Take the Skinheads Bowling

"Take the Skinheads Bowling" is the signature song of Santa Cruz, California alternative rock band Camper Van Beethoven, written by David Lowery and released on their 1985 album Telephone Free Landslide Victory. The song (as covered by the band Teenage Fanclub) was notably featured in the Michael Moore documentary Bowling for Columbine, and received substantial airplay on KROQ, and BBC Radio 2, as well as The Dr. Demento Show. The song was also recorded by Welsh rock band Manic Street Preachers as a B-side to their 1996 single Australia and subsequently included on their B-side compilation album Lipstick Traces (A Secret History of Manic Street Preachers).

Contents

• Lyrics
• Track listing
• References

Lowery admits to being surprised by the success of "Take the Skinheads Bowling," stating on his blog:

I never thought that Take the Skinheads Bowling would become a Hit. If someone had traveled from the future and told me we would have a hit on our first album I would not have picked this song as being the hit. Not in a million years. I would have more likely picked Where the Hell is Bill.

Why? We regarded Take The Skinheads Bowling as just a weird non-sensical song. The lyrics were purposely structured so that it would be devoid of meaning. Each subsequent line would undermine any sort of meaning established by the last line. It was the early 80′s and all our peers were writing songs that were full of meaning. It was our way of rebelling. BTW this is the most important fact about this song. We wanted the words to lack any coherent meaning. There is no story or deeper insight that I can give you about this song.