Enduring 'Panther Phobia' at 25: The Oral History of the Brilliant Panther Burns LP Tav Falco Wants You To Forget

Larry Hardy (In The Red Records): Panther Phobia is a release I’m particularly proud of. I’m abundantly aware that Tav doesn’t feel the same way, which is a shame.

Tav Falco: As Tennessee Williams once wrote of himself, "I feel nothing, I believe in nothing." Hubris is a part of that, and I do not ascribe to pride. Although art has no shame, should we ask that an artist must contain himself by merely reflecting what others may expect of him? Once a work is released, it belongs to the public, and they are free to do what they want with it. Yet the mystique of an artist is complex, and it belongs to no one. It cannot be contained, only created. It cannot be thwarted by adhering to preconceived notions & expectations, it can only be hurled into the future. Mystique cannot be explained, for then it becomes an apology. Mystique is an aura; it is ineffable and cannot be touched, only sensed and revealed in gesture and in spirit. This is what Larry Hardy was really after, and he got what he wanted.

"Panther Phobia heralds a return to the tumultuous and exuberant tones and groans of the band's landmark first LP Behind The Magnolia Curtain," wrote music journalist Robert Gordon back in the year 2000 when describing the first Tav Falco record to hit the shelves in five years. Indeed, Panther Phobia is nothing short of a gift to devotees of The Gories, Oblivians, '68 Comeback, Doo Rag, Bantam Rooster, Bassholes, Soledad Brothers and other champions of the lo-fi, "punk-blues" aesthetic that generated a cult following during the previous decade. So, naturally, one would think the LP is worthy of a birthday celebration at the 25-year mark. Its creator disagrees.

"Although Panther Phobia has its hysterical moments, there is little to recommend in this album other than the ‘Panther Phobia Manifesto,’” was Tav Falco’s message relayed to me by his manager after I pitched the idea for the article. "If CAC is inclined to email a few questions, I will reply in kind."

Tav obviously fronted this incarnation of the Panther Burns, with Jack Oblivian on bass, Ross Johnson on drums, Eric Hill on synth, Brendan Spengler on keys, and Claudine, aka "Kitty Fires," on a second guitar.

In 1995, Falco & the Panther Burns released Shadow Dancer, a tango-celebrating, Italian pop-flavored album that still honed in Falco's adherence to his core influences, but also projected, perhaps, that the Panther Burns' wheelhouse had matured in the 15-plus years of playing. After leaving Memphis for New York City, Falco had fled the continent completely to continue his career with Europe as a home base, specifically Vienna. Needless to say, these new surroundings in the late '90s were worlds different than the environment in which the Panther Burns cut their teeth; being a conductor of the early '80s Memphis underground was a life that went into the sounds of Beyond the Magnolia Curtain.

TF: In late '97 I split from Europe back to US with a psychotic woman I'd taken up with after a gig in New Orleans. Returning to the Land Of The Free was a big mistake. Maybe the biggest of my life. After that record was done in 2000 while living between New Orleans and Memphis, I managed once again to escape Bluff City with just the shirt on my back. After a stint in Buenos Aires, I dug in New York for a tumultuous year putting a new band together before transitioning to Paris. That move effectively marked the end of my residency in Amerika.

LH: I attended a Panther Burns show in Los Angeles at a club called Bar Deluxe in either '98 or '99. I was a big fan and would go see them whenever they came to town. On this particular tour the band’s line up was Tav, Scott Bomar on bass, Jack Oblivian on drums and a girl named Claudine — aka Kitty Fires — on guitar. Claudine was Tav’s girlfriend at the time. Scott and Jack had told me before the show that I should approach Tav about doing a record, they thought the current line up would probably make a really rocking album. The show was great and I thought the band was a particularly great version of the Panther Burns. After the show I introduced myself to Tav and told him I’d like to do an album. We exchanged contact info and soon after the tour we started talking on the phone about doing a record.

