The San Bernardino County Sun from San Bernardino, California • Page 32

'I D6 I ENTERTAINMENT The San Bernardino County Sun SATURDAY, August 10, 1996 Surfers riding an ebbing shock wave Video store industry may have maxed out Music By Andy Smith Knight-Ridder Newspapers Outrage is just business as usual for the Butthole Surfers. It's an attitude that extends right to their name. Whether it's the movies of genital surgery they've screened during concerts, or the genre-bending sonic weirdness, or the lyrics to ditties such as "The Shah Sleeps In Lee Harvey's Grave" and "Bar-B-Que Pope," the Surfers have never been your normal band, even by the very loose standards of alternative rock. Recently the Surfers created a stir by supposedly insulting an audience in Corpus Christi, Texas, that had been throwing objects on stage. "There are few experiences in life that leave one feeling as sullied as a spin through the grooves of a Butthole Surfers record," reports The Trouser Press Record Guide.

So it's odd to find them with a radio single off their current "Electriclarryland" album, a song called "Pepper." Over a hip-hop beat, head Surfer Gibby Haynes delivers a half-spoken litany of fatal events were all in love with dying that recalls punk poet Jim Carroll's "People Who Died." Then the song goes into a chorus that is actually very pretty. So has the mainstream finally caught up to the Butthole Surfers? Or have the Butthole Surfers caught up to mainstream? "I guess it was a very well-timed release," said a rather distracted Haynes. "We were always a half-cycle behind, or maybe we were a half-cycle ahead. Now the cycle has tightened, and for a little while we're right on top of it." The rest of the album includes the slamming punk of "Birds and LA," the odd "Jingle of A Dog's Collar," the pretty, countryish "TV Star," and the ill SkJLL i jlJLLjl 1996. Money from videos accounts for 57 percent of the movie business's U.S.

revenues and 50.3 percent globally. (Only 23 percent of U.S. revenues comes from theaters.) More people than ever are creating their own video libraries by buying videos, and sales spending is projected to surpass rental spending in 1996. Now, the bad news: Compared to 1994, 42 percent of video retailers say they are worse off now, 37 percent say they're the same, and only 21 percent say they're faring better. Rental spending dropped for the first time last year, and is projected to rebound only slightly in 1996.

And some inside the industry see the growth of the video-sales market as a negative. A recent cover of Video Software magazine asks the question: "Is sell-through killing the rental market?" The magazine's numbers show that video spending isn't a zero-sum game, that renting and buying go hand-in-hand. But others worry. Eves predicts that all this will transform the way video stores (the primary rental arenas) and retail outlets (where most sales occur) do business. Blockbuster and Wal-Mart are already testing a joint venture in Denton.

And he says more shelf space will be devoted to tapes for sale. What consumers probably won't see, Eves says, is a drop in prices for either rental or sales. With every penny counting now, video outlets will want to hold onto whatever they can. King Coffey, left, Gibby Haynes and Paul Leary, right, comprise the often irreverent rock band Butthole Surfers. By Beth Pinsker Knight-Ridder Newspapers When you go into a video store, you probably don't think much about the industry trends driving the business.

You just head for the new-release shelf and call it a night. From the outside, it seems pretty simple. Movies come out in theaters and then on video. With VCRs in 85 percent of American homes and few viable competing technologies, there's practically a captive audience. But not so anymore.

"What made video stores a get-rich-quick business in the past is that there was no competition," says Jeffrey Eves, president of the Video Software Dealers Association, which represents most of the nation's 27,000 video stores. "People with no experience could open a business and bring in money. My cat could run a good store." In the past year, the market has tightened. It is now what Eves euphemistically refers to as a "mature industry." Suddenly, video seems to have maxed out. The power and problems of the video business are remarkably clear in a series of statistical reports from the VSDA and several trade magazines.

Some highlights: Consumers rate renting a video as the best value for entertainment, above going to the movies, attending sporting events, pay cable or pay-per-view. Fifty-three percent of American households rent a video at least once a month. Total revenue from video rentals and sales continues to rise, to a projected $15.8 billion in Hm who has worked with hot acts like the Toadies and the Meat Puppets. Coffey has his own band, Drain, and runs a hip record label, Trance Syndicate. And Haynes plays with Johnny Depp in a band called and has worked as a disc jockey for an Austin radio station, where his outrageous musical tastes and blunt remarks (he called the station's playlist "puke chunks" on the air) made a powerful impression.

