The Camper Van Beethoven were one of the most brilliant and influential groups of the 1980s. Their sarcastic folk/punk caught both hardcore and traditional rock and roll off guard. The band, along with the Butthole Surfers, also established a detached and ironic attitude, while remaining faithful to the punk ethos, which would change the very way alternative rock expressed itself.

The five had met at Santa Cruz College, one of the last strongholds of hippie culture, and began playing a jovial mix of ska, surf, marches, quadrilles, waltzes, and garage rock, aimed at college radio audiences. Guitarist and singer David Lowery composed most of their punk skits, while multi-instrumentalist Jonathan Segel, who alternated effortlessly between violin and balalaika, oversaw the more dadaist arrangements. Greg Lisher on guitar, Victor Krummenacher on bass and vocals, and Chris Molla on steel completed the lineup, which might have seemed like a band of amateurs but actually offered a sophisticated and forward-looking counterpoint.

The album Telephone Free Landslide Victory (Independent Project, 1985) was packed with hilarious instrumentals that parodied ethnic music in the form of ambient music, from Border Ska to the even more absurd Skinhead Stomp (still ska, with gypsy flourishes), from the Tex-Mex reggae of Yanqui Go Home to the Morricone-style Chinese ballet Mao Reminisces About His Days, to the Cossack dances Vladivostok and Balalaika Gap. The songs are equally convoluted and hilarious but showcase their satirical edge especially in the lyrics, from the country-and-western shuffle of Where The Hell Is Bill, a Country Joe-style protest song poking fun at the punk world, through a breathless polka (Tina) and a beaty giga (I Don't See You), to the psychedelic blues elegy The Day That Lassy Died, a "moving" tribute to the dog-symbol of the "American dream," and the caustic country ballad Ambiguity Song, the epigraph and moral of the album, where Segel’s violin once again imitates Cale’s viola.

Here and there you can hear the folk-rock strumming of Pete Buck, elsewhere the lysergic inflections of Syd Barrett (in the epic pop of Oh No). Embracing the jovial music of Zappa and the Modal Rounders, the Campers renew the arsenal of musical costume debris, speeding across territory spanning three or four continents and elaborating with faux nonchalance the most eccentric vocabulary of rock.
What made them a local institution was above all the novelty Take The Skinheads Bowling (recorded in 1984), which combines jingle-jangle folk-rock, Dylan-style protest ballads, the Velvet Underground’s raga influence, and the amphetamine reels of the Holy Modal Rounders.

The EP Take The Skinheads Bowling (Pitch A Tent, 1986) added another jovial novelty, Cowboys From Hollywood, a Morricone-style country tune with music hall choruses and balalaika arpeggios; another delirious Cossack dance, Atkuda; a vigorous ska, Epigram; and a playful beach tune, Colonel Bermudez (the "contras" general). Segel establishes himself here as one of rock’s most ingenious and eclectic arrangers.

The amateurish sound of Landslide Victory disappears on the next album, II & III (Pitch A Tent, Feb 1986), played and recorded more professionally, with greater emphasis on keyboards (again Segel), roots-rock, and atmosphere. The gags are less hilarious but more musical: Bad Trip is a ragged blues with surf organ, Circles a raga with modal chimes à la Jerry Garcia, Dustpan and Cattle epic, cosmic jingle-jangle in a free-form style reminiscent of the Dead, ZZTop Goes To Egypt a driving R&B stomp scarred by stellar violin. The Campers also indulge in lowbrow imitations: Mamas & Papas-style folk-rock (Sometimes), a couple of beat-era garage-rock songs (Chain Of Circumstances and Down And Out), plus the usual hoedowns (Abundance), waltzes (Sad Lovers), ragtime (Goleta), jigs (No Flies On Us), and "Cossack" ska (No Krugerrands and 4 Year Plan) for a music hall of the absurd that entertains even the most neurotic and nihilistic punks; yet their music is more than ever a "cultured" art pervaded by a caustic sense of postmodern artistry. They excel in the genre of paradoxical instrumentals, representing a new form of pan-ethnic, surrealist chamber music.

The third album, Camper Van Beethoven (Pitch A Tent, Nov 1986), perhaps their most complete and mature, is another collection of eccentricities and heresies, such as the epic Jonathan Richman-style refrain with reggae-Tex-Mex tempo, Dylan Desire accents, and hippie spirit in Good Guys And Bad Guys; or the frenzied "railroad" blues of We Love You, with Jeff Cotton-style guitar, quasi-voodoo drumming, and flower-child satire. The album is not only more "spoken" than the previous ones but also explores new "languages," from the psychotic hillbilly of Joe Stalin's Cadillac, worthy of Commander Cody, to the whip-cracking Native American rhythm of History Of Utah; with a particular fondness for the psychedelic-era garage-pop vocabulary: acidic choruses (We Saw Jerry's Daughter), epic guitar bursts reminiscent of Jefferson Airplane (Surprise Truck), vocal and rhythmic orientalism (Still Wishing To Course), Doors-style melodies and organ (Lulu Land), minimalist keyboards and lysergic choruses (Peace And Love), martial cadences and hard rock riffs (Shut Us Down); and for the equally picturesque raga-rock vocabulary: the Hare Krishna anthem of Five Sticks, the Celtic/Cajun/medieval hop of Une Fois and its mystical/psychedelic version Stairway To Heaven. This album seems to be a parodic upside-down tribute to the fallen hippie civilization. The incoherent harmonies created by Segel’s violin in frenzied duels with Chadbourne’s banjo, Lisher’s lead, and Molla’s steel form the grotesque Babel of the album. Credit also goes to drummer Crispy Derson (Chris Pedersen), the most imaginative and versatile of those who rotated around the core quintet. There are actually too few pure instrumentals, such as the frenzied How Yourself Down. Lowery, for his part, has developed a more "serious" vocal technique that does not merely mock stereotypes but defines a clear and linear register, akin to many singers of the beat era. An original neo-psychedelic ballad form appears on the horizon, emerging from the encyclopedic melting pot of folk music from everywhere.

