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Meat Puppets stage comeback

By Cara Jordan

FILE

Anyone who lived in Charleston in the early- to mid-'90s may remember the glory days of local radio station 96 WAVE. Well, the old 96 WAVE crew that produced the legendary free concerts known as Wavefest in the mid-'90s will be in full effect Saturday night at The Windjammer when Woodman Productions presents the Meat Puppets (pictured with former drummer Bostrom), with local band Red Handed opening.

It's been a rocky road since brothers Cris and Curt Kirkwood of the Meat Puppets started their punk-rock-gone-cow-punk band in the early '80s with original drummer Derrick Bostrom.

Throughout the band's career, the Meat Puppets produced a number of albums and gained notoriety, though the rise to fame was not always positive.

Formed under the hot Phoenix sun, the Meat Puppets rose to become a leading punk rock band under SST Records, along with other notable bands the Violent Femmes and the Gun Club. But with the development of its own style and musical attitudes, the band began to thematically transition into rock infused country with a hippie flare.

In an interview from the early years, Bostrom was quoted saying that the band was "so sick of the hardcore thing."

Perhaps more prolific in songwriting than musicianship, the Meat Puppets released a number of albums through the '80s and into the early '90s.

During the rise of alternative rock, the band reached its breadth when it began to tour with Nirvana in 1993. This culminated with the Kirkwood brothers' guest appearance on MTV's Unplugged with Nirvana. The brothers performed three original tracks from their album "Meat Puppets II" alongside Kurt Cobain.

Due to Cobain's participation in "Lake of Fire," the song became a craze with Nirvana and Meat Puppet fans alike. A few months after the performance, Cobain died of a drug overdose — a daunting omen for the future of the Meat Puppets.

In 1994, the band released "Too High to Die," which became the most commercially successful album of the Meat Puppets career and reached gold status.

Riding on the success of the newly released album, the Meat Puppets toured with Soul Asylum, Cracker, Blind Melon and Stone Temple Pilots. Though the band was rising to fame, the members, namely Cris, were spiraling downward into severe drug addiction.

After the tour with STP, Cris was so addicted to cocaine and heroine that he only left his house to get more drugs.

The Meat Puppets released "No Joke!" in 1995, but due to Cris' addiction, the band was forced to break up.

"My brother cost himself, me and Bostrom millions of dollars," Curt once said. "His drug abuse was this band's only catastrophe. The record company had big, high hopes for our last album, but when they saw the internal problems they decided to cut their losses."

"I don't really blame them," he continued. "It just got away from us because I wouldn't let him go."

In 1998, Curt formed a new band under the name Royal Neanderthal Orchestra, though the band's stint together was short lived.

The Meat Puppets remained apart until 2006, when the Kirkwood brothers joined drummer Ted Marcus for a reunion.

The new trio recorded and released "Rise to Your Knees" under Anodyne Records last month. Since the reunion, the Meat Puppets enjoyed the limelight when they played the famous Austin, Texas, festival SXSW in March. The band is currently touring up and down the East Coast.

The Meat Puppets will perform Saturday at the Windjammer. Tickets are $20 and available at The Windjammer or online at etix.com.