But an era when Perry Farrell titled an album "Noth ing's Shocking," can the Butthole Surfers keep on surpising, if not actually shocking, a jaded public? There was a lengthy pause at the other end of the phone. "Doing original music is surprising enough for most people," Haynes said. "The whole idea of (rock) shows is to be something of mystery flashing lights, darkness, loud noise, you're not really supposed to know what's going on it's an amazing thing to me, that we pull off shows at all." electronic blips and buzzes of "My Brother's Wife," a tale of forbidden lust foryou-know-who. "Let's Talk About Cars" consists entirely ofa conversation in French. This, by the way, is considered one of the band's most accessible records.

The original title of the album was to be "Oklahoma!" but the Surfers changed the title to avoid legal problems with Rogers Hammerstein, who wrote the Broadway show, and Capitol Records, the label for the Broadway soundtrack album. As it happens, Capitol is also the Surfers' record label. The Texas band was founded in 1981 by Haynes and guitarist Paul Leary. Haynes, believe it or not, was an accounting student at the time. In the pre-Nirvana era, before bands like the Surfers could count on major label support, they toured endlessly, releasing albums on tiny independent labels and building a devoted, if warped, following.

Haynes said that once the Butthole Surfers started, there was no turning back. "Maybe the very first song we ever did, 1 thought maybe we were going too far. I can't remember what it was but I remember thinking 'We've done it After that, there was no turning back." By the '90s, though, they had signed with Capitol, played Lol-lapalooza, and were considered pioneers of alternative rock. "Well, a lot of bands say we have influenced them, but I think it's in terms of the spirit, not the sound," Haynes said. "Very few bands would ever try to sound like us." By now, all three of the main Surfers Leary, Haynes and drummer King Coffey have their own projects.

Leary is a record producer TV PREVIEW 'M r2Sif Barry Corbin As Maurice Minnifield doing things," he tells Anne Osborne, a beautiful federal attorney, in a memorable line borrowed from the film. Remy's smooth, sexy style annoys, alarms and excites Anne, who is engaged to an environmental attorney in her hometown, Washington, D.C. In another scene, also true to the film, she tells him, "I've never had much luck with sex." Anne is in New Orleans to investigate illegal dumping in the bayou an opportunity for the show's directors to use stunning TV HIGHLIGHTS 'Big Easy' arrives as drama series on the USA Network Entertainment Tonight CBS News Special: Smithsonian Touched by an Angel Walker, Texas Ranger News 2KCBS 2 2 6 1 Current Affair Extra Atlantis: The Lost Continent World's Greatest Magic II News 4 KNBC 4 4 4 Captain America Hercules: The Legendary Journeys Xena: Warrior Princess INews I Sportspage Coach 5KTLA 15 j5 Jeopardy! I Wheel of Second Noah Gregory K. ('93 Joseph Gordon-Levin, Bill Smitrovich. News 7KABC 7 7 7 Fortune Rescue 911 Inside Edition News 7ie Homing Alter ('86) Jane Fonda, Jeff Bridges.

-NlghtEyts 9KCAL 9 9 9 3 NFL Preseason Football Cop! I Cops Sightings INews Mad TV ii kttv ii ii ii (6:00) The Barbarians Tin First Deadly Sin ('80) Frank Sinatra, FayeOunaway. News Baywatch Nights 13KCOP 13 13 13 87) Chibimaruko I Yappari Sanma News Magazine I Soko Ga Shiritai lOshare Japan News I Kempo TV 18KSCI 18 18 Chan (6:30) Dos Ategns GaWlanas Al Fllo da los Machetes Roberto Guinar, La Tenia deli Miwrta Rodolfo de Anda, Program 22KWHY 22 22 17 Natciso Busquets. I Claudia Guzman. Pagado Race for the Presidency This Is America I Country Connection I Austin City Limits Historic Hotels 24KVCR 24 24 12 Nova Nature Pride and Prejudice ('40) Greer Garson, Laurence Olivier. fioodoya-28KCEI 28 28 8 Chios De Buen Humor con Sabado Sabado Gigante International Noticias 34KMEX 34 34 10 Gigante Carman I Pat Boone John Jacobs I Ron Luce I Real Videos I Del Way I Fire by Nite C.S.

