''Lick My Decals Off, Baby'' is the fourth studio album by American musician

Captain Beefheart Don Van Vliet (; born 'Don Glen Vliet'; January 15, 1941 – December 17, 2010) was an American singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and visual artist known by the stage name Captain Beefheart. Conducting a rotating ensemble known as the M ...

(Don Van Vliet) and

the Magic Band The Magic Band was the backing band of American singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Captain Beefheart between 1967 and 1982. The band was formed by guitarist Alex St. Clair with Beefheart as the lead singer; eventually, they morphed into ...

, released in December 1970 by

Straight Straight may refer to: Slang * Straight, slang for heterosexual ** Straight-acting, normal person * Straight, a member of the straight edge subculture Sport and games * Straight, an alternative name for the cross, a type of punch in boxing * Str ...

and

Reprise Records Reprise Records is an American record label founded in 1960 by Frank Sinatra. It is owned by Warner Music Group, and operates through Warner Records, one of its flagship labels. Artists currently signed to Reprise Records include Green Day, En ...

. The follow-up to ''

Trout Mask Replica ''Trout Mask Replica'' is the third studio album by the American band Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band, released as a double album on June 16, 1969, by Straight Records. The music was composed by Captain Beefheart (Don Van Vliet) and arrange ...

'' (1969), it is regarded by some critics and listeners as superior, and was Van Vliet's own favorite of his albums. In his words, the title credo of the album was an encouragement to "get rid of the labels", and to evaluate things according to their merits.

Composition

Captain Beefheart performs vocals, harmonica, and woodwinds on the album, joined by Bill "Zoot Horn Rollo" Harkleroad on guitar; Mark "Rockette Morton" Boston on bass guitar; Art "Ed Marimba" Tripp, late of

Frank Zappa Frank Vincent Zappa (December 21, 1940 – December 4, 1993) was an American guitarist, composer, and bandleader. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa composed Rock music, rock, Pop music, pop, jazz, jazz fusion, orchestra ...

Mothers of Invention The Mothers of Invention (also known as the Mothers) were an American rock band from California. Formed in 1964, their work is marked by the use of sonic experimentation, innovative album art, and elaborate live shows. Originally an R&B band ...

, on marimba, drums, and percussion; and John "Drumbo" French on drums and percussion. French had been the band's arranger and musical director on ''Trout Mask Replica''. Van Vliet ejected French from the group—both figuratively and literally, by allegedly throwing him down a flight of stairs—shortly after ''Trout Mask Replica'' was completed, and these roles passed to Harkleroad. French returned to the group shortly before recording began, but after Tripp had been hired to replace him, and so both percussionists appear on the album. Most of the songs began as piano improvisations by Van Vliet, which Harkleroad arranged into full-band compositions.Harkleroad, Bill with Billy James, 1998: ''Lunar Notes: Zoot Horn Rollo's Captain Beefheart Experience.'' SAF Publishing Ltd. The musical lines on ''Decals'' tend to be longer and more intricate than the assemblage of short fragments that characterized much of ''Trout Mask Replica.'' The

liner notes Liner notes (also sleeve notes or album notes) are the writings found on the sleeves of LP record albums and in booklets that come inserted into the compact disc jewel case or cassette j-cards. Origin Liner notes are descended from the prog ...

contain two poems or sets of lyrics for songs not present on the album, one untitled and the other entitled "You Should Know by the Kindness of uh Dog the Way uh Human Should Be".

Critical and commercial reception

Critic

Robert Christgau Robert Thomas Christgau ( ; born April 18, 1942) is an American music journalist and essayist. Among the most influential music critics, he began his career in the late 1960s as one of the earliest professional rock critics and later became a ...

said of the record: "Beefheart's famous five-octave range and covert totalitarian structures have taken on a playful undertone, repulsive and engrossing and slapstick funny."

Lester Bangs Leslie Conway "Lester" Bangs (December 14, 1948 – April 30, 1982) was an American music journalist and critic. He wrote for ''Creem'' and ''Rolling Stone'' magazines and was also a performing musician. The music critic Jim DeRogatis called ...

noted the maturation of Beefheart’s previous musical and lyrical concerns, writing that "even though the sonic textures are sometimes even more complex and angular than on ''Trout Mask''...his messages are universal and warm as the hearth of the America we once dreamed of". With

John Peel John Robert Parker Ravenscroft (30 August 1939 – 25 October 2004), better known as John Peel, was an English radio presenter and journalist. He was the longest-serving of the original disc jockeys on BBC Radio 1, broadcasting regularly from ...

championing the work on

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

radio, ''Lick My Decals Off, Baby'' spent eleven weeks on the

UK Albums Chart The Official Albums Chart is the United Kingdom's industry-recognised national record chart for album, albums. Entries are ranked by sales and audio streaming. It was published for the first time on 22 July 1956 and is compiled every week by the O ...

, peaking at number twenty and becoming his highest-charting album in the country. An early promotional

music video A music video is a video that integrates a song or an album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing device intended to ...

was made of its title song, and a television commercial for the album was also produced that included excerpts from "Woe-is-uh-Me-Bop", silent footage of masked Magic Band members using kitchen utensils as musical instruments, and Van Vliet kicking over a bowl of porridge onto a dividing stripe in the middle of a road. The video was rarely played, but was later accepted into the

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...

