Listen to Early White Zombie Song ‘Scarecrow #2′ (Exclusive)

The track is from an upcoming collection of rarely heard songs from the band's New York City days

White Zombie, circa 1986. Photo: Scott Smith

The band White Zombie made a name for itself in the early and mid-1990s with heavy, horror-themed songs such as “Beavis and Butthead” favorite “Thunder Kiss ’65” and the hit single “More Human Than Human.” But before the band’s MTV salad days, White Zombie was a noise-rock group from New York City’s underground scene that pressed only a few hundred copies of its first few records in the mid- to late 1980s, leaving several songs out of print.

But on June 3, 39 early White Zombie tracks will be available, remastered by guitarist J. Yuenger, in a boxed set called “It Came From N.Y.C.“ that will include five LPs or three CDs, and a 108-page, photo-packed hardcover book that chronicles the band’s rise. The remastered version of the previously unissued song “Scarecrow #2” premieres today on Speakeasy.


“Scarecrow #2″ rips along with a thundering, droning groove and wailing vocals, but its improvisational spirit distinguishes it from later, more slickly produced White Zombie tracks. It’s also a reflection of the band’s macabre influences at the time, according to Sean Yseult, the band’s bassist and co-founder along with singer Rob Zombie.

Photo: Numero Group

The two were a couple who met at the Parsons School of Design, bonding over their mutual obsession with horror movies, including the 1932 Bela Lugosi film that gave the band its name. (“We loved Bela Lugosi. Who doesn’t?” Yseult says.) She was also into goth acts such as Bauhaus and the Birthday Party, while Zombie was a big fan of the dark-punk group the Misfits.
“We were the two freaks in the cafeteria,” Yseult says.


Both Yseult and Zombie had been looking to start a band, but they never found the right people, and they went through several guitarists and drummers in the early going. White Zombie recorded its first version of “Scarecrow” in 1985, but revisited the song during the sessions for its second 7-inch vinyl record. Tim Jeffs, who plays guitar on “Scarecrow #2,” was a big Stevie Ray Vaughan fan, according to Yseult, and it gave the song an entirely different sound. “It just had a cool jam to it,” she says.

With the little money they had, Yseult and Zombie did two different pressings of their second 7-inch record, 1986′s “Pig Heaven.” Yseult says she would use the color Xerox machine at her job to print labels, and friends who worked at print shops would help them, too. Then, she and Zombie would distribute the vinyl themselves.

An original cassette from a 1986 White Zombie recording session. Photo: Numero Group 

“We walked all over Manhattan and dropped them off at Midnight Records and Bleecker Bob’s, and all those great vinyl shops that used to exist,” Yseult says.

After White Zombie broke up in 1998, Zombie went on to become a solo artist, director of horror films such as “House of 1,000 Corpses” — and defender of Japanese band Babymetal. Yseult, for her part, pursued her own career in music and art. Her art show Soirée D’Evolution is on display at the Lethal Amounts gallery in Los Angeles.

Now, three decades after those first White Zombie tremors, Yseult is listening to the old stuff with fresh ears — and she likes it. Back then, she and Zombie would often dismiss what they had just recorded as bad and then move on to the next project.

“We knew exactly what we were doing,” she says of the band’s experimental ways in those early days. “That’s what we were going for. There’s some really cool stuff in there.”

Calia, Michael. "Listen to Early White Zombie Song ‘Scarecrow #2′ (Exclusive)." WSJ. May 11, 2016. Accessed May 17, 2016. http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2016/05/11/listen-to-early-white-zombie-song-scarecrow-2-exclusive/.