Smell the Glove (Polymer, 1982):
The band’s 14th album, rated B+ by Entertainment Weekly. The U.S. tour to support the album was the basis of Marty DiBergi’s documentary, "This is Spinal Tap." Also known as the Black Album after Polymer bowed to demands from retailers such as Sears and K Mart to block out the "sexist" cover. The original cover depicted, in the words of Polymer rep Bobbi Flekman, a "greased, naked woman on all fours with a dog collar around her neck, and a leash and a man’s arm extended out up to here holding on to the leash and pushing a black glove in her face to sniff it." The band had considered the cover a gag, with Ian noting that their original concept included something much more provocative than a glove. David: "You know, if we were serious and we said, ‘Yes, she should be forced to smell the glove,’ then you’d have a point, but it’s all a joke." Nigel: "It is and it isn’t. She should be made to smell it, but..." David: "But not, you know, over and over." After seeing the Black Album for the first time in Milwaukee during a sound check, the responses ranged from Ian’s "simple, beautiful, classic," to Nigel’s "It’s like a black mirror" to David’s "It looks like death" to Nigel’s "How much more black could this be? and the answer is ‘None. None...more black’ " to David’s "This is something you put around your arm. You don’t put this on your fucking turntable." Ian, nevertheless, declares the album as a "turning point." The black cover has often drawn comparisons to the Beatles’ "White Album," as well as their infamous "Yesterday and Today" butcher cover.
We are the children who grew too fast
We are the dust of a future past
We raise our voices in the night
Crying to heaven
And will our voices be heard
Or will they Break Like The Wind
We are the footprints across the sands
We are the thumb on a stranger's hand
We made a promise in the night
Swearing to heaven Is this a promise we keep
Or one we Break Like The Wind
Hey!
We are the guests who have stayed too long
We are the end of the endless song
We send our hearts into the night
Soaring to heaven
And will out hearts still beat on
Or will they Break Like The Wind
Ooh, Break Like The Wind.
We're taking a sophisticated view of the idea of sex:
Working on a sex farm
Trying to raise some hard love
Getting out my pitchfork
And poking your hay
Scratching in your henhouse
Sniffing at your feed bag
Slipping out your back door
I'm leaving my spray
Sex farm woman
I'm gonna mow you down
Sex farm woman
I'll rake and mow you down
Sex farm woman
Don't you see my silo rising high -
Big Bottom: Classic tune from 1970 album "Brainhammer"; later included on 1984 soundtrack. The band wrote the lyrics in 20 minutes (DV) to what has become Tap's most covered song, most recently by Soundgarden. Within weeks after its 1984 rerelease, the poetic yet disturbing lyrics "My baby fits me like a flesh tuxedo/I love to sink her with my pink torpedo" had become an anthem on elementary school playgrounds across the United States. Derek, on the song's effects on fans: "We got a lot of girls with big bottoms coming backstage. You get what you ask for in the world of rock 'n roll." (PE) Nigel, on the song's controversial lyrics: "It's not like we're saying women are this or women are that. We are merely making, if you like, a scientific study of the bun." David: "We do not consider the subject of this song a human being at all but merely part of one. That gives us license to be as free as we want." (SNL) In the exclusive "Talk With Tap" interview on the UK CD single of "The Majesty of Rock," the band went further, explaining that the song is "an ode to women." Nigel: "It's really our love of those creatures of the smaller version." David: "And the lower smaller version." Derek: "And the bigger, bottom part of their smaller version." David: "And just below the lower middle section of their person." Nigel: "Women will say 'Big Bottom' is sexist, but aside from women, who says it is what I'd like to know." In a 1996 interview, David explained the inspiration for the song: "I was dating a beautiful woman who went by the professional name of Lhasa Apso. Extraordinary beautiful...." Derek: "With one small exception." David: "But that exception was the inspiration. End of story." (AOL) Finally, here is why the song has so much bass. David: "All of us are great admirers of reggae music, and we all agreed that, you know, they all had this great kind of throbbing, pounding bass. It made the finest stereo equipment sound like it was broken, that's how great these bass parts were. So we just put as much bass as we could in this one, hopefully too much."