. Throughout the set, he’ll pull at the
flag, set fire to it (even with Tiny G.G cowering underneath) and,
by way of extravagant finale, shove it right the hell up his arse,
right up, till nary a star nor stripe remains. Fumbling around up
there for a minute, he retrieves said item, waves it around and
then tries, unsuccessfully, to tear it in five.
This show, recorded on the fifteenth of May 1993, is by far the
most entertaining of the trio presented in Terror In America.
G.G hasn’t even crossed the stage before he’s punched someone in
the head, one of those punches has a fella recoiling from the
screen on account of the sickening crack done coughed out the
speakers. Later, he’ll hit someone so hard with the microphone that
the venue actually gasps as one, stunned by the gut-troubling thud.
A man might be shocked out his teeth, if G.G wasn’t such a lovable
scallywag.
Look at him there! All finger on lip and lookin’ over the shoulder
like some Hollywood starlet in a 1952 comedy concerning folks
getting into trouble in the workplace.
“Why you…”, you might say, shaking a finger and trying to hold back
that urge for to give the scamp a big ol’ hug.
Or maybe shove a groin in his face, as Gothed-Up Lassie stood
stage-right decides during I Wanna Rape You. G.G starts singing to
her boobs, licking and fumbling away, never missing a lyric, then
heads down south for to serenade the hoo-hah, as is almost
traditional for the performance of the number in question. She
dances on, waving her arms in filthed-mad delirium.
Earlier, during Bite It You Scum, G.G shoves the head of a lucky
lady under his flag for to get all acquainted with Tiny G.G. Then
another lady. Then a fella, who takes offence at this violation,
lunging away from the red, white and blue. Offended beyond all
sense, G.G punches the ungrateful wretch in the ear.
No such concerns with Gothed-Up Lassie, not for a moment will she
shy from G.G’s advances. He’ll return to her a few times throughout
the show, when he’s not throwing traffic cones at the punters or,
indeed, squatting over said cone and then sitting on it, pushing
down till it’s at least a good eight inches up his hole. He’ll shag
it for a moment, after.
Hardly surprising, given all this kissing and squatting and
sucking, that for a good two or three tunes Tiny G.G appears to be
in a state that can only be described as “erect”. The flag juts out
at all sortsa weird angles, kinda angles a fella might expect to
see on a fun-size flag draped down o’er a stiffy.
Who knows what sexual shenanigans would have resulted, had these
randy frolics continued?
No time for worrying about the in / out, though, not when there’s
fingers to be pushed up arseholes, or handbags to be stolen from
ladies in the front row, or, as happens fairly early on, bootlaces
to be tied.
And to think, the show almost didn’t happen.
When G.G takes the stage, after punching yonder fella, he sets
about inspecting the microphones. Seems some of them aren’t turned
on, or aren’t working, or some damn thing, so he sits by the drum-
kit refusing to sing a solitary lyric till someone sorts it out.
“I can sit here all night” he says.
Turns out “all night” means “couple seconds”, since he soon tires
of the charade.
Incidentally, the one mic he uses throughout, the one he derisively
confronts with a sneering “that won’t last five minutes”, it lasts
the whole show, even after it’s been smacked off heads and teeth
and shoved up arses and tossed into the crowd, given to a fella in
exchange for a baseball cap.
G.G gets the mic back, the baseball cap gets flung fuck knows where.
After the flag-up-arse episode, G.G bounds into the crowd, races
for the exit, and disappears into the night.
Show Three – Pyro-G.G
Austin, TX
There’s an old saying, possibly Italian in origin, that goes
something like this;
“Give a naked man some fire and most likely he’ll burn the fuck out
everything.”
Who knows what it means, but whatever it relates to, most likely
the audience at this third show, taking place in The 5th Street
Warehouse in Austin, Texas, most likely they nod like men possessed
when someone utters that oft-quoted homily.
“You’re damn right” they’ll say. “Sure as fuck that bare-arse
bastard’ll set the whole shebang aflame.”
G.G plays with fire plenty throughout the set.
