Bippy talks about its new seven-inch and a lot more

This June, Bippy will be releasing its second seven-inch to date, titled "Jacking Off to 3's Company," and soon after that it will be releasing a 16-song tape. The members of this snotty but highly amusing punk rock band are juniors Art Ettinger on vocals, Chris Stanfield on bass and Larry Szmulowicz on guitar, and sophomore Nachie Castro on drums. In addition to these two new releases, Bippy will be playing in Cleveland, May 17 at Riot 101. Arts reporter Alexandra Chenitz talked with the band.

(The interview begins without guitarist Chris Stanfield.)

Ali Chenitz: What songs are on your fucking thing since I haven't seen it yet?
Nachie Castro: The new seven-inch?
Art Ettinger: There are six songs on our new record. It is called Jacking Off to 3's Company , which is named after one of the songs. The other songs are "False Radical," "Closet Jock-o Man," a song that doesn't have a title yet, a pop song and "Bright Red Pony," which is a Bippy classic that has yet to be immortalized onto vinyl.
NC: Are we going to be misrepresented?
AC: Yeah, I am gonna make you guys look like bastards.
NC: Everyone already thinks we're bastards....
AE: Everyone already knows we're bastards.
NC: Especially Harkness...

AC: Ok, tell me what some of the songs are about. . .
AE: Can you ask about a song in particular?

AC: Fine. Tell me about your lovely "3's Company" song...
AE: Chris wrote the 3's Company song because he is really into TV and masturbation. We'll ask Chris about it when he gets here. It's a political song, you know. It's deep.
LS: Yeah, we're socially aware.

AC: Do you think you are gonna be rock stars or something?
AE: What are you talking about? We are already fucking rockstars.
NC: See, there are many different levels of rockstar. There is "rockstar-rockstar" when you have a limo and 16-year-old girls come and jump you....

AC: Art likes 16-year-olds...
AE: We played for little children once in Lorain, with a Christian hardcore band.
AE: We played with Sicko in Cleveland. Kids seemed to be into us. We are playing Cleveland again a week from this Friday night, and we were just asked to play a huge slew of shows but they are all this summer, and we are not going to be active this summer.
NC: In Cleveland, they had a convenience store across the street with $1.50 40's and Mickeys. It was great.
(Chris Stanfield enters.)
LS: Are you going to include physical descriptions of us in this article?
AC: Uhhhh...
AE: I am not going to whip it out for her.

AC: Since I am interviewing you, you can describe yourselves if you wish, but it was not in my overall plan. It is a pretty small school, I bet people have seen you. . . .
AE: Nachie has a mohawk. . .
LS: The thing is that no one knows who I am . . . no one knows I am in Bippy . . .
AC: Do you want to keep it that way?
LS: It has had its advantages.

AC: Who writes most of the songs?
NC: Laurence.
AE: We still play a couple of songs which ex-Bippy members have written, but most of the songs were written by Larry and I.

AC: What's in the future for Bippy? What happens if you someday graduate? Is Bippy going to die and you will have no more fans?
NC: Well, it depends if we get that gig on the MTV rock awards.
AE: Bippy will never die. The legacy will live on. After we are all gone there will still be Bippy. We have already lost three members - two went bye-bye and one was a hippie, so we killed him and ate him.

AC: So ,who is new to the band this year, raise your hand?
(Nachie and Chris raise hands)

AC: What is the basic message of Bippy? What are you trying to tell people?
AE: Jack off to "Three's Company" and fuck everybody.

AC: Do you have a political stance as a lot of punk bands do?
LS: We aren't real punks, we are just capitalizing on it.
AE: Our message is fuck everybody.
CS: All senators, congressmen and presidents should just jack off to "Three's Company."
AE: The world would be a better place.

AC: Is masturbation a big part of the Bippy existence?
AE: It is a big part of my existence.
CS: It is not a part of mine (laughs)
AE: Even when I get play I masturbate afterwards.
AC: You are not satisfied, Art?
AE: Masturbation is like breathing. It is what I do.

AC: So, Bippy isn't a band all about love? You don't wear beads and patchouli?
AE: No, we don't wear fuckin' patchouli. We actually kill people who wear fucking patchouli.

AC: What do your moms think of Bippy?
CS: My mom thinks it is pretty cool.
AE: My mom loves it.
CS: My parents are so proud of me.
NC: My mom hasn't heard the new seven-inch yet but I was telling her about it and she was like "yeah, that sounds like fun."

AC: Give me another Bippy fact.
AE: Our songs are getting shorter and shorter. That's something we can talk about. When we played our first show, we played seven songs in 20 minutes. Now we play 16 songs in 20 minutes. Songs are shorter, faster and much much better.

AC: Will you give me the lyrics to "Jacking off to 3's Company," already?
CS:
Jacking off to 3's company
Spending the night with my TV.
Jacking off to 3's company
Fantasizing about Mr. Ferley
When I'm feeling down and out
I turn on the TV and whip it out
I picture Terry without her skirt
As I cum all over my shirt
I sit down and watch the show
And feel something start to grow
I just can't control myself
I think I better get some help.

AC: Would you like to say anything to the Oberlin community?
AE: Fuck all of you.
LS: Let's think of something more articulate to say.
NC: Come see our shows, let us play in your co-ops, don't fuck with kids from outside of Oberlin who come to see us play, glass sweeps up easily...
AC: Take a shower. . . .
AE: Take a shower, you smelly hippie fucks.

AC: Art, this hostility is a constant for you.
NC: You stroke his hostility.
AE: I am constantly baited to make anti-hippie statements, and it becomes a vicious cycle. I love hippies, I absolutely love them. They are the most wonderful people in the whole world, and they smell so fucking wonderful...
NC: ...and they're easy.

AC: Let's briefly talk about the controversial Crucifucks show.
AE: It was a wonderful show.
AC: It was a big deal that they came here.
AE: In the past week the Student Senate made an official statement that the show should not have been shut down. It was a really great show for us to play. Also, it was the first show which the Crucifucks played in nine years. Kids came from all over the East Coast and Midwest to this show....and since this show we have been offered to play six or seven shows, but they are all this summer, so we probably won't be able to play with them. This show was great for us, we had a great crowd response, and we had kids we have never even seen before singing along to our songs.
NC: We had two 13-year-old kids singing along in the second mic. They knew all of the words.
AC: Great crowd response from your eyes, but apparently not with Harkness'. They were not impressed by broken bottles or peeing in the bushes...
LS: That's not the only thing. I saw some punks harassing some women who were walking to the Talcott Formal
AC: Whose side are you on any way?
NC: I was at the Talcott Formal and people had no problem with the damn show. They thought it was funny that a bunch of punks were sitting outside of Harkness.
CS: It is all an issue of these rich Oberlin students who feel threatened by people they perceive as violent ruffians.
AE: The assumption that you can judge from their appearance is disgusting. I mean - the people who came out here - I am not saying it matters who these people are - but this assumption that they were street people is ridiculous. . . I mean all of these people drove out here. . .
AE: What Oberlin is really about is closing yourself off. It is about controlling language, and it is about . . . . basically this campus is focused on language, not issues. It is focused on closing off not opening up. People here are way too uptight. People are very, very conservative in their own way. We have a new song on this subject. It's called "False Radical," and it's about status quo liberals who constantly pat themselves on the ass for being so radical, when in fact they just help support the system.