TF: There were no plans to record in Amerika when I de-camped from Vienna. In '98 in Memphis, after a rare festival appearance with the Billy Lee Riley Band and Panther Burns, a guy in blue jeans walks up to me beside the stage and sticks $6,000 cash in my pocket. It was Larry Hardy. He said he wanted an album. I was sleeping in a back house with leaves on the floor beside the L&N railroad tracks, so I said OK... Some friends recorded for [In the Red]. Larry knew what he wanted. Garage funk. He did not have to ask for that because the people surrounding me at the time couldn't play anything else.

LH: In talking with Tav before the recording I told him that I wanted a very raw rock n’ roll album along the lines of Magnolia Curtain, or, even more so, the band’s first single from 1980. I really wanted the same band I saw play in L.A. but also wanted to bring in Ross Johnson from the original band. [I also] said we should have a synthesizer like the band had in the early days. Luckily their original synth player, Eric Hill, was available. I also suggested Jeffrey Evans to record the album as he was a big Panther Burns fan and he knew how to get a good, raw sound.

TF: It was not my intention to record clean or to record raw. I just made music of the kind those around me were capable of making. In the end, it doesn't matter what a record man says he wants because I ultimately can only play in one way. In other words, I am not fully in control of what I am doing.

Jack Oblivian (Oblivians, Compulsive Gamblers): Larry wanted something similar to the first Tav album, Behind the Magnolia Curtain, 'cause whatever Tav was doin at that time was more a slicker, Tango styled thing. He’d been doing that throughout the '90s. From what I remember, Tav went along with it when it hit a certain figure of money, but [Tav's attitude] still seemed like [the project] was not something he wanted to do. It’s like, how much money would it take you to do something that you did a really long time ago? [laughs]. It’d be like asking the Stones [now], "Can you guys do the '60s, mono-recording stuff on a two-track machine? You guys ever thought about doing that? [laughs]."

TF: Fact is, I'm not in this for the money. Yet I do make music, and if somebody wants to pay me, I will certainly play if allowed to be myself. Sure I needed the money at the time. I always need money, but try not to think too much about it. No doubt though, I was grateful to get that recording budget from In The Red.

Curtain, recorded in 1980 and released the following year on Rough Trade, first demonstrated Falco’s excellence in celebrating the region’s pioneers in blues, country, and early rock 'n' roll.  

"The sound is dense, the time is elastic," wrote AllMusic’s Thom Jurek. "This is ramshackle, raw, unholy, and utterly amazing; a timeless classic. It took the band a tad over six hours to record, and you can hear that."

JO: I was just out of high school when I moved to Memphis in the summer of '87. And, I went to this thing called Counterfest, which was downtown, it was a little weekend festival that Tav would do. It would start on a Friday before it got dark, and then it would go until midnight or something like that. That’s when I [sic] was first introduced to Tav. I think he played on the second night … I didn’t go to college, so being exposed to Tav and Big Star right out of high school was big for me.     

Ross Johnson (Alex Chilton, Panther Burns): Alex [Chilton] was the draw early on when he would play with the band, but Tav was such a tireless self-promoter. He put together Counterfest and we’d end up playing at like two or three in the morning because he booked all these hardcore bands to play before us. Tav was very generous with giving other people a forum — especially women.  

Jeffrey Evans ('68 Comeback, Gibson Bros): Tav is a real musicologist. His research is original – taking a video camera into Mississippi [sic] in the '70s… There were The Blasters and The Stray Cats sorta doing a literal 50s rockabilly thing. And then there was Tav Falco, bad notes were ok. And that’s how I play guitar! I play bad notes.

JO: I’m not really a bass player as you can tell on that record. Ya know, I can play the root notes, but I’ve never really gotten the grasp of scales. I guess I kind of know what they are … I told Tav several times, “Get somebody else [on bass] that’s better. It’s not gonna hurt my feelings.”

JE: You have to keep in mind, I wasn’t [Tav’s] first choice, or his second choice, his third choice or tenth choice for producer. I think everybody said, "no" so… But to work with him was a great honor. I wish he liked Panther Phobia better than he did, but you know…people say they like it…Ross [Johnson] likes it, so that’s good. 

