Why Butthole Surfers Are Turning Down Six-Figure Money to Reunite

In a time where bands make significant money to reunite, don't look for alt-rockers the Butthole Surfers ever to return despite "six-figure offers."

While the group is more than happy to revisit their past works through reissues, the thought of returning to the concert stage is something that's a non-starter for original members Gibby Haynes and Paul Leary.

Why Won't Butthole Surfers Be Reuniting?

Reflecting on their past with The Guardian, the duo recalled starting off more as an artistic project than a rock band, with their performance art making for wilder and wilder live shows increasingly fueled by excesses that admittedly got out of hand.

“We’re not as good as we could be today, and that’s because I lost my shit,” reflects Haynes. “I did too many drugs. I totally screwed up the deal. It’s my bad. It’s on me.”

Leary adds: “We were some genuinely fucked up people. We’re good people, but we’re fucked up – we’re damaged.”

When asked about the possibility of a reunion, Leary offered, “We’ve been getting six-figure offers to play live, but I just don’t want to do it. We’re really lucky to not be in prison and I don’t want to push that any more. I don’t want to be sending a bandmate home in a body bag or for a venue to burn down.”

Haynes, meanwhile, seems to have found happiness in having a family life after so many years on the road. “I have a 13-year-old son, who is the fucking light of my life,” he says, “I’ve got an actual family and it’s awesome. Little league baseball and middle school basketball? Dude, it’s the shit.”

About Butthole Surfers

As previously stated, being a rock band was almost a secondary thought for the group. “Our first couple of shows were performance art with music as a background,” says Leary. “We were more into the art side of it, and then music kind of took over.”

“We had no plan whatsoever,” he adds. “We were into dadaism and loved the random nature of how things turn out.”

"The whole thing was an attempt to get attention. We made art for money and attention,” adds Haynes.

While art played a part in the band's motivations, an audience eventually found them for the music as well. They were part of the inaugural Lollapalooza festival, and with the '90s alt-rock explosion, they finally cracked the Billboard 200 Album Chart with their sixth album, 1993's Independent Worm Saloon.

READ MORE: Whatever Happened to the Bands From the First Lollapalooza Festival?

Radio found them as well as they scored airplay for "Who Was In My Room Last Night" and topped the Alternative Airplay chart in 1996 with "Pepper" from their Electriclarryland album. Another song, "The Shame of Life," kept them on the airwaves into the early 2000s.

The group largely stopped touring after 2011, registering sole performances in 2016 and 2017. They've been on hiatus ever since, though they did issue a coffee table book reflecting their history titled "Butthole Surfers: What Does Regret Mean?" in 2019.

What Butthole Surfers Are Up To in 2024?

As mentioned earlier, the band is reissuing some of their music through Matador Records. The label has made served up reissues of their early recordings, Psychic .... Powerless ... Another Man's Sac, Rembrandt Pussyhorse and Live PCPPEP