The Shaggs
Encyclopedia
The Shaggs were an American
all-female rock
group formed in Fremont, New Hampshire
in 1968. The band was composed of sisters Dorothy "Dot" Wiggin (vocals/lead guitar
), Betty Wiggin (vocals
/rhythm guitar
), Helen Wiggin (drums
), and later Rachel Wiggin (bass
).
The Shaggs were formed by Dot, Betty, and Helen in 1968 on the insistence of their father, Austin Wiggin, who believed that his mother foresaw the band's rise to stardom. The band's only studio album
, Philosophy of the World
, was released in 1969. The album failed to garner attention, though the band continued to exist as a locally popular live act. The Shaggs disbanded in 1975 after the death of Austin.
The band is primarily notable today for their perceived ineptitude at playing conventional rock music; the band was described in one Rolling Stone
article as "...sounding like lobotomized
Trapp Family singers." As the obscure LP achieved recognition among collectors, the band was praised for their raw, intuitive composition style and lyrical honesty. Philosophy of the World was lauded as a work of art brut, and was later reissued, followed by a compilation album, Shaggs' Own Thing, in 1982. The Shaggs are now seen as a groundbreaking outsider music
group, receiving praise from mainstream artists such as Kurt Cobain
and also from Frank Zappa
after he called the Shaggs "better than the Beatles". Terry Adams
of NRBQ
compared the group's melodic lines and structures to the free jazz
compositions of Ornette Coleman
.
woman, that he would have two sons after she had died, and that his daughters would form a popular music group. The first two predictions came true, so Austin set about making the third come true. Austin withdrew his daughters from school, bought them instruments, and arranged for them to receive music and vocal lessons. The Wiggin sisters themselves never planned to become a music group, but as Dot later said, "[Austin] was something of a disciplinarian. He was stubborn and he could be temperamental. He directed. We obeyed. Or did our best." Austin named The Shaggs after the then-popular shag hairstyle and as a reference to shaggy dog
s. In 1968, Austin arranged for the girls to play a regular Saturday night gig at the Fremont, New Hampshire
Town Hall.
On the topic of the album, Cub Koda
wrote, "There's an innocence to these songs and their performances that's both charming and unsettling. Hacked-at drumbeats, whacked-around chords, songs that seem to have little or no meter to them ... being played on out-of-tune, pawn-shop-quality guitars all converge, creating dissonance and beauty, chaos and tranquility, causing any listener coming to this music to rearrange any pre-existing notions about the relationships between talent, originality, and ability. There is no album you might own that sounds remotely like this one." (emphasis in original) [] Reportedly, during the recording sessions the band would occasionally stop playing, claiming one of them had made a mistake and that they needed to start over, leaving the sound engineers to wonder how the girls could tell when a mistake had been made.
At this point, the man who had promised to press 1,000 copies of Philosophy of the World reportedly absconded with 900 of them, as well as with the money paid him. The rest were circulated to New England
radio stations but attracted little attention, and Austin's dreams of superstardom for his girls were dashed.
Upon closer examination, The Shaggs seem to have a consistent (but highly idiosyncratic) approach to melody
, harmony
, and rhythm
. The songs use highly irregular verse structures, which are emphasized by the melodic structures, which typically accord one note per syllable: the guitar accompaniment attempts to reproduce this pattern as well. Most of the Shaggs' material is made up of eighth- and quarter-notes.
In 1975, Austin Wiggin arranged a second recording session for his daughters, during which time the group recorded several songs. However, when the sessions were forestalled by Austin's fatal heart attack, The Shaggs aborted the recording project and disbanded the group shortly thereafter.
, who owned an original copy of the LP and were fans of the music, convinced their record label, Rounder Records
, to reissue Philosophy of the World. Upon the LP's release, Rolling Stone
magazine accorded the Shaggs "Comeback of the Year" honors. The album was widely—if derisively—reviewed. Adams and Ardolino issued some unreleased 1975 recordings on the 1982 LP Shaggs' Own Thing
, but its closer approximation to conventional music caused some to disregard this collection. In 1988 Dorothy Wiggin rediscovered the lost masters of Philosophy of the World in a closet; these and the tracks from Shaggs' Own Thing were remastered and released on Rounder as a self-titled compilation, which had a resequencing of all tracks. RCA Victor released Philosophy of the World (with the original track sequence) on CD in 1999, whereupon it was hailed as something of an avant-garde
cult classic
. The Wall Street Journal reviewed the CD on the day it was released, and The New Yorker
subsequently ran a lengthy profile of the Shaggs, authored by Susan Orlean
.
