Self-described industrial-jungle-pussy-punk, MSI is the only band I know of that truly deserves their own classification: they just don't sound like anyone else.
Mindless Self Indulgence is essentially the creation of James Euringer, or Little Jimmy Urine to his fans, the cute lead singer who writes all the songs and programs the beats and Atari sound-effects. According to Jimmy, "I was sitting around sucking some dick and I thought to myself, How can I use this skill to my advantage? And I realized-- the music business ! The rest is, as they say, history." 1
He's not big on straight answers.
So back in '97 or so, Jimmy released a CD called "Mindless Self-Indulgence", which was more or less a solo attempt to sound like Nine Inch Nails. The angsty and (relatively) long songs are:
- Unsociable
- Do Unto Others
- Bed of Roses
- Do Unto Others Part 2
- Kick
- Unsociable extended
- Kick remix
- Do Unto Others clean version
All things considered though, a damn good
album, although virtually impossible to find now. In my opinion, the man's a
musical genius. Anyway.
Jimmy decides to form a
band, but he ostensibly hates
musicians, so he recruits his friends instead;
Steve Righ? on the 4-stringed
guitar,
Vanessa YT on
bass, and
Kitty on a cute li'l
drum kit. With their
debut album "
Tight" (released April 20, 1999 on
Uppity Cracker, their own
record label) they achieve the
manic,
ADD, tempo-hopping
genre-blurring
tongue-in-cheek style that is characteristic of their sound. It's, well,
tight.
According to the band, "Tight" is "the sloppy, slapped-together, "actual" debut record. Rejected by roadrunner, discontinued cuz it's funny, hard to find cuz people hate us."
2 ("Tight" is now out of print and selling for exorbitant amounts of
money on
ebay) And the track listing IS:
- Grab the Mic
- Bring the Pain
- Tight
- Mindless Self Indulgence
- Diabolical
- Molly
- Tornado
- Daddy
- Pussy All Night
- Apple Country
- Dickface
- Bite Your Rhymes
- Hail Satan!
- ecnegludnI fleS SseldniM
MSI was signed to
Elektra at some point, and released their second album
Frankenstein Girls Will Seem Strangely Sexy under that
label February 22, 2000. FGWSSS features 30
tracks in under an hour in alphabetical order. The artwork was done by
Jamie Hewlett, the creator of
Tank Girl. The warning in the
liner notes is worth reprinting here:
You must listen to this album with your tongue planted firmly in your cheek. If you don't have a sense of irony, or you are a piece of shit bigot, or a fundamentalist anything, return this album immediately, don't come to our shows, don't wear our t-shirts. Fuck off. If you're a parent who neglects, beats, or doesn't show your child love, know that we don't condone violence so don't waste our time in court while you try to explain to a jury how our music made your "happy & normal" child into a deranged lunatic.
Thank You
In FGWSS, MSI's often silly and often acidic sense of humor is further revealed. It's doubly ironic that the plethora of
Hot Topic punks in the audience don't realize that their favorite band is making fun of them. The track list is:
- Backmask
- Bitches
- Boomin'
- Clarissa
- Cocaine and Toupees
- Dicks Are For My Friends
- F
- Faggot
- Futures
- Golden I
- Harry Truman
- Holy Shit
- I Hate Jimmy Page
- I'm Your Problem Now
- J
- Keepin Up With The Kids
- Kick The Bucket
- Kill The Rock
- Last Time I Tried To Rock Your World
- London Bridge
- M
- Masturbates
- Planet of the Apes
- Played
- Ready For Love
- Royally Fucked
- Seven-Eleven
- Step Up, Ghetto Blaster
- Whipstickagostop
- Z
MSI has developed a solid base of insane fans in part by touring with acts such as KoRn, Rammstein, Lords of Acid, ICP, and System of a Down. Jimmy has said "It's like the evil Grateful Dead. They follow us from state to state. I see the same motherfuckers in the front row every fucking night. They might as well be part of the band."3
MSI is infamous for their wild live act, which tends to feature gratuitous nudity (mostly Jimmy's) and outrageous antics, projectiles of cornflakes, twinkies, and bodily fluids, and humping of stuffed animals, audience members, and each other, punctuated by Jimmy's penchant for drinking his own urine and making out with the audience. Yes, in that order.
In 2001, Vanessa YT left the band, supposedly to become an astronaut, and was replaced by LynZ. Around that time as well, they got sick of being fucked over by Elektra, and extricated themselves from their contract.
Back on the Uppity Cracker label, MSI released "Alienating our Audience" in 2002 and launched their very first headlining tour of the same name. AoA is a live CD consisting of half new songs and half old crap:
- Tornado
- Thank God
- Two Hookers
- Revenge
- Molly
- Like Shit
- Diabolical
- Last Gay Song
- Rip Off
- Panty Shot
At the same time, Urine and Righ? released
The Left Rights, a joke
side-project which frankly sounds like it took half an hour to make. At any rate, the tour was a big success, selling-out
venues across the country--to the shock of the band members, who are extremely fan-friendly and often spend hours after the show signing
autographs and chatting with
groupies.
They've been getting quite a bit of press lately,
in spite (or perhaps because) of their refusal to actually answer questions or tell the truth. (For example, they told
Alternative Press, Feb 2003, that LynZ is Jimmy's little sister.
Most of the kids think this is bullshit.)
Mindless Self Indulgence is supposedly back in the
studio now, working on their fabled new album. Or maybe just setting stuff on
fire.
1. Stillman, Brian. "Mindless Self Indulgence" Revolver Mar/Apr 2003, pp72-76.
2. www.mindlessselfindulgence.com
3. Moose. "Mindless Self Indulgence" Outburn Apr 2003 (source of direct quote, although he said something similar to me in person months before this)