Sussewell 40KTBN 40 SO I I I I las Calenfuras de Juan Camaney I Luis de Pandllleros, Oloi Muerte 2 Mario Almada, Boxeo Telemundo S2KVEA 52 52 16 Alba, Cesar Bono. Haul Beunfil. Hideyoshi I Horse Racing Paid Program I Mickey Mantle Story: Bigger Than Jackie Robinson Story I Paid Program 56KPOC 56 I Life U.S. Customs: Classified American Gladiators Outer Limits Tales-Crypt I Tales-Crypt Ent. Us Vegas 64KHI2 By Roberta Nelson TVData Features Syndicate The steamy, sultry city known as the Big Easy sizzles onto tele- visin screens at 9:59 p.m.

Sunday. Based on the 1986 theatrical release of the same name, "The Big Easy" premieres on USA Network as an hourlong drama series filmed entirely on location in New Orleans. "The city has kind of an underbelly and nether world, and that hasn't been portrayed in the past by films that tried to portray it, including (the film) "The Big Easy," says David Ross McCarty of Louisiana Locations, consultant to the film and the series. "We ask the locals, 'What is unique? Things that have never been seen? Neat little getaways that you know The sexy, sassy city famous for its wrought-iron architecture, cool jazz and hot Cajun food is as prominent in the series as the stars. "We're using all very realistic names, music, foods, beers and flavors; we'd use smells too, if we could do it," McCarty says.

Music Dixieland, blues and zydeco plays a prominent role. "The Big Easy" stays faithful to the original film, straying only occasionally to accommodate the series' storylines. Tony Crane plays Detective Remy McSwain, a charming womanizer who rarely goes by the book. "We've got our own way of photography of New Orleans' natural environment. Anne, played by Susan Walters, is as foreign to the hot, humid South as a Nordic ice queen.

She's even allergic to shellfish. Together, Remy and Anne fight crime in the Crescent City. That is, when the sexual sparks between them momentarily subside. Remy seems to be related to half the town the half he hasn't slept with. Wherever he goes, there is a cop who is his cousin, a woman from his past or a body whose face he recognizes.

"Remy McSwain never met a floater he didn't know," says his partner, Det. Darlene Broussard (Karla Tamburrelli), a former showgirl. Barry Corbin, who played Maurice Minnifield in "Northern Exposure," plays CD. LeBlanc, New Orleans' sheriff and Remy's uncle. While the CD.

LeBlanc character in the movie was corrupt (and killed off), the series' CD. is a wise counselor to Remy. What sets "The Big Easy" apart from other crime dramas is its strong identification with the people and places of New Orleans. From the funeral at the end of the second episode to the Mardi Gras beads hanging on Remy's bedpost, no one would mistake "The Big Easy" for a show set anywhere else. TALK KFI-AM 640 KCIN-AM 1590 KABC-AM 790 NEWSSPORTS KNNZ 540 KMPC-AM 710 KFWB-AM 980 KMEN-AM 1290 SPANISH KSZZ-AM 590 KPLS-AM 830 KCAL-AM 1410 KNSE-AM 1510 KSZZ-FM 97.5 OTHER LANGUAGE KFOX-FM 93.5 KLSX-FM 97.1 KTOT-FM 101.7 KCIN-AM 1590 KWQ-AM 910 KNX-AM 1070 KCKC-AM 1350 KLAX-FM 97.9 KWRM-AM ....1370 KDIF-AM 1440 KLVE-FM 107.5 KMAX-FM 107.1 B.B.