On November 20 and 21, 1999, NRBQ
celebrated their thirtieth anniversary with two concerts in New York City
; their opening act each night were The Shaggs. Helen, who had been suffering from depression
for years, declined to attend, so Ardolino, NRBQ's drummer, was faced with the challenging task of attempting to play Helen's parts. Dot, Betty, Rachel, and Ardolino played the same four-song set both nights. These performances marked the Shaggs' only live stage appearances outside of Fremont.
In 2001, the Animal World
label released Better Than The Beatles
, a Shaggs tribute album
. The title was based on the title of an article by Lester Bangs
in which he described the importance of what The Shaggs accomplished musically. The album featured established acts such as Ida
, Optiganally Yours
, R. Stevie Moore
, Deerhoof
and Danielson Famille covering The Shaggs' songs.
Artisan Entertainment
bought the movie
rights to the band's story in 2000, with Katherine Dieckmann
assigned to script and direct. Since that time, the project has been acquired by a succession of production companies, but no film has yet been made.
A stage musical about The Shaggs, Philosophy of the World by librettist/lyricist Joy Gregory, composer/lyricist Gunnar Madsen
, and co-conceiver/director John Langs, opened at the John Anson Ford Theatre in Los Angeles
in November 2003. The LA Weekly Theater Award
-winning Scenic Design was created by Brian Sidney Bembridge
. The production was staged at Lookingglass Theatre Company in Chicago in the spring of 2004 and at the New York Musical Theatre Festival
in September 2005.
The show received its New York premiere starting May 12, 2011 in a co-production between Playwrights Horizons
and New York Theatre Workshop
.
In May 2011 The Shaggs were the subject of a BBC Radio 4
documentary by Jon Ronson
.
Helen Wiggin died in 2006. She was survived by her two sons. The widow of Austin Wiggin, Jr., Annie Wiggin, died in 2005.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
all-female rock
Rock music
Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...
group formed in Fremont, New Hampshire
Fremont, New Hampshire
Fremont is a town in Rockingham County, New Hampshire, United States. The population was 4,283 at the 2010 census. Fremont is crossed by the Rockingham Recreation Trail and NH Route 107.-History:...
in 1968. The band was composed of sisters Dorothy "Dot" Wiggin (vocals/lead guitar
Lead guitar
Lead guitar is a guitar part which plays melody lines, instrumental fill passages, guitar solos, and occasionally, some riffs within a song structure...
), Betty Wiggin (vocals
Backing vocalist
A backing vocalist or backing singer is a singer who provides vocal harmony with the lead vocalist or other backing vocalists...
/rhythm guitar
Rhythm guitar
Rhythm guitar is a technique and rôle that performs a combination of two functions: to provide all or part of the rhythmic pulse in conjunction with singers or other instruments; and to provide all or part of the harmony, ie. the chords, where a chord is a group of notes played together...
), Helen Wiggin (drums
Drum kit
A drum kit is a collection of drums, cymbals and often other percussion instruments, such as cowbells, wood blocks, triangles, chimes, or tambourines, arranged for convenient playing by a single person ....
), and later Rachel Wiggin (bass
Bass guitar
The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....
).
The Shaggs were formed by Dot, Betty, and Helen in 1968 on the insistence of their father, Austin Wiggin, who believed that his mother foresaw the band's rise to stardom. The band's only studio album
Studio album
A studio album is an album made up of tracks recorded in the controlled environment of a recording studio. A studio album contains newly written and recorded or previously unreleased or remixed material, distinguishing itself from a compilation or reissue album of previously recorded material, or...
, Philosophy of the World
Philosophy of the World
Philosophy of the World is the first album by The Shaggs, released in 1969 by Third Word Records and rereleased in 1980 by Red Rooster Records/Rounder Records after the band NRBQ found it at a Massachusetts radio station in 1978...
