Let There Be GWAR

by Bob Gorman (Compiler), Roger Gastman

Let There be GWAR will give fans the world over the most comprehensive guide to the greatest band ever created. Covering the beginning of time at The Dairy in Richmond, Virginia, where the band first met, to their spread across the land like a disease through the 1990s and 2000s, this book is a record and testament to all that is GWAR. Music changed when GWAR entered the arena with their intense performances of blood spewing nuns, ravaging stage shows and outlandish costumes, all while entertaining and awing the growing number of fans across the globe. Let There be GWAR takes you through the GWAR kingdom in photos, band posters, ephemera and interviews, chronicling their albums, comics and video in a blood-stained hardbound luxe book. GWAR fans, known as The Scumdogs of the Universe, will unite and delight in the wretched world of GWAR through the pages of this monstrous book.

Genres: Music

360 pages, Hardcover

First published September 14, 2015

Reviews

[Tom Schulte · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent layout and design by Roger Gastman and Leon Gonzalez really take this collection of GWAR history and ephemera compiled by GWAR insider Bob Gorman to a higher level. Images are on the page or adjacent page to relevant text and text fills pages exactly, with nothing dangling alone on a final page. This takes this history of the uncouth and many-membered costume metal space pantheon from its earliest days in Richmond, Virginia to the vista of a future sans deceased founding member and frontman Dave Brockie.

[Brad · Rating 5 out of 5]

I now know more about GWAR than I ever needed to and I was interested the whole time. The book is quite the historical document.

The only conceivable way a person would be disappointed with this book is if they wanted less detail or they wanted to know the intimate biographical details of the band members. That is not the book’s focus. GWAR is more than a band and a low-art stage show; it is an art collective sometimes referred to as “the Slave Pit.”

The only way I would improve the book would be to make it a complete visual, historical document including DVDs of their videos (or a single DVD documentary, like a video greatest hits), but I also realize that that is unrealistic. It would either shoot GWAR in the foot financially or make the book unmarketably expensive.


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I took copious notes:

