Gals Panic was an Austin

Austin, Texas

Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of :Texas and the seat of Travis County. Located in Central Texas on the eastern edge of the American Southwest, it is the fourth-largest city in Texas and the 14th most populous city in the United States. It was the third-fastest-growing large city in...

, Texas

Texas

Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...

 ska-punk band, formed in 1992. The band's name comes from the Kaneko

Kaneko

, also referred to as , was a Japanese video game publisher founded in Suginami, Tokyo, Japan by Hiroshi Kaneko. It published a number of games both under its brand and other companies, such as Air Buster, Nexzr, Shogun Warriors, DJ Boy, Guts'n, and the Gals Panic series...

 arcade game

Arcade game

An arcade game is a coin-operated entertainment machine, usually installed in public businesses such as restaurants, bars, and amusement arcades. Most arcade games are video games, pinball machines, electro-mechanical games, redemption games, and merchandisers...

 of the same name

Gals Panic

The Gals Panic games are variants of the classic puzzle game Qix. The objective is to uncover the silhouette portion of background with a marker until at least 80% of the silhouette is uncovered...

.

Band history

The original lineup for based Gals Panic consisted of vocalist Lance Fever (aka, Lance Myers), guitarist Jerm Pollet, and original bassist DJ Saturn playing along to a drum machine programmed by Mark Nineteen. It wasn't long before they found a real drummer, Steve Austin, to replace Mark Nineteen and the drum machine. DJ Saturn quit one year later and was replaced by Erik "the Butcher" Grostic, who played with the band for six months. Cardinal Connor joined the band in 1994, two weeks before their first US tour. In 1995, the band self-released their debut, and only, full-length album, I Think We Need Helicopters, through Goopy Pyramid Records. The album features cover versions of "Superstar

Superstar (Delaney and Bonnie song)

"Superstar" is a 1969 song written by Bonnie Bramlett and Leon Russell that has been a hit for many artists in different genres and interpretations in the years since; the best known version is by the Carpenters in 1971.-Original Delaney and Bonnie version:Accounts of the song's origin vary...

" and "We've Only Just Begun

We've Only Just Begun

"We've Only Just Begun" is the signature song of The Carpenters, written by Roger Nichols and Paul Williams , and is often used as a wedding song. The song was ranked at #405 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of "the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time".The song was recorded by Smokey Roberds, a friend...

", two tracks previously recorded by The Carpenters

The Carpenters

Carpenters were an American vocal and instrumental duo, consisting of sister Karen and brother Richard Carpenter. The Carpenters were the #1 selling American music act of the 1970s. Though often referred to by the public as "The Carpenters", the duo's official name on authorized recordings and...

.

The band's song "Gals Panic", was featured on the Skarmageddon compilation, released by Moon Ska Records, as well as the soundtrack for the Steven Soderbergh

Steven Soderbergh

Steven Andrew Soderbergh is an American film producer, screenwriter, cinematographer, editor, and an Academy Award-winning film director. He is best known for directing commercial Hollywood films like Erin Brockovich, Traffic, and the remake of Ocean's Eleven, but he has also directed smaller less...

 movie, The Underneath, in which the band also makes an appearance.

The band parted ways amicably in 1997. They have since played four hometown reunion shows in Austin, Texas, the most recent one taking place at Emo's

Emo's

Emo's is a prominent nightclub located in Austin, Texas. Emo's got its start as a Houston punk club in 1989, with the Austin location opening in 1992. The Houston location closed its doors in September 2001....

 in 2010.

Where are they now?

Guitarist Jerm Pollet would form the pop-punk band Missile Command, before moving on to his solo project, Tall, Dark and Lonesome. He later became a member of The Total Foxes. Pollet has also performed music with actor Timothy "Speed" Levitch, under the name Ongoing Wow. When not performing music, he has served as tour manager

Tour Manager

A tour manager is the person who helps to organize the administration for a schedule of appearances of a musical group or artist at a sequence of venues .-Background:...

 for RuPaul

RuPaul

RuPaul Andre Charles , best known as simply RuPaul, is an American actor, drag queen, model, author, and singer-songwriter, who first became widely known in the 1990s when he appeared in a wide variety of television programs, films, and musical albums. Previously, he was a fixture on the Atlanta...

 and performs in the ComedySportz

ComedySportz

ComedySportz is an improvisational comedy organization started in 1984 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, by a group of local comedians including Dick Chudnow, Bob Orvis, Brian Green and many others.-Format:...

 troupe and The Sinus Show. Lance Fever reunited with fellow Gals Panic band members Steve Austin and Cardinal Connor to form The Playdoh Squad who released their first album, Mutate, in 2000. Fever is the owner of Lance Fever Productions, an animation studio

Animation studio

An animation studio is a company producing animated media. The broadest such companies conceive of products to produce, own the physical equipment for production, employ operators for that equipment, and hold a major stake in the sales or rentals of the media produced...

, and has worked on various music projects and films such as A Scanner Darkly

A Scanner Darkly (film)

A Scanner Darkly is a 2006 science fiction thriller directed by Richard Linklater based on the novel of the same name by Philip K. Dick. The film tells the story of identity and deception in a near-future dystopia constantly under intrusive high-technology police surveillance in the midst of a drug...

, Prince of Egypt, Space Jam

Space Jam

Aside from Jordan, a number of NBA players and coaches appeared in the film. Larry Bird portrays a friend of Jordan who joins him for a game of golf. When the Monstars steal the NBA players' talent, they invade a game between the Phoenix Suns and the New York Knicks, causing the Knicks' Patrick...

as well as programming on Adult Swim

Adult Swim

Adult Swim is an adult-oriented Cable network that shares channel space with Cartoon Network from 9:00 pm until 6:00 am ET/PT in the United States, and broadcasts in countries such as Australia and New Zealand...

. He has supported his step-daughter, Ariel Abshire, also a musician, on stage. Connor now lives in Atlanta, Georgia

Atlanta, Georgia

Atlanta is the capital and most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia. According to the 2010 census, Atlanta's population is 420,003. Atlanta is the cultural and economic center of the Atlanta metropolitan area, which is home to 5,268,860 people and is the ninth largest metropolitan area in...

 and continues to perform music. Steve Austin performs with Get Hip Records

Get Hip Records

Get Hip Records is an independent Pittsburgh based music label and distributor formed by Gregg Kostelich in 1986. Kostelich used the label to release music by his own band, The Cynics, as well as other local, indie and retro garage rock bands.-Releases:...

recording artists The UglyBeats. DJ Saturn now plays guitar in The Transgressors.

External links

• Gals Panic bandcamp page
• Gals Panic Facebook page
• A review of I Think We Need Helicopters from the Austin Chronicle, 1995