, was released in 1969. The album failed to garner attention, though the band continued to exist as a locally popular live act. The Shaggs disbanded in 1975 after the death of Austin.
The band is primarily notable today for their perceived ineptitude at playing conventional rock music; the band was described in one Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
article as "...sounding like lobotomized
Lobotomy
Lobotomy "; τομή – tomē: "cut/slice") is a neurosurgical procedure, a form of psychosurgery, also known as a leukotomy or leucotomy . It consists of cutting the connections to and from the prefrontal cortex, the anterior part of the frontal lobes of the brain...
Trapp Family singers." As the obscure LP achieved recognition among collectors, the band was praised for their raw, intuitive composition style and lyrical honesty. Philosophy of the World was lauded as a work of art brut, and was later reissued, followed by a compilation album, Shaggs' Own Thing, in 1982. The Shaggs are now seen as a groundbreaking outsider music
Outsider music
Outsider music, a term coined by Irwin Chusid in the mid-1990s, are songs and compositions by musicians who are not part of the commercial music industry who write songs that ignore standard musical or lyrical conventions, either because they have no formal training or because they disagree with...
group, receiving praise from mainstream artists such as Kurt Cobain
Kurt Cobain
Kurt Donald Cobain was an American singer-songwriter, musician and artist, best known as the lead singer and guitarist of the grunge band Nirvana...
and also from Frank Zappa
Frank Zappa
Frank Vincent Zappa was an American composer, singer-songwriter, electric guitarist, record producer and film director. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa wrote rock, jazz, orchestral and musique concrète works. He also directed feature-length films and music videos, and designed...
after he called the Shaggs "better than the Beatles". Terry Adams
Terry Adams (musician)
Terry Adams is an American pianist/composer and a founding member of the musical group NRBQ , known for decades of extensive touring, energetic and humorous live shows, and wide-ranging musical repertoire, including rock, blues, country, pop, and jazz...
of NRBQ
NRBQ
NRBQ is an American rock band founded in 1967. It is known for its live performances, containing a high degree of spontaneity and levity, and blending rock, pop, jazz, blues and Tin Pan Alley styles. Its best known line-up is the 1974–1994 quartet of pianist Terry Adams, bassist Joey Spampinato,...
compared the group's melodic lines and structures to the free jazz
Free jazz
Free jazz is an approach to jazz music that was first developed in the 1950s and 1960s. Though the music produced by free jazz pioneers varied widely, the common feature was a dissatisfaction with the limitations of bebop, hard bop, and modal jazz, which had developed in the 1940s and 1950s...
compositions of Ornette Coleman
Ornette Coleman
Ornette Coleman is an American saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter and composer. He was one of the major innovators of the free jazz movement of the 1960s....
.
Career
The conceptual beginning of The Shaggs came from Austin Wiggin, Jr.'s mother. During Austin's youth she had predicted during a palmreading that he would marry a strawberry blondeStrawberry blonde
Strawberry blonde or blond may refer to:* Venetian blonde, a light reddish-blond* The Strawberry Blonde, a 1941 film based on a play of the same name by James Hagan.* "Strawberry Blonde", a 2008 track on All or Nothing...
woman, that he would have two sons after she had died, and that his daughters would form a popular music group. The first two predictions came true, so Austin set about making the third come true. Austin withdrew his daughters from school, bought them instruments, and arranged for them to receive music and vocal lessons. The Wiggin sisters themselves never planned to become a music group, but as Dot later said, "[Austin] was something of a disciplinarian. He was stubborn and he could be temperamental. He directed. We obeyed. Or did our best." Austin named The Shaggs after the then-popular shag hairstyle and as a reference to shaggy dog
Dog
The domestic dog is a domesticated form of the gray wolf, a member of the Canidae family of the order Carnivora. The term is used for both feral and pet varieties. The dog may have been the first animal to be domesticated, and has been the most widely kept working, hunting, and companion animal in...
s. In 1968, Austin arranged for the girls to play a regular Saturday night gig at the Fremont, New Hampshire
Fremont, New Hampshire
Fremont is a town in Rockingham County, New Hampshire, United States. The population was 4,283 at the 2010 census. Fremont is crossed by the Rockingham Recreation Trail and NH Route 107.-History:...