1984: Hunter Jackson and Chuck Varga ask an existing band (theatrical punk band Death Piggy, fronted by Dave Brockie) to be in their 8mm space pirate movie Scumdogs of the Universe. (Both these filmmakers and the band used the dilapidated Richmond Dairy building as their studio space.) Jackson and Varga's aesthetic was anti-elitist art. "they got their real inspiration primarily from the lowbrow realms of comic books, KISS, and Dungeons and Dragons." (30) The plot was that the Scumdogs were sent to take over Earth, but get distracted by drugs, woman and rock music. The set was being built at the Dairy and quickly became dubbed the Slave Pit.
In Oct '84, Death Piggy had a notorious show at VCU's Shafer Court, an open0air performance venue on campus. The band handed out paper airplanes, bananas and whipped cream pies.
Mar '85: Brockie and co. borrow Jackson's costumes to open a Death Piggy show as GWARGGH in D.C. They decapitate a fake goat and fake blood ruins the 9:30 Club's monitors. This got both bands banned. At the second show, they staged a hanging, which almost kills Chris Bopst (bass), who later played Balsac Jaws of Death. Audiences seemed more and more drawn to GWAR than Death Piggy. They staged part of the Scumdogs script in Oct '85 and filmed it. They started adding more friends and characters to GWAR. In '86, a newcomer (Dan Drakulich, who later became Sleazy P. Martini) conceived of spraying blood onto the audience; the Drakulich played an excited fan who jumps onstage to meet the band and has his arm ripped off. Another Slave Pit member thought GWAR should have slaves onstage to aid in clean-up and dismemberment.
Leading up to the show, Jackson "filmed a wrestling-style TV commercial of himself dressed as Techno Destructo warning viewers of the local public access station not to go see GWAR unless they wanted to die a bloody death along with his mortal enemies." (53)
Gor Gor is created. Dave Brockie moves from guitar to de facto singer. Hunter Jackson is increasingly frustrated that the band has become more important than the Scumdogs movie. He pieces together the video "GWAR Must Be Destroyed." Halloween '86 at Shafer Court, GWAR debuts the Meat Grinder; people go in and meat comes out. Afterwards, Hunter quits and leaves town with most of the stuff he created; he is gone fort a bout a year. Next the band members who were in the Alter-Natives quit because the Alter-Natives were signed to SST, including Chris Bopst. In need of musicians, they ask a guy Bopst recommended: 17 year old scene veteran Mike "Beefcake" Bishop. One Slave Pit artist figured out that using old fire extinguishers could pressurize the liquids spewed at audiences. Jackson returns to film GWAR a bit. (This may be when he comes back for good?)
They release Hell-O and in Feb '88 have a wrestling show/release party.
By this point, the Slave Pit had relocated to 801 W Broad St. GWAR starts touring. They get Danielle Stamp to play GWAR girl; she makes the role more fleshed out by christening herself Slymenstra Hymen, complete with squirting crotch and fire breathing. The tour got them noticed; they even made the cover of Maximum Rock-n-Roll and Flipside. July '89 they have a notable MTV appearance. "Horror of Yig" was recorded for Sub Pop's Single of the Month, but GWAR bought it back to include on their next album. D.C. drummer Dave Grohl was invited to be their new drummer, but before he could, he's joined Nirvana. They get Brad Roberts, who creates (and is the only person to ever play) Jizmak Da Gusha.
In 1990, GWAR signs to UK's Master Records (US distributor Metal Blade). Shortly after Master went out of business, but not before they'd paid GWAR and distributed the record for a year. Then GWAR got to own their album free and clear!