. Enigma Retro released a

compact disc The compact disc (CD) is a Digital media, digital optical disc data storage format co-developed by Philips and Sony to store and play digital audio recordings. It employs the Compact Disc Digital Audio (CD-DA) standard and was capable of hol ...

edition in 1989; the album has also seen reissue as a 180g vinyl LP, which is still in print. In January 2011, shortly after Van Vliet's death, iTunes and Amazon's MP3 store released the album for download. On November 17, 2014,

Rhino Records A rhinoceros ( ; ; ; : rhinoceros or rhinoceroses), commonly abbreviated to rhino, is a member of any of the five extant taxon, extant species (or numerous extinct species) of odd-toed ungulates (perissodactyls) in the family (biology), famil ...

reissued the album as part of the limited edition four-disc Beefheart

box set A boxed set or (its US name) box set is a set of items (for example, a compilation of books, musical recordings, films or television programs) traditionally packaged in a box, hence 'boxed', and offered for sale as a single unit. Music Artists ...

''Sun Zoom Spark: 1970 to 1972'', which also included ''

The Spotlight Kid ''The Spotlight Kid'' is the sixth studio album by Captain Beefheart. Released in 1972, it is the only album credited solely to Captain Beefheart (Don Van Vliet) rather than Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band, although every member is featured, ...

'', ''

Clear Spot ''Clear Spot'' is the seventh studio album by Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band. It was originally released on LP album, LP in 1972 in a clear plastic sleeve. Production Beefheart's third album ''Trout Mask Replica'' established him as a criti ...

'', and a disc of outtakes from the three albums. The album was reissued separately, without

bonus tracks An album is a collection of audio recordings (e.g., music) issued on a medium such as compact disc (CD), vinyl (record), audio tape (like 8-track or cassette), or digital. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early 20th century a ...

, by Rhino on September 25, 2015.Amazon website retrieved 31 October 2015.
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Track listing

All songs initially composed by

Don Van Vliet Don Van Vliet (; born 'Don Glen Vliet'; January 15, 1941 – December 17, 2010) was an American singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and visual artist known by the stage name Captain Beefheart. Conducting a rotating ensemble known as the M ...

. Arranged by

Bill Harkleroad Bill Harkleroad (born January 8, 1949), known professionally as Zoot Horn Rollo, is an American guitarist. He is best known for his work with Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band. In 2003, he was ranked No. 62 in a ''Rolling Stone'' magazin ...

8-track tape edition

Legacy

Magazine A magazine is a periodical literature, periodical publication, print or digital, produced on a regular schedule, that contains any of a variety of subject-oriented textual and visual content (media), content forms. Magazines are generally fin ...

recorded a cover of "I Love You, You Big Dummy" in 1978.

Personnel

–

vocals Singing is the art of creating music with the voice. It is the oldest form of musical expression, and the human voice can be considered the first musical instrument. The definition of singing varies across sources. Some sources define sing ...

bass clarinet The bass clarinet is a musical instrument of the clarinet family. Like the more common Soprano clarinet, soprano B clarinet, it is usually pitched in B (meaning it is a transposing instrument on which a written C sounds as B), but it plays no ...

tenor saxophone The tenor saxophone is a medium-sized member of the saxophone family, a group of instruments invented by Adolphe Sax in the 1840s. The tenor and the alto are the two most commonly used saxophones. The tenor is pitched in the key of B (whi ...

soprano saxophone The soprano saxophone is a small, high-pitched member of the saxophone family of woodwind instruments invented in the 1840s by Belgian instrument maker Adolphe Sax. Built in B♭ an octave above the tenor saxophone (or rarely, slightly small ...

harmonica The harmonica, also known as a French harp or mouth organ, is a free reed wind instrument used worldwide in many musical genres, notably in blues, American folk music, classical music, jazz, country, and rock. The many types of harmonica incl ...

Zoot Horn Rollo Bill Harkleroad (born January 8, 1949), known professionally as Zoot Horn Rollo, is an American guitarist. He is best known for his work with Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band. In 2003, he was ranked No. 62 in a ''Rolling Stone'' magazi ...

–

electric guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external electric Guitar amplifier, sound amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar. It uses one or more pickup (music technology), pickups ...

, glass finger guitar *

Rockette Morton Rockette Morton (born Mark Boston; July 14, 1949 in Salem, Illinois) is an American musician, best known as a bassist and guitarist for Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band in the 1960s and 1970s. Career In 1963, after moving to Lancaster, Cali ...

– bassius-o-pheilius *

Drumbo Drumbo () is a small village, townland and Civil parishes in Ireland, civil parish in County Down, Northern Ireland. It is about south of Belfast city centre, east of Lisburn and west of Carryduff. It is in the historic Barony (Ireland), baro ...

–

drums The drum is a member of the percussion instrument, percussion group of musical instruments. In the Hornbostel–Sachs classification system, it is a membranophones, membranophone. Drums consist of at least one Acoustic membrane, membrane, c ...

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a percussion mallet, beater including attached or enclosed beaters or Rattle (percussion beater), rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or ...

broom A broom (also known as a broomstick) is a cleaning tool, consisting of usually stiff fibers (often made of materials such as plastic, hair, or corn husks) attached to, and roughly parallel to, a cylindrical handle, the broomstick. It is thus a ...

* Ed Marimba –

marimba The marimba ( ) is a musical instrument in the percussion family that consists of wooden bars that are struck by mallets. Below each bar is a resonator pipe that amplifies particular harmonics of its sound. Compared to the xylophone, the mari ...

, drums, percussion, broom Production * Grant Gibb – personal management * Peacock Ink – album concept *

– back cover painting *

Ed Thrasher Edward Lee Thrasher Jr. (March 7, 1932 – August 5, 2006), known as Ed Thrasher, was an American art director and photographer. He was the recipient of a number of Grammy Award nominations for his work on album covers and won a Grammy for Best Al ...

– photography and art direction

References

{{Authority control 1970 albums Albums produced by Captain Beefheart Captain Beefheart albums Enigma Records albums Reprise Records albums Straight Records albums Avant-pop albums