The Frogs

One of the more singular outfits to arise from the indie rock underground spanning the 1980s and 1990s, the Frogs possessed an ability to draw in and repel listeners across the spectrum. Their knack for crafting and delivering tuneful material across numerous genres stood in deliberate contrast to lyrics that leaned into the ridiculous and often crossed into provocation, mining eccentric comedy from topics including race, sexuality, pop culture, and the recording industry. Although broader commercial success eluded them, the group’s deliberate provocation still reached an unexpectedly wide audience, thanks in large part to vocal support from several key figures in alternative rock, among them Kurt Cobain, Eddie Vedder, and Billy Corgan.

The band originated in 1980 when Milwaukee, Wisconsin siblings guitarist Jimmy Flemion and percussionist Dennis Flemion—who also shared keyboard duties—began performing together. Though additional players contributed across the years, the Flemions stayed at the creative center, frequently working as a duo in both live and studio settings. They launched their partnership with coffeehouse appearances in their hometown before expanding into a trio by recruiting bassist Jay Tiller, already active in Couch Flambeau. Their commitment to the outlandish surfaced quickly when Jimmy constructed oversized wings evocative of either a bat or an angel and began wearing them during Midwest performances, pairing them with wigs and makeshift glam-rock outfits that formed the core of the group’s economical stage presentation. Their 1988 self-titled debut arrived as a collection straddling power pop and glam rock yet attracted scant attention. Several months afterward, lo-fi home recordings by the Flemion Brothers reached Gerard Cosloy at Homestead Records. Intrigued by the tracks the brothers labeled “made-up songs,” which they generated spontaneously while taping, Cosloy selected 14 pieces for release. The resulting 1989 album It’s Only Right and Natural offered eccentric folk-rock explorations of homosexuality that evoked a blend of David Bowie’s Hunky Dory and Tyrannosaurus Rex, while reveling in deliberate provocation on numbers such as “I Don’t Care If U Disrespect Me (Just So You Love Me),” “Dykes Are We,” and “Been a Month Since I Had a Man.” Homestead marketed the Frogs with tongue-in-cheek positioning as “gay supremacists,” turning the record into an underground hit. For the follow-up the Flemions intended to escalate the controversy with Racially Yours, a song cycle written and performed from the perspectives of primarily African-American characters confronting racism—an approach compounded by cover art depicting Dennis Flemion in blackface. Cosloy’s 1990 departure from Homestead to co-found Matador Records led the label’s new leadership to reject the project. Although Matador issued the single “Now You Know You’re Black” in 1994, the full album remained unreleased despite circulation as a bootleg. Matador did put out the holiday single “Here Comes Santa’s Pussy” in 1995, followed in 1996 by another set of “made-up songs,” My Daughter the Broad.

Live performances, however, sustained momentum even as studio output slowed. Cobain’s public endorsement of It’s Only Right and Natural broadened awareness among discerning underground listeners. Corgan’s admiration led to the Frogs opening for Smashing Pumpkins on a 1993 tour, while Vedder booked them for several Pearl Jam dates in early 1994. Beck incorporated a sample from It’s Only Right and Natural into “Where It’s At” on the 1996 album Odelay. That summer the Frogs appeared on the second stage of Lollapalooza, where Corgan frequently guested on the sardonic anthem “I Only Play 4 Money,” a song Vedder also performed with the band. Pearl Jam further signaled approval by using the Frogs’ version of “Rear View Mirror” as the B-side of their 1995 single “Immortality.” Following the 1996 drug-overdose death of Smashing Pumpkins touring keyboardist Jonathan Melvoin, Dennis Flemion joined the group for arena dates that ran into early 1997.

The connection with Smashing Pumpkins revived the Frogs’ recording prospects when Corgan produced the EP Starjob, a narrative arc tracing an alternative-rock figure’s ascent and subsequent decline, credited to “Johnny Goat.” When Corgan’s bandmates James Iha and D’Arcy Wretzky established the Polygram-distributed Scratchie Records, the Frogs signed and issued Starjob as their first major-label-distributed release. Commercial returns remained modest, prompting the 1999 independent album Bananimals on Four Alarm Records, another collection of home “made-up songs.” Four Alarm also released Racially Yours in 2000, while the final Scratchie album Hopscotch Lollipop Sunday Surprise—again partly produced by “Johnny Goat”—appeared in 2001 shortly before the label ceased activity.

Extensive touring followed Hopscotch Lollipop, yet growing disillusionment with the industry led the Frogs to curtail live work and new releases after 2005, although their archive of “made-up songs” continued to circulate among devotees. A potential resurgence arrived with the July 2012 digital release of Count Yer Blessingsz and Squirrel Bunny Jupiter Deluxe, yet only days later Dennis Flemion disappeared while swimming during a family boating outing on Wind Lake in Racine, Wisconsin; his body was recovered several days afterward at age 57. In a Matador tribute Gerard Cosloy observed, “With the possible exception of Bob Pollard, it’s hard to think of anyone nearly as prolific as the Flemions, and you could certainly make a case for their catalog being every bit as impressive.”