GG Allin - Freaks, Faggots, Drunks, & Junkies (Awareness Records, 1991)

By Class Warrior

I purchased this album almost twenty years ago. I remember the day I bought it - my brother came to Spokane to see me during my summer break from college. He intended to "smoke me out," as we described sharing burning cannabis way back then. Between two of our smoking sessions, we paid a visit to one of the local record stores. Back then (the early 1990s) I used to buy a lot of vinyl. I didn't have any punk rock friends, so all my purchases were hit and miss. I bought things based upon reviews in Maximum Rock 'n Roll, mostly. Sometimes they were right about an album, sometimes they were way off. Anyway, I bought this album while at the store. It had a big warning label telling the potential purchaser that it contained scandalous content, and that you shouldn't buy it if you were under eighteen years of age. No problem - I was twenty, I was sorta high, and I had some money. I had wanted to check out GG for some time, so I took it to the counter. The clerk gave me an "are you sure?" look, but she sold it to me. Maybe we listened to it while we got high, but I don't believe we did. My brother is not the GG Allin type, so I probably waited until he left to throw it on the turntable.

GG Allin was in the news right around when I bought this record. If you are not familiar with who this is, you might want to do an internet search. I will skip over his history for the sake of brevity, but I'm sure you will be entertained by his troubling tale. GG always talked about committing suicide on stage, but never did. He waited until he was done performing one fateful night to overdose on heroin. I think this happened in 1993, because I bought the record in the summer of 1994. (Don't ask me how, but I remember where and when I purchased every single record/CD in my collection, up until about 2005. Then I got too busy, I guess...) All the right people hated this guy, so I thought he might be on to something. I put the needle down and waited for the music to start....

Ugh! This sucked so bad! I got that sinking feeling in my stomach I always got (and still do) when I found out I'd thrown away good money on a piece of crap. It was so slow! And when the vocals started - this was the stupidest shit I'd ever heard! It was a collection of the most misogynistic lyrics I'd ever encountered. Throw in songs about drugs, masturbation, less-than-authentic tales of murder, and smelly butts, and it sounded like something a kid would write.

Wait a second...something that a kid would write? That gave me an idea! I bumped up the RPM from 33 to 45...

Hell yeah, it worked! Now, instead of GG and his backing "musicians" sounding like a slow, plodding bar band with an out-of-tune, no-voice dipshit fronting them, they were a fast garage punk group led by the angriest, most misguided, highway-to-hell prepubescent ever recorded! What sounded like the rantings of an idiot on regular turntable speed turned into almost-brilliant preteen invective. This kid is crazy! Hope his parents don't find out about this little project! I continued to listen, entranced by my disturbing discovery.

Probably the biggest highlight was the song "Last in Line for the Gang Bang," an almost unlistenable tune at normal speed. When you turn young GG loose...I can't even imagine a little boy even thinking about such things, let alone singing about them in such a crude fashion. I cannot quote lyrics from this song in good conscience, as this is a Wholesome Family Blog (and I don't want everyone to know that I've heard such things), but I'm sure you can imagine what someone would sing about in a song with this title. Stupidity turns into can't-turn-away shock and hilarity, all with the flick of a switch!

"Sleeping in My Piss" and "Anti Social Masterbator" (sic) are two more tunes that benefited greatly from taking a whip to the drummer and dosing GG's drugs with youth serum. Of course, when a kid sings about napping in his own urine, you might think you have a chronic bed-wetter on your hands. Nope, it's just little GG drinking too much again!

Drink, puke, pass out, I fuckin' do it every night.
I wake up in a pool of piss
Can't control my bladder or my alcohol appetite!

Here's another verse from the same masterpiece:

I drink so much whiskey, it saturates my body.
When I'm falling on the ground, I'm pissing on myself again...

Young GG needs some serious help. This need is evidenced further by the song "Dope Money:"

I'll steal for it
And I'll lie for it
I'll let you suck my cock for it (CW: how generous!)
I'll fuck you up the ass for it (CW: I don't think GG understands how this works...)
Just give me dope, give me dope money
So I can bang it up

If I could turn back time (thank you, Cher), I could warn young GG that he should stay away from the drugs. Then he could have lived on to produce some more female-hating castrato scuzz punk. We would all be, um, richer for this.

This album played at 33 RPM receives 1 punk point. I can almost guarantee you will not like it, nor should you. People love this guy - I don't understand it. If you want to rebel, try being a socialist or an anarchist instead. You'll be much more of a threat that way. Played at the neo-proper 45, however, it gets a full ten punk points on the first listen, then five the next. It eventually settles in at 2 punk points. The novelty wears off after a while, I'm afraid. And the lyrics don't get any smarter when a child sings them instead of a grown man who should know better.

This album makes buying a turntable worth the expense, though.