Outrageous

Massively self-indulgent and perverse to its core, Kim Fowley’s Outrageous stands as one of the most over-the-top rock satires of its era. As an L.A.-based songwriter, producer and impresario, Fowley worked with everyone from the Hollywood Argyles and Gene Vincent to Frank Zappa and Johnny Winter in the ‘60s. His own albums from this time are hodgepodges of faux-psychedelic tunes, venomous parodies, poetic rants and prank phone calls. Outrageous is the best among these efforts, mixing snappy (if twisted) songs with a generous dose of free-association comedy. “Animal Man” and “Bubble Gum” (the latter covered by Sonic Youth in the ‘80s) display the same knack for catchy trash-pop that Fowley manifested as producer of the Runaways a few years later. Most of the rest of the album features improvised routines about hippies, squares, sadomasochism and world revolution that are sporadically hilarious if cringe-inducing. In the end, it’s hard to tell if Outrageous is a joke, an insult or an act of subversion – probably, it’s all three.