The EP Vampire Can Mating Oven (Pitch A Tent, 1987) added to the repertoire the absurd reggae-surf of Heart, the beat/ska refrain of Never Go Back, and the dissonant instrumental Processional.

Tusk (Pitch A Tent, 2002), recorded in 1987, was intended as a track-by-track remake of the Fleetwood Mac album of the same name.

They even recorded a Camper Van Chadbourne with the notorious country-noise guitarist, who contributed demonic odes like Psychedelic Basement. Years later, an album of previously unreleased Camper Van Chadbourne recordings was issued, Used Record Pile (Knitting Factory, 2000).

While Lisher, Pedersen, and Krummenacher devised the Monks Of Doom with members of the Ophelias, Segel indulged in recording a double album, Storytelling (Pitch A Tent, 1988), entirely devoted to his bizarre arrangements.

The group further cleaned up its sound on Our Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart (Virgin, 1988). The tone is generally more pensive than joyvial, particularly with the country-rock ballad Eye Of Fatima (and its hypnotic raga-rock coda), the waltz-like country singalong Change Your Mind, the middle-eastern guitar shuffle Devil Song, the closing Life Is Grand, that sums up the group's philosophy, and the soulful elegy One of These Days, which blends ska guitar and celtic violin. Wind instruments play a bigger role than ever, both as additions and as subtractions to the group sound. The martial, ancestral-sounding lament O Death is enhanced with a Salvation Army-like brass fanfare. The instrumental Waka lets thundering hard-rock riffs maul the exotic trumpet melody that opened it. Keyboards are prominent in Never Go Back, on the other hand, which also boasts catchy vocal harmonies. But Segel's contribution is much stronger when he plays the violin, which then becomes the album's second voice: Segel's tours de force turn simple meditations like She Divines Water into demonic, metaphysical romps.
The pace and the volume pick up only in a couple of songs: Turquoise Jewelry, a romp of emphatic ska tempo, punkish shout and brass fanfare; and the driving, forceful, rocking My Path Belated.
While still full of ideas, this is a much calmer and straight-forward album.

Key Lime Pie (Virgin, 1989) si avventurero` nel commentario sociale "serio" componendo ballate in chiave minore degne di Neil Young (Sweethearts, When I Win The Lottery, All Her Favorite Fruit, Borderline).

Their post-modern, post-folk, one-dimensional world music derives equally from surf beach bands, Salvation Army brass bands, Russian immigrant combos, chamber ensembles, dance-hall big bands, Caribbean steel bands, Mexican orchestras, and Morricone soundtracks. In this melting pot of Californian popular folklore, the Campers skillfully and mischievously deploy thirty years of harmonic inventions: from Cale’s hypnotic viola to the REM-style cryptic jingle-jangle, from Barrett’s psychedelic novelties to the depraved orgies of the Stooges, from Jonathan Richman’s surreal ditties to the Grateful Dead’s acid-rock jams, from Zappa’s absurdist collages to Pete Stampfel’s rollicking rural dances—the only violinist capable of matching Segel’s absurdities.

The power of irrelevance makes these pataphysical clowns the worthy heirs of rock music-hall tradition of the Bonzo Dog Band, revised and updated to the pan-ethnic sensibilities of the new Boheme.

Cigarettes and Carrott Juice (Spinart, 2003) is an anthology of the early years.

David Lowery formed Cracker.

Jonathan Segel's new project, Hieronymus Firebrain (Delta, 1992), displays a more experimental brand of psychedelic jazz/folk-rock. Here (Magnetic, 1994) is far less engaging because the intellectual experiments fail to intrigue and the weight of the disc is left on the shoulders of a witty ditty like Life Blood and an odd instrumental like Swell. The companion live disc, There (Magnetic, 1994), is noteworthy only when it draws inspiration from Frank Zappa's quirky instrumentals (Camel Driver, Crime Prevention Waltz). The project evolved into Jack & Jill, which released Chill and Shrill (Magnetic, 1995) and Fancy Birdhouse (1997). Under his own name he released Scissors and Paper (2000).

Krummenacher released the albums Out in the Heat (Magnetic, 1995), credited to Great Laugh, Saint John's Mercy (Magnetic, 1998) and Nocturne (Pitch-A-Tent, 2003).

The political rock opera New Roman Times (Pitch-A-Tent, 2004), their first studio album in 15 years, vaguely inspired by the war on terrorism, is not so much a Michael Moore-ish anti-establishment rant as it signals a new awareness, typical of the middle age. The disc flounders when the tone gets too grave and serious (Sons of the New Golden West, White Fluffy Clouds), but elsewhere it still radiates pale memories of their demented roots-rock (That Gum You Like Is Back in Style, Militia Song, 51-7, the instrumental R'N'R Uzbekistan, Might Makes Right, I Hate This Part of Texas, The Poppies of Balmorhea). Their trademark infernal humour surfaces in the disco spoof of Discotheque CVB and in the avantgarde spoof of I Am Talking to This Flower. All in all, though, the concept hurts detracts than it enhances. Having replaced nonsense with sense, the CVB sound a lot less vital.