Music / Tales from the Punchbowl

It's alright... don't fear the worm...

Tales from the Punchbowl is the fourth studio album by the band Primus, released in 1995. After the big success which was Pork Soda, Les and Co. decided to go on another direction, covering more topics in the songs.

In 1996 it was re-released as an enhanced CD for CD-ROM, quoted from the back of the inlay of this version "Combining high end production values, 3-D graphics, spectacular effects and loads of insanely cool stuff". It featured an interactive and navigational sea with islands that correlate to the song.

The vinyl editions have two different covers than the CD edition, and either one is arguably less visually garish than the computer generated art on the CD edition. The original vinyl cover showed the band dressed as penguins and standing on an iceberg, while the newer vinyl edition is a photograph of a wooden carving of a toy captain commanding his toy ship.

Tracklist:

1. "Professor Nutbutter's House of Treats" (7:12)
2. "Mrs. Blaileen" (3:19)
3. "Wynona's Big Brown Beaver" (4:24)
4. "Southbound Pachyderm" (6:21)
5. "Space Farm" (1:45)
6. "Year of the Parrot" (5:45)
7. "Hellbound 17½ (Theme From)" (2:59)
8. "Glass Sandwich" (4:05)
9. "Del Davis Tree Farm" (3:23)
10. "De Anza Jig" (2:26)
11. "On the Tweek Again" (4:41)
12. "Over the Electric Grapevine" (6:24)
13. "Captain Shiner" (1:15)

Personnel:

• Les Claypool – vocals, bass, six string bass, bass banjo, upright bass, fretless bass
• Larry LaLonde – guitar, 6-string banjo
• Tim Alexander – drums, drum samples

Tropebound Pachyderm:

• Almost Famous Name: Primus landed in a bizarre, one-sided feud with Dave Pirner of Soul Asylum in 1995, due to this album's absurdist single "Wynona's Big Brown Beaver". Les went to great lengths to point out that the song is not, emphasis not, about Winona Ryder - the spelling and pronunciation are different, not to mention the fact that the lyrics make no sense. Ryder didn't mind, but her boyfriend Pirner did, and even renamed one of his songs "Les Claypool's a Big Fucking Asshole" in concert. The correct title should have been "Dave Pirner Doesn't Know What the Hell He's Talking About".
• Butt-Monkey: Herb in the video for Wynona's Big Brown Beaver. Drawing a busted inside straight in the gang's poker game (in which Ler and Les both have four aces) is the least of it.
• Concept Video: "Wynona's Big Brown Beaver" and "Southbound Pachyderm" both have music videos that follow their songs' lyrics.
• Double Entendre: Subverted with "Wynona's Big Brown Beaver"; it actually is about a pet beaver.
• Drugs Are Bad: "On The Tweek Again":

  His name was Barrest Jeffries

  They picked him up twice

  For cooking up amphetamine

  Now he's on the tweek again

  Drinking county prune

  He doesn't mind so much

• Green Aesop: "Southbound Pachyderm" is about the declining population of pachyderm (meaning thick-skinned), even the music video has this, where a hunter tries to hunt an elephant but ultimately fails.
• Longest Song Goes Last: Inverted with "Captain Shriner" which is just 1 minute and 15 seconds, while the beginning track "Professor Nutbutter's House of Treats" is 7 minutes.
• Miniscule Rocking: "Space Farm" and "Captain Shriner" only last for a minute.
• Sadist Teacher: "Mrs. Blaileen", who controlled her classmates by using humiliation.
• Take That!: "Year of the Parrot" is a take on the music industry, and the plagiarism of it:

  Take a Zeppelin riff

  And you alter it a bit

  And make lots of money

  It's called plagiarism

  You want some of that cheese

  Just take a big ol' bite

  Careful not to choke on it please

• Uncommon Time: "Year of the Parrot" is in 7/4 time.