TF: To my knowledge no producer was discussed. Evans was going to record it, and he did. The sounds captured on that record were evoked from forbidden sins of iniquity. No one should feel deflated about my esteem for this record because there are only a handful of my recordings that I can bear listening to, and certainly only a handful that redeem themselves.

RJ: [Jeff’s studio] was just this medium-sized, four-square apartment. And Jeff was just using whatever mics he had, placing everything wrong [laughs].

JE: I like to stay two or three technologies behind the times. I had a big, Midtown Memphis apartment with wood floors and tall ceilings, it sounded pretty lively in there … With Tav, not only was I using old technology, but I was using recycled tape. And of course, none of that impressed Tav, that I was taking yard sale tape and going in my kitchen and degaussing it, as he would say. Like I said, he’s an interesting guy and brought a lot to the table … what he lacks in one thing, he’s brilliant in the other thing. 

TF: Right, I must admit I was not so impressed because it was the very same recording environment I'd already knew well messing around in my Cox Street pad for 17 years. No complaints, on that score. Just another day in the glue factory.

JO: [Claudine] would always just appear. It was like, "where do you work? [laughs]" Or just tell us where the money comes from. But yeah, she just shows up. I know this is not much about the recording, but, she went with me once to the unemployment office because she thought it was cool, she thought that’s where the rockers went. So, when I came out, she was already out, so I said, “Oh, you’re already done? You’re done early.” And then she said “No, the lady started asking too many questions and I asked her, ‘how long is this gonna take? I’ve got a flight to catch.’”

JE: Claudine was great. Supposedly, every night [after the sessions] Alex Chilton was teaching her the solos to the next day’s songs. And she was a good student, she played a tough guitar.  

RJ: Claudine was the single-most violent woman I’ve ever known. She would pick fights with women and they always got busted up. She never lost a fight with a man. She stabbed men, she threw ceramic ashtrays at boyfriends and nearly blinded them.

LH: When we were getting close to the recording date, Tav started to try and change the plans. I couldn’t tell why as he had seemed receptive in the beginning. Later I realized that he and Claudine had fallen out. I think that changed his whole perspective on the recording. I was the one who insisted that we follow through with the agreed plan and he went along with it.

TF: It wasn't me. Certain women can throw a monkey wrench into anything they touch. Evans got all the psychosis on tape. Quite a feat, actually.

JE: I am not sure how the trust issue was between Tav and Larry. Larry said, “[Tav] could take those tapes at any time, so, if you don’t mind, after your session, make copies of 'em.” So, we’d start at seven in the evening then end at about one in the morning. Then I stayed up all night copying what we’d already recorded so we’d have a safety copy. I think Tav lives for the drama and, to me, there was no drama. It was just good music being played. He didn’t like my living room, he didn’t like using used tape, you know. I was trying to make [the session] more like how they did it in the 1950s, and I think he wanted to be in the studio and be pampered. But I did give him something no one else gave him, and that was as much time as he needed. So, we spent 26 days on it … There were many, many takes. And some days we wouldn’t even get a whole song done. 

TF: Sorry, Evans is a bit misguided in second guessing my orientation to these sessions. Further, I know all about recording over used tapes and filming with leftover short ends. Yes I got the time I needed, which was rewarding. Otherwise, the outcome would've been a total mess under the circumstances.

The first song to come out of the speakers is arguably the album’s best — but for a plethora of reasons beyond the hook. The Panther Burns' take on Jesse Mae Hemphill’s "Streamline Train" is a hypnotizing swirl of blown-out blues that not only sets the stage for the impending hellride, but in one fell swoop, Falco reintroduced genuine punk-blues — a sound he inadvertently helped create 20 years earlier.

LH: “Streamline Train” was my favorite track on the album, though "Young Psychotics" is a close second. I’m a massive fan of Jessie Mae Hemphill and it was through Panther Burns that I found out about her. I suggested the song to Tav and was really happy he agreed to do it. I think they did an incredible job.

