Hairway to Steven cover

Hairway to Steven

Released

The songs on Hairway To Steven originally had only small stick-figure drawings for titles, but they were eventually titled in a more conventional manner. The opening “Jimi” is a nearly 13-minute showcase for guitarist Paul Leary’s post-Hendrixian wailing, as Gibby Haynes roars “What do you know about death? I am death” and the like in an electronically lowered voice. If you don’t listen to the lyrics, “Ricky” and “Rocky” (and “I Saw An X-Ray Of A Girl Passing Gas”) could almost be conventional college rock (as it was known back then), but “John E. Smoke,” with its dubbed-in applause and waves of post-Beat nonsense from Haynes, is the album’s moment of peak Butthole-ism, bafflingly hilarious while still obviously the product of people who know exactly what they’re doing.

Phil Freeman

Suggestions
Sun on Sand cover

Sun on Sand

Joshua Redman, Brooklyn Rider, Patrick Zimmerli
The Sky Below cover

The Sky Below

Miles Okazaki
Red Letters cover

Red Letters

Edward Ka-Spel
Live in Berlin ‘71 cover

Live in Berlin ‘71

Fred Van Hove, Han Bennink, Albert Mangelsdorff, Peter Brötzmann
The Peach Orchard cover

The Peach Orchard

In Order to Survive, William Parker
The Very Best Of cover

The Very Best Of

The Associates
1961 cover

1961

In the Nursery