Standing there with another flag covering his parts, with the white
coat from earlier hung o’er his back, G.G looks like the kinda
fella’s been itching to set light to something for a time.
Thank god there’s a candle lying behind a speaker, a candle which
can be lit, can produce flame, and can be used to ignite the
streams of lighter-fluid he sprays over the sundry cables littering
the stage.
The cables don’t seem too keen on burning, lit for hardly a second
before the flame disappears, and matters aren’t helped by some
fella at the front trying to punch our man throughout the procedure.
G.G swings at him, misses, and so sprays the interfering welp with
the lighter-fluid.
Through it all, as ever, the band play on. All the hits wheeled
out; Cunt Sucking Cannibal, Expose Yourself To Kids, Gypsy
Motherfucker, I Wanna Rape You. Never a beat missed, never a bass-
line fluffed.
Even when G.G’s vocals are lost to the roar of the crowd on account
of a microphone malfunction (G.G swung it at someone’s head, an
action which proved fatal to the equipment, if not the victim, who
just bounds off again whilst folks round about shout either “You
fuckin’ suck” or “You’re fuckin God” depending on the tune being
played at the time), even then they carry-on as if weren’t a damn
thing out of the ordinary going on.
And of course, there’s not.
In-between throwing chunks of the stage at folks and losing the
microphone for a couple minutes, G.G sets fire to the flag, then
his own head. Someone punches him during the latter performance,
extinguishing the flames, G.G reacting by diving off-stage and
smacking the fella in the jaw a time or two.
If a man can’t set his own head on fire ‘thout some motherfucker
interrupting, what the hell can he do?
Throw some cymbals at folks, that’s what.
The crowd here seem much more hostile to G.G than in the other two
shows. For sure, there’s always punching and kicking, but this
seems different, like they genuinely dislike him. You’d be a damn
fool to assume they won’t race towards the stage as one, shouting
about “You fucking pussy!”, then, hilariously, fall over themselves
to get away when G.G returns from off-stage with an armful of drum-
kit to throw at them.
The crew-members run around picking up stray hi-hats, the band
leave the stage, the camera fades to black.
The Bonus Shit
Music Video Distributors have already released what may be the
definitive G.G Allin And The Murder Junkies Live DVD Collection
Type Thing. Raw, Brutal, Rough And Bloody – Live 1991, is a blow-
your-brains-asunder masterwork. Wall-to-wall shitting, punching,
biting and flailing, and also, the live set back then still had
Hanging Out With Jim. Terror In America doesn’t scale those
depraved heights, although it’s still fairly fucking depraved. What
it does have, though, is some “Extra Bullshit You’ll Enjoy” flung
alongside the main events.
Three of these items are fairly useless. Some footage of the boys
in the recording studio, lasting just over a minute. A bit of G.G
getting his head tattooed. Some frolicking round the family pool,
in which G.G throws a woman into said water-hole, then laughs and
laughs as she accosts him along the lines of “Kevin!”
He throws her shoes in, later.
One of these pieces, however, is pretty fascinating, if slight. A
buncha footage recorded at an in-store appearance at Mondo Video in
Hollywood.
Here, he meets fans, looks over some of his old records (including
the classic You Give Love A Bad Name by G.G Allin & The Holy Men,
featuring such favourites as Scars On My Body / Scabs On My Dick
and Bloody Mary's Bloody Cunt), sees one of his own concert tickets
for the first time, and talks about Hated, which seems to be
playing on a TV set behind him. It’s a world away from the G.G
shoved a traffic-cone up his arse a few paragraphs ago. He seems
talkative, nice, even, although, disgustingly, he jokes for a
moment about one of the many sexual assaults he may or may not have
been involved in, a truly hilarious event, I’m sure we can agree.
Worse still, the woman working behind the till finds it just as
riotous.
In case you didn’t know, G.G Allin died in 1993, after an all-night
booze n’ heroin extravaganza. As Todd Phillips said regretfully in
the post-credits sequence added afterwards to Hated; “I had always
hoped he’d go out in a more glorious fashion. On-stage suicide,
five dead fans, something rock n’ roll could never ignore. Instead,
G.G Allin, Public Animal #1, died like a rock star, in typical rock
star fashion.”
