SPIN
4/96
By: Jason Fine
TALES FROM THE CRYPT
Texas's Toadies master the art of darkness.
"KILL! KILL! SMASH those cheeseheads!" Lisa Umbarger, bassist for the Toadies, is up out of her chair, screaming at a TV tuned to the NFL playoff game between the Green Bay Packers and the Dallas Cowboys. The rest of the band-- singer/guitarist Todd Lewis, guitarist Darrel Herbert, and drummer Mark Reznicek-- appears slightly embarrased as Umbarger rants on. "I love the Cowboys," she says proudly. "We're out for blood today."
It's a fitting choice of words coming from the bassist of a band whose hit single, "Possum Kingdom," is a murky vampire's fantasy of seduction and murder. But then the Toadies have a taste for horror. Riding monster grooves that straddle the line between chugging '70s metal and fractured, Pixies-style postpunk, the band's breakthrough album, Rubberneck, is full of dark tales of abduction, murder, and self-immolation-- all set to some of the sweetest hooks of any hard-rock band around.
Veterans of the Dallas-Fort Worth club scene, the Toadies were formed in 1990 when Umbarger and Lewis met working at a Fort Worth record store. The son of a Baptist preacher, it's Lewis who brings the songs twisted characters to life with fire-and-brimstone fervor. "I wasn't even allowed to listen to the radio untill I was 13," Lewis says. "I was told rock'n'roll was Satan's music, so I guess some of that stuff comes out in my songs."
Just back from their first major U.S. tour-- a victorious 17-month voyage that began with the band crammed into a van and ended with a luxury tour bus and a certified gold record-- the foursome seems relaxed and easygoing, nothing like the psychopaths that populate their songs. Just don't tell that to the growing contingent of vampire-wannabes the band counts as fans. "Whenever we play in Florida, all these really pale kids show up dressed in black veils and capes with these fake fangs," says Umbarger. "It kind of freaked me out at first." Adds Herbert: "It's cool as long as we make sure not to let any of them backstage. The last thing we need is vampire groupies. That could be the end of us."
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