Butthole Surfers’ Teresa Taylor Dead At 60

Pat Blashill

Butthole Surfers’ Teresa Taylor Dead At 60

Pat Blashill

Teresa Taylor, one of the drummers for Texas rock legends Butthole Surfers, has died. In 2021, Taylor revealed that she had been diagnosed with “end stage lung disease,” and last fall she said that her death was “imminent.”

“Teresa Taylor passed away peacefully this weekend after a long battle with lung disease,” Butthole Surfers wrote in a statement on their social media accounts. “She will live in our hearts forever. RIP, dear friend.” She was 60.

Taylor was born in 1962 in Arlington, Texas, and she joined up with Butthole Surfers in 1983, right after they released their debut self-titled EP. Taylor, who went by Teresa Nervosa in those days, had played with King Coffey — Butthole Surfers’ founding member and other drummer — in high school marching bands, though for a while they played up the fiction that they were siblings. Taylor was with the band through 1989 (save for one brief break), playing on the albums Psychic… Powerless… Another Man’s Sac, Rembrandt Pussyhorse, Locust Abortion Technician, and Hairway To Steven.

She left the band in 1989 and settled in Austin. In 1990, Taylor had a memorable role in Richard Linklater’s Slacker as “Pap Smear Pusher,” trying to sell a pap smear purportedly used by Madonna. Taylor rejoined Butthole Surfers and played with them for a 2009 tour.

“Teresa passed away clean and sober, peacefully in her sleep, this weekend. She was so brave, even in the face of her horrible disease,” her partner wrote in a Facebook post. “We were all fortunate to have her beautiful, strong spirit in our lives. She will be forever missed. We will have a memorial service sometime in the future.”

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