Thanks folks
Hear what happened when The Duke encountered
G.G Allin’s ghost in Mondo Podcast #7!
Fling The Duke An Email or Sign The Mondo Guestbook
day-to-day, for whatever reason, everyone gets to feeling like
they're fed the fuck up, truth be told.
Maybe a fella’s been ignored a few more times than usual by the
lasses all gathered round the fag-machine. Maybe his jokes been
getting even fewer laughs. Maybe the woman he’s been busy falling
in love with just up’s and off’s and skidaddles out his life by way
of the American Idol voting public.
Look at him there, all weepin’. “She didn’t even get to finish her
song.”
Maybe work’s been suckin’ the colour out his balls and nobody gives
a rancid wank about some book he’s been writing on his breaks from
yonder labour.
Maybe he’s got Jenny Lewis in the ear-holes, those words all a-
quiver with frustration and resignation.
Maybe he’s sat on a park-bench watching the neon spray all
whisperin’ from twixt the legs of some bar cross the city, some red-
lit revue all sophisticated decadence, some slosh-fest he’ll never
be part of.
And he’s thinking; What I oughta do, what would make me feel alive
again, if only for a second, y’unnerstann, if only for half a
moment, what I oughta do is just take a big shit and then grab the
shit in my fist and then throw the shit at the face of some surfer
just happened to be there at the time.
Maybe I’ll wrap a flag round my nuts and then take it off my nuts
and then, and only then, take yonder flag and shove it right up my
arsehole till the fabric’s ticklin’ my liver.
Maybe I’ll sing a song about Bite It You Scum to the hoo-hah of a
lady all gothed-up and high on the filth-fumes round about.
Or fuck it, maybe I’ll just grab Terror In America – G.G Allin &
The Murder Junkies Live 1993, maybe I’ll just fling that in the ol’
discy-spinner-boxeroo and watch as G.G does all that so I don’t
have to.
He’ll be a tad disappointed, our hypothetical friend, he’ll be
mumblin’ himself to sleep all about “he didn’t shit even once” and
“not a drop fell out from G.G’s anus!”
Who knows why, who knows what crazy maniacal concepts led to the
decision, but for whatever reason, not once during the three shows
collected on Terror In America, flung shelve-wards by the wondrous
folks at MVD, not for a second does G.G decide to squat for a bit
and take a big ol’ cack right off the stage.
He’s also got a beer-gut could fell a council estate, s’no use
tellin’ us he ain’t got nothin’ wortha shittin’.
Sometimes he bends over like he might shit, but then no, teasing
you is all, like when Radiohead play the first few bars of Creep
and then plough into some insufferable tripe off of the last record
instead.
But look at that terrifying rage in the furthest corners of his eye-
holes. Think ye not that a shitless stage means a tame ol’ G.G.
When our pal wakes up from out his shallow slumber, when he danders
downstairs and, finding nothing better to do, flings on Terror In
America again, knowing what he knows about the absence of dung,
poop, messy, he’ll find himself staring with unfettered glee into
the very gaping willy-hole of pure nihilistic abandon.
Show One – Angry G.G
Asbury Park, NJ
Bruce Springsteen made a fine ol’ debut album all about Asbury
Park. Greetings From Asbury Park, he mumbled, telling us bout how
he “burst like a supernova” and “combed my hair, it was just
right.” G.G Allin, fresh out prison and playing live with the
Murder Junkies for the first time in 15 months, he ain’t got no
time to worry ‘bout hair or collapsing stars. Stalking the stage
with what looks like a surgical coat covering his white y-fronts /
thong get-up, he gets to quoting from a magazine article, some
observations on G.G from out Mondo 2000; “If you are a young gun
waiting to go off” he hollers, “G.G Allin will help you take aim
and fire. So that’s what I say to you. Take aim and fire.”
Take aim and fire. At what? At G.G, seems to be the crux of the
crowd’s understanding.