Town Hall.
On the topic of the album, Cub Koda
Cub Koda
Michael "Cub" Koda was an American rock and roll singer, guitarist, songwriter, disc jockey, music critic, and record compiler. Rolling Stone magazine felt that Koda was best known for writing the song "Smokin' in the Boys' Room", which reached #3 on the 1974 Billboard charts as performed by...
wrote, "There's an innocence to these songs and their performances that's both charming and unsettling. Hacked-at drumbeats, whacked-around chords, songs that seem to have little or no meter to them ... being played on out-of-tune, pawn-shop-quality guitars all converge, creating dissonance and beauty, chaos and tranquility, causing any listener coming to this music to rearrange any pre-existing notions about the relationships between talent, originality, and ability. There is no album you might own that sounds remotely like this one." (emphasis in original) [] Reportedly, during the recording sessions the band would occasionally stop playing, claiming one of them had made a mistake and that they needed to start over, leaving the sound engineers to wonder how the girls could tell when a mistake had been made.
At this point, the man who had promised to press 1,000 copies of Philosophy of the World reportedly absconded with 900 of them, as well as with the money paid him. The rest were circulated to New England
New England
New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...
radio stations but attracted little attention, and Austin's dreams of superstardom for his girls were dashed.
Upon closer examination, The Shaggs seem to have a consistent (but highly idiosyncratic) approach to melody
Melody
A melody , also tune, voice, or line, is a linear succession of musical tones which is perceived as a single entity...
, harmony
Harmony
In music, harmony is the use of simultaneous pitches , or chords. The study of harmony involves chords and their construction and chord progressions and the principles of connection that govern them. Harmony is often said to refer to the "vertical" aspect of music, as distinguished from melodic...
, and rhythm
Rhythm
Rhythm may be generally defined as a "movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions." This general meaning of regular recurrence or pattern in time may be applied to a wide variety of cyclical natural phenomena having a periodicity or...
. The songs use highly irregular verse structures, which are emphasized by the melodic structures, which typically accord one note per syllable: the guitar accompaniment attempts to reproduce this pattern as well. Most of the Shaggs' material is made up of eighth- and quarter-notes.
In 1975, Austin Wiggin arranged a second recording session for his daughters, during which time the group recorded several songs. However, when the sessions were forestalled by Austin's fatal heart attack, The Shaggs aborted the recording project and disbanded the group shortly thereafter.
Rediscovery
In 1980, Terry Adams and Tom Ardolino, of the band NRBQNRBQ
NRBQ is an American rock band founded in 1967. It is known for its live performances, containing a high degree of spontaneity and levity, and blending rock, pop, jazz, blues and Tin Pan Alley styles. Its best known line-up is the 1974–1994 quartet of pianist Terry Adams, bassist Joey Spampinato,...
, who owned an original copy of the LP and were fans of the music, convinced their record label, Rounder Records
Rounder Records
Rounder Records, originally of Cambridge, Massachusetts, but now based in Burlington, Massachusetts, is a record label founded in 1970 by Ken Irwin, Bill Nowlin and Marian Leighton-Levy, while all three were still university students...
, to reissue Philosophy of the World. Upon the LP's release, Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
magazine accorded the Shaggs "Comeback of the Year" honors. The album was widely—if derisively—reviewed. Adams and Ardolino issued some unreleased 1975 recordings on the 1982 LP Shaggs' Own Thing
Shaggs' Own Thing
Shaggs' Own Thing is a 1982 compilation album by The Shaggs. It contains songs that were composed during 1969 and 1975. Although the album was done by the same group, it lacks the originality that their debut Philosophy of the World had....
, but its closer approximation to conventional music caused some to disregard this collection. In 1988 Dorothy Wiggin rediscovered the lost masters of Philosophy of the World in a closet; these and the tracks from Shaggs' Own Thing were remastered and released on Rounder as a self-titled compilation, which had a resequencing of all tracks. RCA Victor released Philosophy of the World (with the original track sequence) on CD in 1999, whereupon it was hailed as something of an avant-garde
Avant-garde
Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....
cult classic
Cult Classic
Cult Classic is a Blue Öyster Cult studio recording released in 1994, containing remakes of many of the band's previous hits.-Track listing:# " The Reaper" - 5:05# "E.T.I...