King: The Biues Summit Joe Cocker: Have a Little Faith Biography This Week Investigative Reports (Pari 2 of 3) B.B. King-Blues A8.E 33 36 31 Captain Hoiatlo Homnlomr ('51) Destiy Rldee Again ('39) Marlene Remember I Captain Horatio Hombhmei AMC 35 32 26 Gregory Peck. Dielrich. WENN ('51) (6:30) Video Soul by Request I Paid Program Paid Program I Caribbean Rhythms Midnight Love BET 50 43 24 Charles Grodin TimRussert Gerry Spence Rivera Live Cal Thomas I Al Roker I Charles Grodin CNBC 29 38 World Today Sports Tonight NewsNight I Style Sports Latenight Capital Gang Larry King 30 10 35 I Weekend (5:00) American Perspectives American Perspectives Public Policy C-SPAN 59 41 25 Movie Magic I Mysterious Daylight Robbery I Lizards of Oz I Wombats: I Justice Files Fangs! DISC 38 27 28 World Bulldozers MLS Soccer Baseball Tonight Sportscenter Baseball Tonight NR Yearbook Motorcycle Racing AMA 250CC. Sportscenter ESPN 12 6 36 (6:00) Fotow That Dream Support You Local GunRthter (71) James Gamer, The Swdomen ('60) Deborah Kerr, FAMILY 14 44 j2) Suzanne Pleshetle.

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(Live) I (6:00) KarataCop(92) Iron Heart ('93) Brilton Lee, Bok) Yeung. The King el the Klckbmen(m) hom TNT 16 30 34 Ron Marchini. Avedon. Hearts Adrift ('96) Scott Reeves, Sydney Penny. I Pacific Blue Weird Science I Weird Science I USA 53 8 38 to-Torn Petty: Take the Highway ISoulofVHl Top 10 Video Countdown Am.

Bandstand Sen Appeal Number Ones VH-1 320 23 I Baseball INews I Night Court Dog Oaf Altemoon (75) Al Pacino, John Cazak). Lifestyles WON 26 31 I (5:05 In Harm's Way ('65) John Wayne, They Wen Expendable ('45) Robert Montgomery, John Wayne. WTBS 10 29 37 Kirk Douglas. On your radio dial MUSIC: NOSTALGIAOLDIES KCBS-FM 93.1 KRLA-AM 1110 KMEN-AM 1290 KLAC-AM 570 KJQI-AM 540 KRTH-FM 101.1 KOLA-FM 99.9 MUSIC: NEW AGE KTWV-FM 94.7 MUSIC: CLASSICAL KCPB-FM 91.1 KUSC-FM 91.5 KKGO-FM 105.1 MUSIC: JAZZBIG BAND KLON-FM 88.1 KUOR-FM 89.1 KSBR-FM 88.5 KBOB-FM 98.3 MUSIC: EASY LISTENING MUSIC: ADULT CONTEMPORARY KZXY-AM 960 KBPK-FM 90.1 KRXV-FM 98.1 KATY-FM 101.3 KZXY-FM 102.3 KWQ-FM 103.1 KHSJ-AM 1320 KDUC-FM 94.3 KXEZ-FM 98.7 KIIS-FM 102.7 KOST-FM 103.5 KBIG-FM 104.3 MUSIC: COUNTRY KOOJ-FM 92.7 KFRG-FM 95.1 KATJ-FM 100.7 KSZL-AM 1230 MUSIC: ROCK KAKT-FM 92.7 KZLA-AM 93.9 KHYE-FM 105.7 KHPY-AM 1530 KIIS-AM 1150 KSAK-FM 90.1 KLOS-FM 95.5 KISS-FM 102.7 KOCM-FM ....103.1 KROQ-FM 106.7 KNHS-FM 89.7 KCBS-FM 93.1 KEZY-FM 95.9 KCAL-FM 96.7 KQLZ-FM 100.3 KCXX-FM 103.9 1 6:15) (runaway 64) Amy of One 93) A trucker is framed lor the murder of a Wrtuai ComM ('95) Don "The Dragon' Wilson CINEMAX 28 57 20 PG-13' police officer. 'R' Ureal (HuppstCaV('81) Charles I MMrilgM Run ('63) A bounly hunter and an accused embezzler I Best of the Blues Brothers DISNEY 6 16 30 Grodin, 'G' I must duck the mob.

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