Still, ain’t no crowd in the here or there could mess with G.G any
worse or with any more vehemence than G.G messes with G.G.
Throughout Bite It You Scum, Look Into My Eyes And Hate Me, Take
Aim & Fire and Outlaw Scumfuc, G.G slices his chest with a crushed
can, smacks said aluminium off his head a couple dozen times,
climbs the speaker stacks, hangs from the rafters and head-butts
the very damn roof.
Blood gushes from the wounds in his scalp, horrible black globs
trickling down his jaws.
The audience applaud every thud of the microphone ‘gainst teeth.
G.G just glares, those eyes burning holes in that carved-up skull.
What’s going on in that carved up skull, a fella gets to thinking?
Even with the slashing and battering and the flailing, see, even
with the hollering and barking on ‘bout “I fuck all the prostitutes
I know / They tell me I smell like raw sewage”, even still, G.G
seems oddly restrained. Maybe that time in prison done shook him up
a tad with regards the old “action / reaction” shindig. Maybe he’s
contemplating the legal consequences of a kick to the face of a
stranger or a gobfull o’ shite spat at a lady down front.
Even Tiny G.G has remained behind that fetching undergarment, save
for a brief flash of pube (a fairly distressing development,
considering how clean-shaven Tiny G.G usually appears).
For a moment, just before Terror In America, G.G pauses, scans the
crowd. Who are these people, these folks who’ve braved any number
of Princes, Paupers and Beggars all hugging the streets of Asbury
Park for to make it here, to the Fast Lane, a tiny venue snuggled
‘midst those “flags of piracy”, that “countryside burning with
wolfmen fairies”?
“Everyone’s wrecked on main street from drinkin’ unholy blood”
Bruce had observed. These folks here, are they wrecked on the
unholy blood?
G.G leans over and punches a fella in a leather-jacket right the
fuck upside the teeth.
The crowd erupt with orgasmic euphoria. “Yeah!!!!”
Cause it’s just not a G.G Allin show if he’s the only one choking
on blood. Damn place spasms and shakes, all that tension, all those
verses that went past with not a solitary slap to a gig-goer’s
chops, they just served to make this one swift blow all the sweeter.
Look at them there, clamberin’ over one another in a frenzied lunge
t’wards G.G’s knuckles. C’mon then, y’big slab o’ toss, come swing
your fists o’er here, see what you get. What you’ll get’ll be a
kick in the lungs.
This delirious give and take ‘tween G.G and Audience, it lasts for
much of the reminder of the show.
Every now and then some brave soul’ll race for the stage,
testosterone bubblin’ in the hairs ‘tween the teeth, they got fists
raised and eyeballs clenched and heads throbbin’ with tension.
They'll aim a punch at G.G’s side, or arm, or arse, then sprint off
to the far wall before the mad fucker turns back to face them.
Most likely he’ll get them anyroad, most likely those feet gon’ hit
that fucker sometime or other before show’s end, most likely that
smug yap gon’ get fisted at some point.
Throughout the set a strange bond seems to develop between G.G and
a surfer-type stood at the front of the stage. Surfer Lad sometimes
participates in the shenanigans round about. Sometimes he’ll punch
or get punched, sometimes he’ll shove someone or yell about
“motherfucker”, but whatever he’s doing, Surfer Lad rarely leaves
his spot, even when everyone else has sensibly scarpered to fuck
since look there, that mad bastard’s comin’ at us with the fuckin’
drum-kit!
Surfer Lad looks like whatever’s going on in his head, it involves
him and G.G and nobody else. The only time he seems unsure of
himself is when G.G gallivants off on one of his occasional
dalliances to the furthest corners of the venue, kicking and
spitting and roaring at folks thought they’d be safe back here, way
over here by the exits in groups of twelve or twenty. During these
spells, Surfer Lad takes to head-butting the monitor in front of
him, again and again and again.