. The Wall Street Journal reviewed the CD on the day it was released, and The New Yorker
The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
subsequently ran a lengthy profile of the Shaggs, authored by Susan Orlean
Susan Orlean
Susan Orlean is an American journalist. She has been a staff writer for The New Yorker since 1992, and has contributed articles to Vogue, Rolling Stone, Esquire, and Outside....
.
On November 20 and 21, 1999, NRBQ
NRBQ
NRBQ is an American rock band founded in 1967. It is known for its live performances, containing a high degree of spontaneity and levity, and blending rock, pop, jazz, blues and Tin Pan Alley styles. Its best known line-up is the 1974–1994 quartet of pianist Terry Adams, bassist Joey Spampinato,...
celebrated their thirtieth anniversary with two concerts in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
; their opening act each night were The Shaggs. Helen, who had been suffering from depression
Clinical depression
Major depressive disorder is a mental disorder characterized by an all-encompassing low mood accompanied by low self-esteem, and by loss of interest or pleasure in normally enjoyable activities...
for years, declined to attend, so Ardolino, NRBQ's drummer, was faced with the challenging task of attempting to play Helen's parts. Dot, Betty, Rachel, and Ardolino played the same four-song set both nights. These performances marked the Shaggs' only live stage appearances outside of Fremont.
In 2001, the Animal World
Animal World
Animal World is a collection of short stories written by Antonio di Benedetto, with hallucinatory animal transformations by the internationally acknowledged Argentine master.- Summary :...
label released Better Than The Beatles
Better Than The Beatles
Better Than The Beatles: A Tribute to The Shaggs is a tribute album consisting of cover versions of songs by The Shaggs from their sole album, Philosophy of the World.-Track listing:# Philosophy of the World - Ida...
, a Shaggs tribute album
Tribute album
A tribute album is a recorded collection of cover versions of songs or instrumental compositions. Its concept may be either various artists making a tribute to a single artist, a single artist making a tribute to various artists, or a single artist making a tribute to another single artist.There...
. The title was based on the title of an article by Lester Bangs
Lester Bangs
Leslie Conway "Lester" Bangs was an American music journalist, author and musician. He wrote for Creem and Rolling Stone magazines, and was known for his leading influence in rock 'n' roll criticism....
in which he described the importance of what The Shaggs accomplished musically. The album featured established acts such as Ida
Ida (band)
Ida is an indie rock band from New York City. They are known for their three part harmonies, sparse, minimal, often quiet arrangements, and for their three singer-songwriters...
, Optiganally Yours
Optiganally Yours
Optiganally Yours is a band formed around the Optigan, a toy organ produced by Mattel in the 1970s that plays the sounds of instruments that have been recorded onto celluloid disks...
, R. Stevie Moore
R. Stevie Moore
Robert Steven Moore is an American singer, songwriter, and musician. In addition to having numerous albums released on labels around the world, the prolific Moore has self-released over 400 cassette and CD-R albums since 1968, as well as dozens of home videos, mostly through the R. Stevie Moore...
, Deerhoof
Deerhoof
Deerhoof is a musical group consisting of Satomi Matsuzaki, John Dieterich, Ed Rodriguez and Greg Saunier.-Origins:In 1992, Greg Saunier, having recently graduated with a degree in music composition from Oberlin Conservatory of Music, joined a short-lived San Francisco quartet called Nitre Pit, on...
and Danielson Famille covering The Shaggs' songs.
Artisan Entertainment
Artisan Entertainment
Artisan Entertainment Inc. was a privately held independent American movie studio until it was purchased by a Canadian studio, Lionsgate, in 2003. At the time of its acquisition, Artisan had a library of thousands of films developed through acquisition, original production, and production and...
bought the movie
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
rights to the band's story in 2000, with Katherine Dieckmann
Katherine Dieckmann
Katherine Dieckmann is a film and music video director known for her work with R.E.M. and the feature films Good Baby and Diggers.-Music video filmography:*"Shiny Happy People" by R.E.M.*"Stand" by R.E.M.*"Your Ghost" by Kristin Hersh...
assigned to script and direct. Since that time, the project has been acquired by a succession of production companies, but no film has yet been made.