p. 130 - They meet Al Jourgensen who wants to produce a song for them. Beforehand, he makes the group snort cocaine lines that spell out the word Fugazi, Jourgensen having recently recorded Pailhead with Ian MacKaye.
On their European tour, some shows were cancelled by protests because jokingly discount tickets were offered if kids brought their parents' severed heads. Brockie donned his costume and joined the protests.
Their second album Scumdogs of the Universe was released in July 1990.
The concert video Live from Antarctica was released, also in 1990.
Late 1990 brought the Tour de Scum, which introduced a new villain: The Morality Squad, a satire of Tipper Gore's group PMRC. (It featured the character Corporal Punishment.) They also wrote new songs for this that would later be on America Must Be Destroyed in fall '91. They also rebuilt Gor or for travel. On this tour Brockie is arrested for obscenity in North Carolina; police take Oderus's phallus--his cuttlefish of Cthulu--as evidence. (Some footage of the arrest would later be used in Phallus in Wonderland.)
At the end of 1990, GWAR was asked to appear in an MTV TV show (Idiot Box) and an Ethan Hawke film, Mystery Date.
Also in 1990, they have their first GWAR art show at Exile on Grace St.
A new home base was found on Chamberlayne Ave, 8 times the size of the previous one on Broad.
After that they asked the record label for money for a new film with budgets and sets. This was Phallus in Wonderland, which Brockie says may be the best thing GWAR ever did. Same plot as Tour de Scum. Nominated for a Grammy.
On May 15, 1992, cops shut down a show in Athens, GA prompting a group of students and the ACLU to fight a court case with GWAR for their rights having been violated. (The concert in question involved roasting a pig-masked police officer like a pig, a reaction to the Rodney King beating.)
GWAR was featured on Beavis and Butthead periodically and even were part of the plot for SNES's Beavis and Butthead video game.
Gwar fans are "bohabs."
Next tour was themes as Sleazy P. Martini's camPAIN for President in '92.
1994's This Toilet Earth (4th album) introduces the World Maggot. Skulhedface video ('94) features Sebastian Bach and Jello Biafra. The project's goal is to get it into the midnight movie circuit, but the project fails for having too many cooks.
Around this time, they had a side group called the X'Cops, but without GWAR costumes, audiences didn't even know it was a GWAr side band and simply hated the group for their cop attitudes.
Song "So Fucking What" receives a '95 Grammy nom for Best Metal Song. It was recorded on Ragnarok (album #5). For this album they blow most of the video budget on just one song "Surf of Syn," hoping in vain that MTV would be interested in the Godzilla-esque video. The second video "Meat Sandwich" was more slapdash; the title is a horrendous reference to holy communion.
In '95, they tour with Neurosis.
X-Cops headline in Europe on a surreal tour with a German white Body Count (Ice T's group that did "Cop Killer") cover band called Bronx Boys.
In the mid-90's, they meet two heroes: Alien (film) designer H. R. Giger and outsider artist Robert Williams.
Oct '96 - GWAR on Jerry Springer.
'97 album Carnival of Chaos was Dadaist in its embrace of all genres and ideas, but resulted in a bloated, often mediocre product.
The plot (which is on video as The Dawn of the Day of the Night of the Penguins (Nov '97) involved an army of toxic mutant penguins, a robo Sleazy P. Martini, mutant Gor-Gor, radioactive crack and more.
One member described them in this period as being self-parodying.