G.G and Surfer Lad got a weird connection goin’ on. Sometimes the
Messiah anoints the Disciple’s face with The Red, shoving his
bloodied scalp into the enraptured reveller’s yap. Sometimes G.G
punches him, and Surfer Lad retaliates, but it’s more flirtation
than anything else, a thread carried to some sort of conclusion
when the two passionately kiss for a moment, G.G then grabbing his
bud’s hair tween his teeth and tugging at it like a wolf tearing
the bollocks out a dead bull’s scrotum.
But for all the biting and kicking and punching, G.G has no desire
to hurt these people. Make them bleed and poke their eyes,
certainly, who wouldn’t? But without these folks he’s just that
gabblin’ hillbilly stood front that town hall audience way back
when, as can be viewed in Todd Phillip’s blindingly brilliant Hated
– G.G Allin And The Murder Junkies. Back then, nobody gave much of
a gypsy’s wank about this lunatic, this deranged schizo spouting on
‘bout “You cunt!” and “Fuck you!” and so on and so forth, there was
nothing dangerous about him, or at least no more danger than a man
might find in the actions of coked-up preacher stood naked in your
kitchen with a knife the size o’ Venus in his grip.
Here, though, with the likes of Surfer Lad and Leather Jacket Man
hangin’ on his every obscene sprawl, G.G means something. The whole
violent parade, it’s like sex-crazed stags butting heads ‘gainst
one another. For sure, they’re ramming skulls, but they’re the
same, those stags. They both got the same goal.
The audience shout “Fuck you!”, but they’ll also shout “You’re God!”
He’ll ask them to hate him, but he’s not beyond making a wee quip
now and again for to give them a chuckle.
“Jesus sucks dick!” one fella shouts.
“Well he fucked me in the ass, so you’re lucky” comes the click-
clack response from the stage.
G.G’s on the verge of taking whatever it is he does that bit closer
to the throb of popular culture. He tells the crowd all about how
they’ll be hearing a lot from him in the next few months, how he’s
gonna be on Jerry Springer soon.
(The Jerry Springer episode in question would’ve been a glorious
addition to this release, but, alas, no. The sight of Springer
chastising G.G for calling the audience “cunts” remains one of the
finest moments in all televisual history.)
This sense of purpose in his every shambling thrust, this sense of
anticipation, of something about to occur, it rises in sheets from
the gashes in his chest and has a man forgetting that G.G didn’t
even take a shit.
Who can notice anything of the sort, when our man’s all yacking off
along the lines of “This is not Lollapalooza!” and “This is the
real Rock N Roll underground! Not the frauds, not the phonies, not
the majors. This is a small crowd but we’re all winners cause no-
one else had the balls to come.”
G.G, however, has balls. Or one, at least, as is evidenced when he
starts tugging at the thong through Kill The Police and a nut gets
tangled up in the fabric.
G.G even comes back for two encores. “It’s against my better
judgement” he says, “But it is our first show in fifteen months.”
He gives an a-cappella version of I Live To Be Hated. “The band’s
not here, who the fuck cares?” Not these folks, that’s for damn
sure. Still, The Murder Junkies return to do it properly, G.G
flashes Tiny G.G a time or two, everyone cheers.
“We all stand as one!” someone announces.
“Will we” G.G muses. “I wonder…”
After all, weren’t none of these fools sat in that prison cell.
Show Two – Randy G.G
Atlanta, GA
In 1970, Kate Millet produced a piece of art called The American
Dream Goes To Pot. What it consisted of, you’ll be aware, was a
cage housing a toilet, which in turn played host to an American
flag. Millet was angry and disgusted and saddened by what she saw
going on round about her, and did what any sane individual would
do. She flung a flag in a toilet.
In 1993, G.G Allin was thinkin’ much along the same lines. He
arrives onstage wearing nothing save for a bandana and an American
flag draped over Tiny G.G. Throughout the set, he’ll pull at the
flag, set fire to it (even with Tiny G.G cowering underneath) and,
by way of extravagant finale, shove it right the hell up his arse,
right up, till nary a star nor stripe remains. Fumbling around up
there for a minute, he retrieves said item, waves it around and
then tries, unsuccessfully, to tear it in five.
