Hug
Auto/Erotic/Life
Some folks constantly spew forth obscenities to no end other than the brief euphoria of packing a big wad of curses between their cheek and gum. Perhaps it’s natural defiance for a five-year-old to do this, but an adult’s only defense is a vaguely sociopathic brand of nostalgia. Hug encapsulates this downtrodden mentality with all the idiotic veracity it deserves on their debut six-song EP. For a clearer picture, imagine the teenage Frogs mercilessly thwacking away on their grandparents’ Brook Mays magic fingers organ on Sunday afternoon after church and lunch at Luby’s. What grandma did to deserve being jarred from her afternoon nap by two boys screaming, “Get your dick covered in shit at the circus!” is a mystery best left unsolved. Most people deft enough to document their most prurient sexcratory thoughts at 14 and 15 receive a big jolt of mortification by looking back on them as adults. Hug seems to embrace these adolescent toilet sex barbs as a sort of inverted golden age. In the words of Hank Hill, that ain’t right. Nevertheless, the local trio earns our begrudging admiration for being there and doing that so we don’t have to. 
This article appears in February 4 • 2000.
