Genres Alternative rock Genre Alternative rock | Years active 1990s Record label Bong Load Custom Records | |
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Labels Bong Load Custom Records Past members Don Burnet (aka Dallas Don), Beale Dabbs (aka Frosting), Brandon Jay (aka Quasar), Jeff Watson Origin Los Angeles, California, United States | ||
Lutefisk was an American alternative rock band based in Los Angeles. It was active in the 1990s as part of LA's "Silver Lake" alternative music scene, during which time it released two studio albums on Bong Load Records and recorded a third unreleased record for A&M Records.
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History
Lutefisk's frontman, Don Burnet, was formerly the frontman of the band Plain Wrap during the 1980s, and led the band 3D Picnic from 1986 to 1992. Burnet had also played drums for Beck before becoming Lutefisk's guitarist. The founding of the band was related to the curing of a "premature midlife artistic crisis", faced by Burnet the age of 30. The name of the band refers to lutefisk, a dried fish dish prepared with lye of Scandinavian origin, which 'window of success' as a recipe is, according to Garrison Keillor's book Pontoon rather small. According to Burnet, the band's name is about playing pop songs hard to stomach.
Lutefisk released its first album, Deliver From Porcelain: Theme and Variations, in 1995 on Bong Load Custom Records. It was named the 10th best local album of the year by Mike Boehm in the Los Angeles Times. In 1996, Lutefisk performed at Lollapalooza on the indie stage.
They released their second and final album, Burn in Hell Fuckers, on the same label in 1997. Its name derives from a phrase the band's frontman, Don Burnet, wrote on the wall of their recording studio after it was robbed. Burnet wrote the phrase because he hoped it might scare away the burglars if they returned. Lutefisk recorded Burn in Hell Fuckers on a 4-track, which they wore out during the album's production. It received mixed reviews from critics, particularly pertaining to the band's cover of Wild Cherry's "Play That Funky Music". Critics who wrote favorably of the cover included Steven Mirkin, who praised the cover as "near perfect", and Curtis Bonney, who wrote that it "plunges into the radioactive whirlpool and comes out mangled, nearly (and hilariously) unidentifiable." Conversely, Randy Roberts said the band's decision to cover it "makes one question the band's musical judgment from the first note to the last." The album was awarded a three-star rating by Jeff Salamon, who described the album's sound as "a cross between the Grifters and Frank Zappa".
The August 2009 issue of Spin Magazine included Lutefisk in their article SPIN's 100 Greatest Bands You've Probably Never Heard Of.
Band Members After Lutefisk
Jeff Watson is currently Vice President of Interactive Marketing at Warner Bros. Records. Brandon Jay along with his wife Gwendolyn Sanford scored the music to season's 2-8 of the television show Weeds and the first two seasons of the Netflix show Orange is the New Black. Beale Dabbs produced Philadelphia artist Slo-Mo's first solo record Novelty and contributed production to his follow up My Buzz Comes Back. Beale also remixed songs by Mississippi hill country blues artist RL Burnside on his album "Come On In". The RL Burnside/Beale Dabbs song "Shuck Dub" was featured in the "The Sopranos" episode, "Another Toothpick". Dallas Don Burnet released a solo record titled L.A. Party in 2012.