Texas has created some vile frontmen, in addition to presidents and religious leaders. Whether it's the shotgun-shooting, dancer-fucking antics of Gibby Haynes, or the cookie-dough in butt-crack ball-mic-ing of David Yow, some sick fucks have led punk bands down South. None could be as psychotic as Bobby Soxx, though: Looking like an ex-con Buddy Holly after swiping Dennis Hopper's pill stash, Soxx was legendary even among the afore-mentioned gents, a guy whose idea of a joke is stepping in cow shit before he kicks you in the nuts. Anyone playing on the same bill as his notorious band Stick Men with Ray Guns were doubly fucked: Soxx was known to piss on bands mid-set (ask MDC), and-- as the photos here evidence-- cram the mic up his ass at the end of their set, guaranteeing that special "tossed salad" taste for the next group.

As their heyday was back in the early eighties, and they never toured outside their homestate, few folks ever got to experience the SMWRG shitstorm. Were it not for the Richard Hell/Thurston Moore project Dim Stars, you might never have heard their most nefarious song, Christian Rat Attack, which kicks off this crucial compilation, assembled by Emperor Jones.

Christian Rat Attack is a classic slab of early-eighties Texas pscyho-punk at its most hateful and despicable, finally available in its unedited glory. The Genesis opening lines culminating in "On the seventh day, God rested...his prick in Satan's butt" were mixed out of the version on the Cottage Cheese from the Lips of Death compilation by an offended producer. From their most infamous moment, the band lunges forth like an unholy zombie, lurching and screaming its rotting brains out, Soxx shredding his throat as he shrieks and sneers about hacking up nuns and priests.

The second song Grave City pounds even harder, way more brutal than the version that slithered out on the old A Texas Trip compilation from the late eighties. This 1982 recording lays out the blueprint for future Texas legends Scratch Acid, who even went so far as to take the graveyard theme for their own on The Greatest Gift. There's no way they can touch this version though, which is unmerciful in its dying animal howls and corpse-thudding bass hits (courtesy of Bob Beeman); Clarke Blacker's guitar fries like some methed-up Robert Fripp, spewing white-hot hate. Just as malevolent: Kill the Innocent, a sludgy mess of migraine drums, melted bass, and Bruce Loose-styled wails about wading through the minds of two glue-sniffing mass murderers from Houston in the early 70s. "Take 'em home and perform deviant death tricks/ Rape 'em, wrap 'em in a hefty bag/ Bury them all in an old boat shed."

From there the sound quality begins a slow descent into live boombox oversaturation, hiss, and generational loss. Due to their extremely confrontational behavior, Stick Men were not often asked to record, and aside from the aforementioned compilations, they never appeared on record. The remainder of Some People Deserve to Suffer culls most of its bits from shows on the brief Rock Against Reagan tour, even from the practice space as they hash out songs. As Beeman puts it in the notes: "We played music for people to feel, not to listen to."

Rather than coming across as a scrap heap of rehearsal tapes though, the songs are mixed into each other, giving off the vibe that you're actually there, at a shitty dive like the Ritz or Raul's, where the speakers are already blown anyway, and you're too fucking wasted on Lone Star and cross-tops to give a fuck. Even on the more juvenile, offensively-titled, parenthetical songs like Buttfuckers (Try To Run My Life), Nazi Cowboys (On Welfare), or Pee Pee in the Disco Mommy (I Gotta), the Stick Men are thorough in their groovy hate: Bobby Soxx channels bleak, black bile, Blacker's guitar slashes out with that serrated Keith Levene edge, and the rhythm section remains as sinewy and savage as Travis Bickle in the whorehouse. Truly abhorrent shit, Some People Deserve to Suffer renders similar relics like Generic Flipper or the Germs' GI into pleasant, light-hearted romps. Not a mean feat.

-Andy Beta, March 6th, 2003

© 2003 Pitchforkmedia.com - Review of Stick Men With Ray Guns' Some People Deserve to Suffer