TF: Jesse Mae played marching snare drum in Napoleon Stricklin's Fife & Drum Band from Senatobia. The ethnomusicologist, David Evans, arranged for the rhythm section to come up to Memphis to record 4-tracks on our first album Behind The Magnolia Curtain at Ardent studio. It was a state-of-the-art facility, but The Panther Burns managed to violate the college boy vibes of the place and wreck any notions the engineers may have had of maintaining professional continuity. The drummers from Senatobia were happy with a couple buckets of fried chicken and short pints of Tennessee whiskey. Later, Jesse Mae picked up the guitar and incarnated herself as the Shewolf. Although she came from a musical family well known in Mississippi, I didn't know she played the guitar. Maybe she didn't either. No one knew Teenie Hodges played the guitar until one day he told Willie Mitchell he could play when he was hired to paint his house. Those people just pick up a guitar one day and start playing. Something extraordinary comes out. I wanted to be one of them. The secret weapon on “Streamline Train” is the two-drum setup. Though Johnson was the album’s official drummer, Oblivian added additional drumming on “Streamline” that seemed to sonically create a phantom train chugging through the piece. 

JO: I thought, “Wow, this two-drum thing sounds great! It wouldn’t have worked on any of the other songs [we did], but the rhythm of [‘Streamline’] really brought things to life. The cymbals kind of sound like a train. That was Tav’s idea on that. He already knew there’d be two drums on that one. 

RJ: Jack and I were set up side by side. There was a house kit there and Jack brought in his kit — it was just perfect. I don’t like to use the term “magic,” but that was magic. I don’t know how it happened [laughs]. I’ve done a lot of double-drumming with the Panther Burns cause Tav used to come into town [after he’d left Memphis] and would tell his drummer “Ross is gonna play with us for the set.” I could usually fit in very well with whoever he brought over from Europe. 

JE: One thing I will credit for [sic] is that I made Tav a one-hour cassette of some of my favorite 45s that I thought he’d be interested in doing. Some of the songs are what you’d expect, bluesy, rockabilly, pop, but they were songs that I thought fit what he was doing. And, I don’t know if it’s a compliment or not, but he did pick one of those songs out of the hour of stuff. “Cockroach,” by Charlie Feathers …. “Cockroach” was one of the records in the jukebox series on Feathers Records — they were 45s …. When I moved to Memphis and started working for River Records, [sic] I learned the owner, Jerry Gibson, was good friends with Charlie and he’d bought the whole catalog of the Feathers Jukebox series. So every one of these records were at the store I worked at …. The weirdest [single] was “Cockroach.” Ya know, it goes, “ooooh biiiig ol’ cockroach!” And that’s all there is to it, except it’s insane! That’s my kind of song there. 

JO: I knew who Charlie Feathers was but I had never heard that song “Cockroach.” I never heard his recording of it until years on some compilation of outtakes or something because I don’t think that song was on a record. It’s just him going “mmmmmm” making noises with the slapback echo, “cock-ROACH!” I don’t even think you can call it a song, ya know?  

RJ: I did not play on “Cockroach.” It was played with spoons and I was completely absent from it!

TF: Charlie Feathers was a musical genius. A primitive one, but one of two geniuses I have known in my life. The other being failed Arkansas poet and agent provocateur, Randall Lyon. Among those who ever strummed a guitar, Charlie Feathers had as much if not more integrity than any of them, and sang in three octaves. He invented the hiccup vocal, and he had the operatic prowess of a hillbilly Pavarotti. From the first note he struck onstage, he had the audience in the palm of his hand. Mesmerizing. You couldn't take your eyes off him. He knew precisely how his music should sound sonically and technically. He taught his son, Bubba, how to play his music. Today there is no finer guitarist in Memphis than Bubba Feathers.

JE: A lot of [the songs] were by people that Tav met and artists who he saw play live in their own surroundings. That’s what’s impressive about Tav, he was close to the source. I think that brought a lot of weight to [Panther Phobia].

JO: There was a song that luckily didn’t make the album. It was a Johnny Cash song and we did at least like twelve takes, I mean we spent a whole night on it. Each time we tried to rehearse it then play it, it sounded worse and worse. After each time I was like, “God, I hope this doesn’t end up on the record.” Luckily, Tav forgot about it. I can’t remember which song it was. It wasn’t any of the hits or anything like that. And I was thinking, “Why this Johnny Cash song? He has so many other good ones.” Sometimes songs just don’t work, and that one wasn’t working …. Maybe Tav was boot camping us or something [with that song], maybe it was a mental test or something [laughs], ya know, “I am gonna get in this band's head!”  