This show, recorded on the fifteenth of May 1993, is by far the
most entertaining of the trio presented in Terror In America.
G.G hasn’t even crossed the stage before he’s punched someone in
the head, one of those punches has a fella recoiling from the
screen on account of the sickening crack done coughed out the
speakers. Later, he’ll hit someone so hard with the microphone that
the venue actually gasps as one, stunned by the gut-troubling thud.
A man might be shocked out his teeth, if G.G wasn’t such a lovable
scallywag.
Look at him there! All finger on lip and lookin’ over the shoulder
like some Hollywood starlet in a 1952 comedy concerning folks
getting into trouble in the workplace.
“Why you…”, you might say, shaking a finger and trying to hold back
that urge for to give the scamp a big ol’ hug.
Or maybe shove a groin in his face, as Gothed-Up Lassie stood
stage-right decides during I Wanna Rape You. G.G starts singing to
her boobs, licking and fumbling away, never missing a lyric, then
heads down south for to serenade the hoo-hah, as is almost
traditional for the performance of the number in question. She
dances on, waving her arms in filthed-mad delirium.
Earlier, during Bite It You Scum, G.G shoves the head of a lucky
lady under his flag for to get all acquainted with Tiny G.G. Then
another lady. Then a fella, who takes offence at this violation,
lunging away from the red, white and blue. Offended beyond all
sense, G.G punches the ungrateful wretch in the ear.
No such concerns with Gothed-Up Lassie, not for a moment will she
shy from G.G’s advances. He’ll return to her a few times throughout
the show, when he’s not throwing traffic cones at the punters or,
indeed, squatting over said cone and then sitting on it, pushing
down till it’s at least a good eight inches up his hole. He’ll shag
it for a moment, after.
Hardly surprising, given all this kissing and squatting and
sucking, that for a good two or three tunes Tiny G.G appears to be
in a state that can only be described as “erect”. The flag juts out
at all sortsa weird angles, kinda angles a fella might expect to
see on a fun-size flag draped down o’er a stiffy.
Who knows what sexual shenanigans would have resulted, had these
randy frolics continued?
No time for worrying about the in / out, though, not when there’s
fingers to be pushed up arseholes, or handbags to be stolen from
ladies in the front row, or, as happens fairly early on, bootlaces
to be tied.
And to think, the show almost didn’t happen.
When G.G takes the stage, after punching yonder fella, he sets
about inspecting the microphones. Seems some of them aren’t turned
on, or aren’t working, or some damn thing, so he sits by the drum-
kit refusing to sing a solitary lyric till someone sorts it out.
“I can sit here all night” he says.
Turns out “all night” means “couple seconds”, since he soon tires
of the charade.
Incidentally, the one mic he uses throughout, the one he derisively
confronts with a sneering “that won’t last five minutes”, it lasts
the whole show, even after it’s been smacked off heads and teeth
and shoved up arses and tossed into the crowd, given to a fella in
exchange for a baseball cap.
G.G gets the mic back, the baseball cap gets flung fuck knows where.
After the flag-up-arse episode, G.G bounds into the crowd, races
for the exit, and disappears into the night.
Show Three – Pyro-G.G
Austin, TX
There’s an old saying, possibly Italian in origin, that goes
something like this;
“Give a naked man some fire and most likely he’ll burn the fuck out
everything.”
Who knows what it means, but whatever it relates to, most likely
the audience at this third show, taking place in The 5th Street
Warehouse in Austin, Texas, most likely they nod like men possessed
when someone utters that oft-quoted homily.
“You’re damn right” they’ll say. “Sure as fuck that bare-arse
bastard’ll set the whole shebang aflame.”
G.G plays with fire plenty throughout the set.
Standing there with another flag covering his parts, with the white
coat from earlier hung o’er his back, G.G looks like the kinda
fella’s been itching to set light to something for a time.
Thank god there’s a candle lying behind a speaker, a candle which
can be lit, can produce flame, and can be used to ignite the
streams of lighter-fluid he sprays over the sundry cables littering
the stage.
