The Fugs
The Fugs are a band who formed in New York City in 1965 by Ed Sanders and Tuli Kupferberg, and who were joined later that year by Peter Stampfel and Steve Weber of the Holy Modal Rounders.
The band was named by Kupferberg who borrowed it from the euphemism in Norman Mailer's novel, The Naked and the Dead.
The Fugs were a satirical and self-satirizing rock band which performed at Vietnam War protests nationwide. The band's frank lyrics about sex, drugs, and politics aroused a hostile reaction in many quarters. One of their better known songs was an adaptation of Matthew Arnold's poem, Dover Beach. Another was a William Blake poem.
The Fugs played their "final" concert of the 1960s in 1969 at the Hershey Arena in Hershey, Pennsylvania with the Grateful Dead.
The Fugs reunited in 1984 with several performances at the Bottom Line in NYC.
A reunited Fugs are planning to tour in the fall of 2004.
Discography
- The Village Fugs (The Fugs First Album) 1965; rereleased 1966
- The Fugs (2nd album) 1966
- Virgin Fugs (bootleg) 1967
- Tenderness Junction 1968
- It Crawled into My Hand, Honest 1968
- Belle of Avenue A 1969
- Golden Filth (Live at the Fillmore East) 1970
- Refuse to Be Burnt Out (Live reunion) 1984
- No More Slavery (Studio album) 1985
- Star Peace (two disk set, an opera) 1986
- Fugs Live in Woodstock 1989
- Songs from a Portable Forest (best of 1980s reunions) 1992
- The Real Woodstock Festival 1995
- The Fugs Final CD (Part 1) 2003