Slymenestra Hymen moves to L.A. continuing her Girly Freak Show and setting 3 Guinness Records, 2 for fire breathing and one for conducting electricity.
GWAR sometimes tried out new music around Richmond as costume-free RAWG.
With some members burning out or moving on, the Dave Brockie Experience was started, recording 2 albums and a live album from CBGB’s a month after 9/11 called Live from Ground Zero.
It was a silly ear for GWAR, including a talking toilet portal (a Portal Potty) and a Sailor Moon semi-homage wizard character with a penis-shaped head, Scroda Moon.
GWAR made We Kill Everything (1999), which is universally regarded as musically weak. People playing in GWAR wondered why they were choosing silly over quality. And it got harder to stay devoted in the same way when Rob Zombie and Marilyn Manson managed to be financially comfortable pursuing art with a similar style. They filmed “It’s Sleazy” which took a year to edit and would help result in Jackson’s final exit from the group.
With one album due to Metal Blade, they did one with just five musicians, their characters only (no extra characters), no plots…just songs about killing things: Nov. ‘01’s Violence has arrived. (8th album) “less goofy, more spooky.” Around this time, some line-up changes aided the more metal sound.
They lost their physical space around this time. Then VH1 included them in their “100 Most Metal Moments.”
New record: War Party (’04) on D.R.T., a political anti-Bush album. They did a video in Time Square in support. The tour had simplified storytelling: just straight up killing.
They revamped The Torture Cart, which acts as the bottom half of a victim spewing guts and such while a real person’s top half acts and such.
2005 – They get a new tour manager, Eddie “Dr. Evil” Oertell(?), who brings them to the next level professionally, figuring out how to make their live performances manageable and efficient. He gets them to play festivals.
Owing DRT an album, they record a live album in Pennsylvania and name it Live from Mt. Fuji, released May ’05.
They were on MTV’s Jackass spin-off called Viva La Bam.
Early ’06 – “Art of GWAR” show (p. 255)/ Around this time, mid-sized venues in Richmond started opening again, too.
Video: Blood Bath and Beyond (June ’06), sold 10,000, clip show of mixed footage billed as a goofy award show.
Next album was Beyond Hell, a Dante’s trip through hell lead by Jitler as guide (Hitler grafted to Jesus) and the people they meet.
Beyond Hell Tour ‘06/’07 – only time they played album start to finish for live show concept. It featured Nazi Pope.
A semi-truck hit their headquarters while they were on tour and some stuff was stolen, but not much. One new prop in 2007 was the severed head of Mr. Lordi from Lordi, a Finnish metal group that was vocal about their dislike of GWAR, that Oderus carried on a stick and talked shit about. It seemed to keep Mr. Lord Lordi quiet. Also on that tour, they were booed for including the VA Tech killer.
Some TV people came to GWAR in 2008 with a reality show concept.: GWAR franchises to younger musicians to tour on their behalf while the older GWAR members stay home. The twist is he younger musicians are scared of GWAR. Sony actually liked the idea, but would only it if they could also own the music publishing rights, GWAR declined.
2008 – Filed a lawsuit against D.R.T. for not paying them. Won, and won the full rights to those albums. Re-signed with Metal Blade. Then 2008’s Electric Dysfunction Tour, and intergalactic wrestling match, complete with video “backstage” footage. On the tour, they also gave a high school lecture; the school’s orchestra performed “Sick of You” to welcome them.
11th album, Lust in Space (Sept ’09) – GWAR leaves Earth only to learn that crack only exists on Earth.
IN Sept. ’09, Oderus Urungus became and “Interplanetary Correspondent” on Fox’s late night show, Red Eye. He was booted after GWAR started disemboweling Sarah Palin onstage.
They did a telethon online called the Crack-a-thon with guests, all to “pay Oderus’ drug bills.”
Then the second half of the band’s 25th Anniversary Tour.
12th album – Bloody Pit of Horror (Nov ’10) – no plot, all killing. “Litany of Slain” lists all the people GWAR have ever killed onstage.
Fall ’10 – Inducted into the Harvard Lampoon and appear on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. Invited back in ‘11/ Also the first annual GWAR-B-Q. Flattus Maximus (Cory Smoot), th main writer for the past 10 years died Nov. ’11, age 34. His character is retired. Enter Pustulus Maximus.
In ’12, Oderus was a character on a sitcom (cable and web) called Hollisham(?) as an imaginary friend to an aspiring horror filmmaker.
Did A.V. Club’s A.V. Undercover “Carry On My Wayward Son.” They were the last band with the last choice of cover. Then Riot Fest. ’12 and ’13 Fate or Chaos Tour plot – GWAR vs. God. (Zach Blair of Rise Against returned to record a solo as Splattus Maximus)
Sept ’13 – Battle Maximus album released. June ’13 played an Alice Cooper/Marilyn Manson show in Michigan.
Another A.V. Undercover: Billy Ocean’s “Get Outta My Dreams, Get Into My Car”
Feb. ’14 – lay Australia and Japan for first time ever.
Mar 23, 2014 – Brockie found dead from heroin toxicity. Age 50. It’s believed he was a dabbler, not an addict.
Private service on April Fool’s Day at the National. The 5th Annual GWAR-B-Q was also an Oderus Viking funeral.
Enter singer The Berseker Blothar, played by former Beefcake Mike Bishop, now a seasoned professor with a music PHD. Blothar’s an old, retired warrior who has to go to battle once again. Blothar has udders.
Enter Vulvatron Destructor, a cybernetic female assassin from the future with blood-spewing breasts
This line-up did A.V. Undercover 2014: Pet Shop Boys’ “West End Girls” with a Jim Carroll tribute to Brockie inserted in there (“People Who Died”).
GWAR Bar opened Dec. 31, 2014. And one member is working on GWAR-themed e-cigs.

[Ghouleh Slymenstra · Rating 5 out of 5]

This compendium of all things Slave Pit and GWAR was an historical treasure trove. Wildly informative, heartfully endearing and chock-full of great photos and poster scans, “Let There Be GWAR” is the perfect addendum to any fan’s collection this infamous shock rock band.

[Harrison Rip · Rating 4 out of 5]

This made me love GWAR and costumes more than before

[Benjamin · Rating 5 out of 5]

READ THIS! LIKE NOW!

[Scott Simmons · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great history of the band. I'm so glad the time and effort was put in to making something like this.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book for long-time fans of the band GWAR. Brilliantly produced, deluxe hardcover. High-quality all the way around, from the lenticular cover to the copious amounts of photographs, flyer reproductions, band posters, etc. The book covers the entire history of the Slave Pit art collective and the band, up through and including the death of GWAR's front man, Dave Brockie (Oderus Orungus), in 2014 and gives hope for the future of the band moving forward. GWAR can't be stopped! Long live Oderus Urungus and long live GWAR!