The cables don’t seem too keen on burning, lit for hardly a second
before the flame disappears, and matters aren’t helped by some
fella at the front trying to punch our man throughout the procedure.
G.G swings at him, misses, and so sprays the interfering welp with
the lighter-fluid.
Through it all, as ever, the band play on. All the hits wheeled
out; Cunt Sucking Cannibal, Expose Yourself To Kids, Gypsy
Motherfucker, I Wanna Rape You. Never a beat missed, never a bass-
line fluffed.
Even when G.G’s vocals are lost to the roar of the crowd on account
of a microphone malfunction (G.G swung it at someone’s head, an
action which proved fatal to the equipment, if not the victim, who
just bounds off again whilst folks round about shout either “You
fuckin’ suck” or “You’re fuckin God” depending on the tune being
played at the time), even then they carry-on as if weren’t a damn
thing out of the ordinary going on.
And of course, there’s not.
In-between throwing chunks of the stage at folks and losing the
microphone for a couple minutes, G.G sets fire to the flag, then
his own head. Someone punches him during the latter performance,
extinguishing the flames, G.G reacting by diving off-stage and
smacking the fella in the jaw a time or two.
If a man can’t set his own head on fire ‘thout some motherfucker
interrupting, what the hell can he do?
Throw some cymbals at folks, that’s what.
The crowd here seem much more hostile to G.G than in the other two
shows. For sure, there’s always punching and kicking, but this
seems different, like they genuinely dislike him. You’d be a damn
fool to assume they won’t race towards the stage as one, shouting
about “You fucking pussy!”, then, hilariously, fall over themselves
to get away when G.G returns from off-stage with an armful of drum-
kit to throw at them.
The crew-members run around picking up stray hi-hats, the band
leave the stage, the camera fades to black.
The Bonus Shit
Music Video Distributors have already released what may be the
definitive G.G Allin And The Murder Junkies Live DVD Collection
Type Thing. Raw, Brutal, Rough And Bloody – Live 1991, is a blow-
your-brains-asunder masterwork. Wall-to-wall shitting, punching,
biting and flailing, and also, the live set back then still had
Hanging Out With Jim. Terror In America doesn’t scale those
depraved heights, although it’s still fairly fucking depraved. What
it does have, though, is some “Extra Bullshit You’ll Enjoy” flung
alongside the main events.
Three of these items are fairly useless. Some footage of the boys
in the recording studio, lasting just over a minute. A bit of G.G
getting his head tattooed. Some frolicking round the family pool,
in which G.G throws a woman into said water-hole, then laughs and
laughs as she accosts him along the lines of “Kevin!”
He throws her shoes in, later.
One of these pieces, however, is pretty fascinating, if slight. A
buncha footage recorded at an in-store appearance at Mondo Video in
Hollywood.
Here, he meets fans, looks over some of his old records (including
the classic You Give Love A Bad Name by G.G Allin & The Holy Men,
featuring such favourites as Scars On My Body / Scabs On My Dick
and Bloody Mary's Bloody Cunt), sees one of his own concert tickets
for the first time, and talks about Hated, which seems to be
playing on a TV set behind him. It’s a world away from the G.G
shoved a traffic-cone up his arse a few paragraphs ago. He seems
talkative, nice, even, although, disgustingly, he jokes for a
moment about one of the many sexual assaults he may or may not have
been involved in, a truly hilarious event, I’m sure we can agree.
Worse still, the woman working behind the till finds it just as
riotous.
In case you didn’t know, G.G Allin died in 1993, after an all-night
booze n’ heroin extravaganza. As Todd Phillips said regretfully in
the post-credits sequence added afterwards to Hated; “I had always
hoped he’d go out in a more glorious fashion. On-stage suicide,
five dead fans, something rock n’ roll could never ignore. Instead,
G.G Allin, Public Animal #1, died like a rock star, in typical rock
star fashion.”
Thanks folks
Hear what happened when The Duke encountered
G.G Allin’s ghost in Mondo Podcast #7!
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