JE: Tav didn’t want any artificial reverb, so we had a tape reverb [machine], and he hung it from the ceiling. He got up there with a ladder and some big ol’ nails and we hung the reverb unit from rope. It just sorta swung in the doorway. I don’t know, I guess he thought it was a more natural sound or something. He said, “Well, that’s how Dick Dale does it!” … I tried to please him, ya know, he’s a perfectionist so that’s hard to do …. Tav kept saying “I want a really good mono mix.” And I finally asked why and he said, “So we can get some AM airplay.” I said, “AM airplay?” He said, “Right.” Ok. And then, there’s a line in “Manifesto” where he says something like “you will suck the mop of equity” or something. And I said, “Suck the mop?” And he said “Well it’s 'cock,' but you can’t say that and get played on the radio.” 

RJ: I really love playing that record and I love the way it sounded …. We did a lot of takes of a lot of songs, but I didn’t mind it because they all felt really good …. I loved playing every night for almost a month. A singular experience with the Burns. One time only while recording.

JO: There should be a statue of Tav [in Memphis, though] that shouldn’t happen until he’s completed his full run of life on earth. But Tav is the king of the Memphis underground …. If anybody wanted to mimic Tav for like one record or a seven inch, and try to do "his sound," I don’t think it can be done. Tav’s had so many different people backing him but he still has his unique thing. Even when he’s doing the more slick stuff, it still has swagger. 

TF: I do not revive anything. I am always just me inside. I have only one song to sing. Nothing more. I have sung the same song my entire career, and I still do. You can dress it in different clothes, but that naked thing underneath is still just Tav.

Now, back in 2025, I’d be remiss if I didn’t ask for Tav’s take on what the flying fuck is happening in the United States right now.