A stage musical about The Shaggs, Philosophy of the World by librettist/lyricist Joy Gregory, composer/lyricist Gunnar Madsen
Gunnar Madsen
Gunnar Madsen is an American composer and vocalist. He was the founder and leader of The Bobs before leaving the group in 1991, and has released several albums as a solo artist since then.-Biography:...
, and co-conceiver/director John Langs, opened at the John Anson Ford Theatre in Los Angeles
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
in November 2003. The LA Weekly Theater Award
LA Weekly Theater Award
LA Weekly Theater Award is an annual critics' award established in 1979, given by the LA Weekly for outstanding achievements in small theatre productions in Southern California...
-winning Scenic Design was created by Brian Sidney Bembridge
Brian Sidney Bembridge
Brian Sidney Bembridge is an American scenic and lighting designer for theater and film. His work has been seen on stages throughout the country and internationally on screen. Mr. Bembridge has also taught and lectured at several universities...
. The production was staged at Lookingglass Theatre Company in Chicago in the spring of 2004 and at the New York Musical Theatre Festival
New York Musical Theatre Festival
The New York Musical Theatre Festival is an annual three-week fall Festival which presents more than thirty new musicals at venues in New York City's midtown theater district...
in September 2005.
The show received its New York premiere starting May 12, 2011 in a co-production between Playwrights Horizons
Playwrights Horizons
Playwrights Horizons is a not-for-profit Off-Broadway theater located in New York City dedicated to the support and development of contemporary American playwrights, composers, and lyricists, and to the production of their new work....
and New York Theatre Workshop
New York Theatre Workshop
__notoc__New York Theatre Workshop is an Off-Broadway theatre noted for its productions of new works. Located at 79 East 4th Street between Second Avenue and the Bowery in the East Village neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, it houses a 198-seat theatre for its mainstage productions, and a...
.
In May 2011 The Shaggs were the subject of a BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
documentary by Jon Ronson
Jon Ronson
Jon Ronson is a Welsh journalist, documentary filmmaker, radio presenter and nonfiction author, whose works include The Men Who Stare At Goats. His journalism and columns have appeared in British publications including The Guardian newspaper, City Life and Time Out magazine...
.
Helen Wiggin died in 2006. She was survived by her two sons. The widow of Austin Wiggin, Jr., Annie Wiggin, died in 2005.
Members
- Dorothy "Dot" Wiggin — vocals, guitar (1968–1975, 1999)
- Betty Wiggin — guitar, vocals (1968–1975, 1999)
- Helen Wiggin (deceased) — drums (1968–1975)
- Rachel Wiggin — bass guitar (1969–1975, 1999)
- Tom Ardolino — drums (1999)
Collections
- Shaggs' Own ThingShaggs' Own ThingShaggs' Own Thing is a 1982 compilation album by The Shaggs. It contains songs that were composed during 1969 and 1975. Although the album was done by the same group, it lacks the originality that their debut Philosophy of the World had....
(1982) - The Shaggs (1988 - includes all studio recordings)
V/A compilations
- Songs In The Key of ZSongs in the Key of ZSongs in the Key of Z is the title of a book and two compilation albums written and compiled by Irwin Chusid. The book and albums explore the field of what Chusid coined as "outsider music"...
- The Curious Universe of Outsider Music (2000)
External links
- The Shaggs official website
- Meet The Shaggs (biographical information)
- My Pal Foot-Foot (unofficial site)
- VarietyVariety (magazine)Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
review of 2003 off-Broadway production Philosophy of the World, by Joy Gregory, based on the Shaggs - Obituary for Helen Wiggin Bickford
- A Shaggs Jazz Review by John McNeilJohn McNeil (Musician)John McNeil is an American jazz trumpeter. He has performed with artists including Horace Silver, Gerry Mulligan, and The Thad Jones/ Mel Lewis Orchestra.-External links:...