Locust Abortion Technician

Locust Abortion Technician was the first Butthole Surfers album not recorded in a professional studio. The band rented a small house in Winterville, Georgia, and bought an old Ampex eight-track machine and two microphones. Leary said the machine stood about seven feet tall, and that when they wrote a song they would switch it on and play. Without studio bills to worry about, they were free to experiment even more. The album marked Jeff Pinkus's debut on bass and the return of Teresa Nervosa on second drums, and it was the first to use Haynes's Gibbytronix vocal effects, heard on Sweat Loaf and Human Cannonball.

Several tracks carry their sources openly. The O-Men spoofs the band Omen and nods to Seattle's U-Men. Kuntz runs a Thai song, Klua Duang, by Phloen Phromdaen and Kong Katkamngae through Haynes's effects, and Leary said Haynes did not want it on the record but he insisted. Hay is a different mix of 22 Going On 23 played backwards at double speed, with cows from a nearby slaughterhouse. The cover painting, Fido and the Clowns, is by Arthur Sarnoff.

Reception

It appeared in the year-end lists of Melody Maker, NME and OOR, and in Robert Dimery's 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. Pitchfork ranked it 189 on its 2018 list of the best 1980s albums, saying "none of their albums captured that live insanity better." The Quietus called it the high watermark of their recorded work in 2017. Leary told the site it was one of the records he was somewhat proud of.