Southbound Pachyderm

"Southbound Pachyderm"
Single by Primus
from the album Tales from the Punchbowl
Released	1995
Length	6:22
Label	Interscope
Songwriter(s)	Les Claypool, Larry LaLonde, Tim Alexander
Producer(s)	Primus
Primus singles chronology
"Mrs. Blaileen" (1995) "Southbound Pachyderm" (1995) "Shake Hands with Beef" (1997)

"Southbound Pachyderm" is a song by the American rock band Primus. It was released on their fourth studio album Tales from the Punchbowl (1995). It was also released as a single, and a stop-motion animated video was made for it. The song is about the extinction threat faced by elephants, rhinos and hippos.^[1]

Les Claypool said in 2015 that "Southbound Pachyderm" is one of his favorites songs to play live.^[2] It has been played 457 times since its live debut, making it the 7th most played song by Primus.^[3]

Track listing

1. "Southbound Pachyderm (Radio Edit)" - 4:00
2. "Wynona's Big Brown Beaver" - 4:24
3. "Jerry Was A Race Car Driver" - 3:11
4. "Those Damned Blue Collar Tweekers" - 5:18
5. "My Name Is Mud" - 4:40

Background

The inspiration for the song came from an image that CMJ New Music Monthly said Claypool "couldn't shake ... 'an elephant's ass heading away from you'".^[4][5]

Music videos

Two music videos exist for the song "Southbound Pachyderm".

The first version was included in the CD+ Enhanced CD version of the album, which allowed a computer's CD-ROM to access enhanced aspects of the album, namely becoming a tug boat captain that allowed one to explore different parts of the punchbowl world. It was a pastiche of San Francisco, elephants with propellers and wings, and psychedelic imagery. It is currently not published, although such version can be viewed online.^[6]

The official music video for the song is in entirely stop-motion with the band (in live action) appearing on TV screens. For the stop motion story, it features elephants being stalked by poachers but are saved at the last moment by several scientists. At the climax of the video, the scientists and the elephants (along with some hippos and rhinos) then escape from their laboratory when the poachers begin to attack via orders from their leader.

Claypool came up with the idea for the video and included regular character Flouncin' Fred.^[7] The video reflects Claypool's concern over the conservation status of pachyderms.^[8] He and Raub Shapiro co-directed the video. Shapiro had previously produced the video for "Wynona's Big Brown Beaver". Claypool initially worked on storyboards for the video but moved on to foam sculptures when he found that medium easier to express his ideas. Raub then did storyboards, and they handed the work to animators, who used stop motion photography. Animation was slow work; Claypool said that the studio was only able to produce six to ten seconds of footage per day, and the video took six weeks to complete.^[9]

Legacy

Claypool later referenced the song in a pinot noir wine called Purple Pachyderm.^[10]

References

1. Primus' Claypool Readies Video For "Southbound Pachyderm" - MTV
2. Jones, Bill. "Rank Your Records: Les Claypool Rates Primus' Albums". Noisey. Retrieved 15 December 2020.
3. "Southbound Pachyderm by Primus Song Statistics | setlist.fm". setlist.fm.
4. Lanham, Tom (August 1995). "Primus". CMJ (24): 18–21.
5. Holthouse, David (1995-08-23). "BEAVERS AND PENGUINS AND PACHYDERMS, OH MY!PRIMUS PUTS THE BASS IN YOUR FACE--ALONG WITH DOSES OF INNOVATION AND CARTOON WEIRDNESS". Phoenix New Times. Retrieved 2015-02-01.
6. "Primus - Southbound Pachyderm (Enhanced CD)". YouTube. Archived from the original on 2021-12-21. Retrieved 2020-05-17.
7. Prato, Greg (2014). Primus, Over the Electric Grapevine. Akashic Books. p. 196. ISBN 9781617753220.
8. Goldberg, Michael (1996-03-08). "Primus' Claypool Readies Video For "Southbound Pachyderm"". MTV. Archived from the original on February 1, 2015. Retrieved 2015-02-01.
9. Horak, Terri (1996-04-06). "Band Is Involved with Vid, Enhanced CD". Billboard. Vol. 108, no. 14.
10. Sweet, Carey (2012-01-29). "Claypool Cellars primed by Primus' Les Claypool". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved 2015-02-01.