TF: Although Amerika appears to have fallen into the toilet for good, should we second guess its chances of surviving the present takeover of the federal government by deep state fascist oligarchs? — A coup d'etat facilitated by  a TV circus populist  demagogue who worships at the profane altar of spectacle and riches. A political boss who has deputized a callous technocrat boss richer than he is to act as a co-president with orders to dismantle federal agencies that serve rank-and-file working citizens and veterans. The DOGE team of former Planatir techno-brats  are given illegal access to the federal database and its payment systems controlling trillions of taxpayer dollars. The prize for DOGE and Palantir will be priceless personal data to be harvested on each and every citizen touched by governmental and financial institutions.  The federal work force is being gutted and will be replaced by stooges in blind obeisance to the god emperor while their agencies will be restructured and placed under the Dept. Of State. Entitlement obligations are under attack with ultimate aim of demolishing Social Security and Medicaid while extreme tax breaks are proposed for the 1% of billionaires. This process of rapid destruction of the democratic foundations of our republic is not the product of capricious whim by a orange goof ball sitting behind the resolute desk. The agenda postulated by technocrat theoreticians and engineers is to totally replace the provisionally democratic US constitution with a CEO corporate structure operated by a central authority. Technocracy views democracy as an obsolete system that is slow, unwieldy, inefficient and flawed with the concept of empathy for the governed. The nefarious agenda of Project 2025 to control the entire country from the Oval Office by lawless executive decree started on day one of 2nd term of the Cheeto Mussolini. It is a highly detailed, articulate blueprint covering the first 180 days of the new administration. The Project 2025 Mandate is no secret. Download and read it here. The Project 2025 Mandate is a product of The Heritage Foundation supported by other far right, white Christian Nationalist  think tanks. Identified as the enemy are universities who will not allow the White House to control their affairs nor to subvert their independence. Also targeted is the judicial system and particularly judges and law firms who refuse to bend their oath to justice and the constitution in order to suit the demands of White House and the DOJ. Libraries, the Kennedy Center, Dept. Of Education, Parks Service, and the VA among numerous other agencies are identified as targets. Washington is already a sewer. AIPAC and other Israeli lobbies have bought most republican congressmen and placed 'minders' inside their offices who formulate legislators' stances and control their voting.  Congress will be next to be de-potentiated, dehumanized, and forced to enact executive decrees with only token debate. Private Equity firms like Blackrock and The Carlisle Corp. will supersede the powers of the US legislature. US proxy dirty wars and scorched-earth military operations like in Gaza, Ukraine, and soon Taiwan will also be propped up by private equity firms and and central banks. Those banks will be forced to adopt mandates imposed by executive decree because countries are off-loading their US Treasuries holdings due to fallout over US tariffs, investment banks will forced to hold Treasuries on their own balance sheets representing astronomical US debt. Project 2025 and Washington think tank policies do not care about crashing the economy. Investment banks are switching their status to commercial banks so they can be bailed out of crisis situations, thus generating massive earnings and financial rewards for elite investors and Wall St. insiders. Such financial disruptions will become cyclical until one day no longer sustainable.AI driven data models engineered by Palantir for military applications will orchestrate every facet of the Pentagon eventually including full blown weapons systems. AI data magnates like Peter Thiel of the Paypal mafia and co-founder of Palantir Technologies have no political ideology other than replacing the political system with technocracy. Meanwhile, Thiel threw 750 million dollars at the Trump & Vance America First Action super PAC and also just as much to the Kamala Harris campaign! What is interesting will be the point at which Artificial Intelligence systems become elaborated enough to develop an independent moral sensibility. Brace yourself for the outcome of that reality by the end of this decade. Of course we know the US foreign policy agenda is to protect its global hegemony by containing China, Russia, and BRICS economically and militarily. These US Dept. of State policy statements are fully public. Read here. The myriad network of military bases strategically positioned around the world is the US strategy to control international shipping lanes because Amerika has not the military power nor discipline to successfully meet head-on the greater military might and technical expertise of its adversaries. Yet the essential issue to protect its global hegemony lies not in the military, nor AI chips sanctions, but in the continued dollarization of international trade transactions. Unless the US dollar remains the international currency standard for world banking and world trade, NO ONE will be interested in holding US debt and US Treasury bonds. Why should they? No country wants to PAY for being contained and controlled by a deep state Cheeto Mussolini. In Amerika every day we see ICE, the DOJ, and the Dept. of State order its masked and hooded GESTAPO accosting, beating, detaining, and disappearing US citizens and students at an alarming rate. Anyone, any student who protests the United States morally repulsive weapons support for Israeli genocide in Gaza is subject to detention. The personal data of dissenters is being harvested by the CIA and FBI via Palantir Technologies who are presently also directing ICE activities across the country. As Dr. Martin Luther King proclaimed, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." Where is the voice of the musical world? Eno spoke out. Yes, and others who are refusing to rest and say “we are free” until we are all free. No, we cannot remain silent. Silence is complicity. Edward Abby wrote, "A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government". While president Theodore Roosevelt once said, "Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does not mean to stand by the president. "Our forebears fought and sacrificed for liberty. It was not easy. Now it is our turn. Our nation was built by immigrants, and a republic was formed. It was organized according to democratic principles, but accessible only by the educated. We have made mistakes, and we have undergone many dark chapters, unjust and cruel. We can do better. The only egregious threat is from within – that of the uneducated, ignorant majority. I may not live among you now. I am an American living abroad, but I pay US taxes. Halfway around the world is not far enough away – no distance is because you cannot escape from your identity. You can only expand it. I have learned that borders do not define a country. Only culture and language can do that. Yet languages like music transcend nations and can be embraced by all. That is the language I am trying to learn and to speak whether in harmony or in discord. When the voices of dissent grow and grow and GROW — led by courageous, selfless senators Bernie Sanders and AOS standing for hope and justice and for government for the people and by the people - you can be sure that the Cheeto Mussolini sitting behind the resolute desk will impose martial law on our population. He has already asked El Salvador to build five more CECOT prisons so he can fill them up by executive decree. Jim Morrison said, “They've got the guns, but we got the numbers!” Remember that and remember fascist regimes do not last – they crumble from within. The very ones who put them in power will bring them down - IF the oppressed and disenfranchised masses of AMERICA stand up TOGETHER. Panther Men and Panther Women RISE UP, REFUSE, RESIST, REVOLT !!

