Joey Killingsworth must love collaboration.
That’s the only way to explain the astounding run of records he’s produced and played on with his band mates in Joecephus & the George Jonestown Masscre (JGJM, as they refer to themselves). With titles like Heirs of the Dog: A Tribute to Nazareth, Five Minutes To Live: A Tribute To Johnny Cash, and Mutants Of The Monster: A Tribute to Black Oak Arkansas, and Call Me Animal: A Tribute to the MC5, the band has mastered the art of gathering input from a host of contributors who all pay tribute to foundational bands and artists.
And yet it would require JGJM to assemble that particular list of fundamental influences: Nazareth, MC5, Black Oak Arkansas, Johnny Cash — the list could and probably will go on, but the intersection of all those acts is JGJM in a nutshell. And at the heart of it is Joey Killingsworth, whose latest brainchild has been to pay tribute not to an artist, but to an entire state. And a big one at that.
With the new LP (and CD and streamed album), Trippin’ Through Texas: A Tribute to Texas Music, JGJM have cooked up arguably their most coherent and visionary tribute album yet. The first Saustex Records physical release of 2026, this tribute album, like the others, benefits a charity. The High Voltage Music Program of San Antonio, Texas, now headed into it’s 10th year, provides free after-school music instruction to teens, and Saustex will be donating $5 to High Voltage for every LP, CD or digital copy sold via Bandcamp.
As the liner notes put it, the album “does some exploratory surgery on a vast mine of gems by Texas songwriters and features another stellar guest list that includes:
Gary Floyd (Dicks, Sister Double Happiness, Black Kali Ma)
Scott Ayers (Pain Teens, Jane Woe)
Jeff Clayton (Anitseen)
Sir Barry Hannibal (Antiseen)
Cody Richardson (Richardson Seeds, Pure Luck, Hickoids)
JD Pinkus (Butthole Surfers, Honky, Pure Luck)
Tall Tall Trees
PW Long (Wig, Mule)
Jimbo Mathus (Squirrel Nut Zippers)
Jeff Smith (Hickoids)
Harvey McLaughlin (Hares, Sandworms, Hickoids)
David Yow (Scratch Acid, Jesus Lizard, Flipper)
Paul Leary (Butthole Surfers)
Lydia Lunch
We Are The Asteroid
Alicja Trout (Lost Sounds, River City Tanlines)
Nick Oliveri (Kyuss, QOTSA, Dwarves)
Brett Bradford (Scratch Acid, Jefferson Trout)
Tex Perkins (The Cruel Sea, Beasts of Bourbon)
Matt Walker (The Cruel Sea, The Fat Rubber Band)
Ironically, having an entire state as the album’s focus is also an opportunity to include a wider range of styles than previous releases. And for veteran hard rock troubadours like JGJM, the real heros of Texas music truly put the “trippin'” in the album’s title. And yet, ranging from country to punk to psychedelic rock, the album maintains a consistent vibe throughout due to the chemistry of JGJM, a band that’s so locked in, they can keep it loose.
While they can certainly clamp down on jackhammer riffs when needed, they also conjure up a perfectly slack garage domain in which to operate in unpredictable ways. That’s apparent right off the bat, with Willie Nelson’s “Time of the Preacher” rendered by Gary Floyd of the classic Texas punks, Dicks. True to the self-referential nature of the Texas punk scene, there’s also a version of the Butthole Surfers’ “Gary Floyd,” an anthem in honor of the pioneering singer. Sung by David Yow (Scratch Acid, Jesus Lizard, Flipper) with
Paul Leary (Butthole Surfers) also on board, it’s one of the most unhinged vocal performances and makes use of some imaginative production. Indeed, the entire album shows a willingness to tweak and distort the singers’ voices in crunchy and intriguing ways. When a singer’s delivery is a little unhinged to begin with, it’s complemented nicely with some Dalek-like vocal effects.
The band also rises and falls to the occasion as each song demands. Jimbo Mathus’ glorious take on “She’s About a Mover” has all the lunging and lurching of a backyard hootenanny with a spiked punch bowl — a sound that suits the band well. That mood’s continued with the irresistible down-home blues stomp of “There Oughta Be A Law Against Sunny Southern California,” featuring Harvey McLaughlin and Jeff Smith. On the other hand, JGJM can bring the metal sludge when Lydia Lunch takes the reins on “Shallow Hole,” delivered in an agitated, vampiric manner with an assist from We Are the Asteroid. And speaking of that manner, don’t sleep on Roky Erikson’s classic “Night of the Vampire,” delivered by none other than the Butthole Surfers’ J.D. Pinkus and Scott Ayers of the Pain Teens.
Topping it all off is a dark reading of an already dark masterpiece: Townes Van Zandt’s “Nothin’,” featuring Tex Perkins, Matt Walker, and Luke John, and it’s the perfect capstone to an album that’s fun, manic, loose, very Texan, and very trippy.
Joecephus & the George Jonestown Massacre play a free record release show for Trippin’ Through Texas at Murphy’s Bar this Saturday, May 23, with The Eastwoods opening.