SCUM OF THE SCREEN

Most of the songs on “grinding stripper rock” band Scum of the Earth’s upcoming release “Sleaze Freak” were recorded with frontman Riggs’ custom guitar that was inspired by “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.” The one-of-a-kind Fernandes Vertigo guitar is wrapped in real pigskin that’s been sewn together.

“I wanted it to look like Leatherface from ‘Texas Chainsaw Massacre,’ except on a guitar,” said Riggs, a former guitarist for Prong and Rob Zombie. “It also kind of looks like Freddy Kruger’s face.”

Riggs, who is also the owner and creator of a Lucite guitar filled with fake blood, said although his pigskin guitar has started to smell and is slightly rotting, he hopes to keep it around long enough to have various tattoo artists decorate it. So far, he’s had a skull and crossbones, and the phrase “fuck you” inked onto it.

“Sleaze Freak” is the band’s follow-up to the 2004 critically acclaimed “Blah...Blah...Blah... Love Songs for the New Millennium.” The album hits streets as a 13-song treat of shock-by-shock confessions laid bare and uncut, covering everything from sex, murder and mayhem to religion. Titles like “Bombshell From Hell,” “Devilscum,” “Death Stomp,” “I Am Monster,” Scum-O-Rama,” “Corpse Grinders,” and “Love Pig,” which features Myspace metal diva Metal Sanaz, give you an idea of what you’re in for with the October 23 release from Eclipse Records.

“I think a lot of bands wimp out on their second record, so I figured I’d do the exact opposite,” said Riggs, whose comrades in Scumdom are Brandon (bass, background vocals), Skylar (guitar) and Adrian Ost (drums). “(I decided to) make it as fucked up and crazy as possible. So far, everyone that’s heard (‘Sleaze Freak’) is liking it a lot better than the last one. There’s more energy throughout the whole thing.”

Like Rob Zombie, sleazy cinema plays a pretty big role in the music Riggs creates. Not only is his band named after a 1963 Herschell Gordon Lewis sexploitation classic, sound clips from old exploitation films have appeared in his work. “The Murder Song,” which features bits from 1974’s “Deranged,” is a perfect example. Scum of the Earth’s music has also appeared in the indie films “Dorm of the Dead” and “Devil Girl.”

So what are some perfect scum-of-the-screen Halloween party movie recommendations from Riggs? “Frankenhooker,” “Motel Hell,” “Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers,” “From Beyond,” “The Curious Dr. Humpp” and “Blood Sucking Freaks” top his holiday watch list.

Frank Henenlotter might be best known for his “Basket Case” trilogy, but for Riggs it’s Henenlotter’s 1990 horror-comedy “Frankenhooker” that gets his praise. “It has always been a classic to me,” Riggs said. “It’s a story of a mad scientist’s fiancé, who gets killed by a remote control lawn mower. The mad scientist then develops super crack that he gives to hookers that make them explode so he can build his fiancé back from hooker body parts. Then it starts getting really freaky.”

Fred Olen Ray’s 1988 “Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers” is another freaky favorite for Riggs. Starring Scream Queens Linnea Quigley and Michelle Bauer with Leatherface himself - Gunnar Hansen, “Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers” is a cross between horror, film noir and comedy with a private eye tracking down a runaway and getting mixed up with a cult of chainsaw-loving prostitutes. The movie offers lots of gore, some nudity and chainsaw-to-chainsaw combat action.

If west coast hookers just aren’t your thing, Riggs suggests Emilio Vieyra’s “The Curious Dr. Humpp.” “This is 60’s B-horror porn from Argentina,” Riggs said. “There’s robots, monsters, sexual experiments and a brain in a jar.” The 1967 film was shot in two weeks and originally titled “La Vengenza del Sexo.” Jerald Intrator (“Satan in High Heels,” “The Sexperts,” and “Striporama”) bought the rights to it, inserted twenty minutes or so of nudity, titled it “Dr. Humpp…” and released it to America in 1971. “You just have to see this one,” Riggs said. “The Curious Dr. Humpp” is also loaded with great bits of dialogue like “Sex dominates the world and now I dominate sex” and “Use my body to keep you alive.”

And speaking of great movie lines, “Meat’s meat, and man’s gotta eat” is a gem from Kevin Connor’s often underrated 1980 film “Motel Hell,” another favorite of Riggs. “This is a bizarre movie about cannibals,” Riggs said. “They set booby traps on the highway to catch their victims, cut their vocal cords and plant them in a secret garden until they’re ripe. Then the victims are picked by hypnotizing them into believing they’re astronauts. The cannibals put nooses around their necks and pull them out of the ground with a tractor before making them into jerky.”

Stuart Gordon’s “From Beyond,” a 1986 film based on a H.P. Lovecraft short story and Joe Reed’s 1976 “Blood Sucking Freaks” round out the list for Riggs. “From Beyond” stars Jeffrey Combs and Ken Foree and is filled with “bondage, mad scientists, a third eye that pops out of your brain and lots of 5th dimension kind of shit,” according to Riggs.

“Blood Sucking Freaks” has been called one of the most subversive, sick and demented films ever made, which is probably why it gets a thumbs up from Mr. Scum of the Earth. “This one has plenty of blood and gore, bondage, a midget that eats eyeballs and Playboy playmates,” Riggs said. “It’s the story of an off Broadway play that tortures and kills women for real on stage and everyone thinks it’s part of the show.”

Perhaps Riggs can incorporate something along those lines into Scum of the Earth’s next concert tour. If not, there’s at least an idea for another nightmare of a guitar in there somewhere.

Check out Scum of the Earth’s official site here. Riggs and company can also be found on Myspace.

- CCF, October 2007