"MANIFESTO" by Tav Falco & The Unapproachable Panther Burns

LOUNGERS, RAKES, LOAFERS, FOPS, FLANEURS, EXHAUST QUEENS, MIDINETTES, PUPPET HEADS, IMPERIALIST RUNNING DOGS, & BACKSLIDING HEIFERS!

WE ARE THE NEO-RUMORIST BAND OF FLOWERY TROUBADOURS — KNOWN AS THE UNAPPROACHABLE PANTHER BURNS!

WE ARE THE DITCH-DIGGERS IN AMERICAN MUSIC — ALREADY HURLED INTO THE FUTURE, WE ARE THE VANGARD OF ART DAMAGE — the LAST STEAM ENGINE TRAIN LEFT ON THE TRACK THAT DON’T DO NOTHING BUT RUN & BLOW!

UNDER THE PSYCHOTROPIC RED HAZE OF IMPENDING CATASTROPHE, WE ARE COMING TO YOUR TOWN. WATCH OUT FOR YOUR HAPPY HOME!

PANTHER PHOBIA, PANTHER PHOBIA, PANTHER PHOBIA!

BURN, BURN, BURN! – BURN, BURN, BURN!

TONIGHT WILL BE THE NIGHT TO FORGE A TRAGIC ALLIANCE WITH THE UNDERGROUND!

TONIGHT WILL BE THE NIGHT TO CRACK THE IMPERIALIST BLACK EGG!

TONIGHT WILL BE THE NIGHT TO GET YOUR ASHES HAULED!

WE’RE NOT TALKING ABOUT PIES AND CAKES, CLUTCHES AND BRAKES, OR THE HIGH SOCIETY SCHOOL OF THE ARTS — NOT WHEN THERE ARE RATS IN MY KITCHEN. SET THE FILTH ON FIRE!

PANTHER PHOBIA, PANTHER PHOBIA, PANTHER PHOBIA!

BURN, BURN, BURN! – BURN, BURN, BURN!

WATCH THE THIN SHADOW OF DOUBT FALL FROM THE BALCONY.

WORD FALLING — FOTO FALLING

WE ARE THE TAIL DRAGGERS - WHO BRING DAGGERS BACK TO THE STAGE. WE SHALL DESTROY THIS CIVILIZATION THAT IS SO DEAR TO YOU, IN WHICH YOU ARE CAUGHT LIKE FOSSILS IN SHALE. YOU ARE THE FELLATORS OF THE USEFUL, THE MATURBATORS OF NECESSITY. I SHALL NEVER WORK; MY HANDS ARE PURE. MADMEN, HIDE YOUR PALMS FROM ME, AND THOSE INTELLECTUAL CALLOUSES THAT ARE THE SOURCE OF YOUR PRIDE. I CURSE SCIENCE, THAT TWIN SISTER OF LABOR. KNOWLEDGE! HAVE YOU EVER REACHED THE BOTTOM OF THAT BLACK PIT? SO I WISH YOU A HUGE FIRE-DAMP  EXPLOSION  THAT WILL FINALLY RESTORE YOU TO THE SLOTH THAT IS THE ONLY FATHERLAND OF TRUE THOUGHT. NEGROES! LEAVE YOUR GHETTOS! All SHACKLES TO YOUR HAPPINESS DAMNED! LET THE DRUG MERCHANTS FLING THEMSELVES UPON OUR TERRIFIED NATIONS. RISE, O WORLD!  SEE HOW DRY THE EARTH IS, AND READY,  LIKE SO MUCH STRAW, FOR EVERY CONFLAGRATION. LAUGH YOUR FILL. The PANTHER BURNS ARE THE ONES WHO ALWAYS HOLD OUT A HAND TO THE ENEMY...!

PANTHER PHOBIA, PANTHER PHOBIA, PANTHER PHOBIA!

BURN, BURN, BURN! — BURN, BURN, BURN!