This album is the first published example of two things for which The Residents became known: the concept album and music about music. Considered by some to be the cornerstone of The Residents' reputation, The Third Reich 'N' Roll consists of two tracks (one on each side of the LP), each a medley of deconstructed (dismembered?) covers of popular songs from the '60s.

In the original album liner notes, The Cryptic Corporation calls The Third Reich 'N' Roll The Residents' "tribute to the thousands of little power-mad minds in the music industry who have helped make us what we are today, with an open eye on what we can make them tomorrow." The ESD Classic Series CD liner notes call the album a "scathingly satirical look at '60's bubble-gum rock somehow twisted into shocking '70's bubble-gum avant-garde". Other descriptions included "Pop meets Dada", "the 60's as done by the 70's German avant-garde". Uncle Willie describes the album as "[taking] all your favourite bubble gum riffs from the sixties, dress[ing] them up in avant-guard drag, and send[ing] them into the streets to break windows".

The Residents put a lot of effort into the packaging and promotion of the album. In keeping with the "Third Reich" theme, the promotional photos featured men in swastika glasses and wearing giant swastika collars. The Nazi references and swastikas were a problem all through the album's history.

In fact, the album couldn't be released in Germany at all because the swastikas in the cover art are banned there. The band put out a "censored" version of the album cover in responce.

The Residents also made a short film to promote the album -- one of the very first music videos. It is in two parts. The first features The Residents, in newspaper costumes, dancing around to the album's version of Land of 1000 Dances in a newspaper world the band created in their studio. In the second half, a newspaper man is joined by an Atomic Shopping Cart, giant pork chops, and various other props from the Vileness Fats movie in a pixelated dance. The newspaper costumes caused more publicity problems for the band, though, since the tall, conical hoods led some of people to think that the group was promoting the Ku Klux Klan. In actual fact, the costumes were made that way because that was the simplest way to make a head-covering out of newspaper.

Ralph Records also released a special limited release of twenty-five The Third Reich 'N' Roll Collector's Boxes in 1980. The packaging was very elaborate: the disk was "hand pressed" in red marbled vinyl with a silk-screened sleeve and labels, all wrapped up in a black, velvet-lined wooden box. The box opened by a sliding panel which was hand silk-screened with the cover art, and contained two signed and numbered lithographs. The whole thing was bundled up in a draw-string bag made of fabric left over from a Christo's art project.

1. Swastikas on Parade
2. Hitler Was a Vegetarian

(Swastikas on Parade may consist of: Let's Twist Again / Land Of 1000 Dances / Hanky Panky / A Horse With No Name / Double Shot Of My Baby's Love / The Letter / Psychotic Reaction / Hey, Little Girl / Papa's Got A Brand New Bag / Talk Talk / I Want Candy / To Sir, With Love / Telstar / Wipe Out / Heroes And Villains)

(Hitler Was a Vegetarian might include: Judy In Disguise (With Glasses) / 96 Tears / It's My Party / Light My Fire / Ballad Of The Green Berets / Yummy Yummy Yummy / Rock Around The Clock / Pushing Too Hard / Good Lovin' / Gloria / In A Gadda Da Vida / Sunshine Of Your Love / Hey Jude / Sympathy For The Devil)


The 2017 pREServed edition includes the following bonus tracks:

• Satisfaction
• Loser ??... Weed
• Beyond The Valley Of A Day In The Life
• Flying
• German Slide Music Pt1
• German Slide Music Pt2
• German Slide Music Pt4
• German Slide Music Pt5
• German Slide Music Pt6
• The 'Oh Mummy' Show (Live, 1976)
• The Letter (1982 Rehearsal)
• Satisfaction (Live, Madrid, 1983)
• Land Of 1000 Dances (Scott Colburn 1992 Mix)
• Loser ??... Weed (Live 2013)
• Third Reich (Icky Flix DVD Mix)
• Third Reich (Live 2001)
• Oh Mummy Backing Tape Concentrate
• Third Reich Outtakes Reel

"Why do The Residents hate The Beatles?"

That was a popular question several years ago when Ralph Records released The Residents' first album, Meet the Residents. Not everyone appreciated seeing their Beatle-Gods treated so non-seriously. The real Beatles, obviously being more intelligent than their fans, thought it was hilarious. Capitol Records, predictably, thought the cover should be changed, so it was.

Then there was the second album, Not Available. Produced in total secrecy, the album is a conceptualization of the theory of obscurity, as applied to phonetic organisation, as originally put forth by the Bavarian avantguardist, N. Senada, with whom The Residents worked in the late 1960's. According to the theory of obscurity, the album was not to be released. However, in 1978, four years later after completion, the LP was released to fulfill contractual obligations.

In a more traditional vein, The Residents announce the release of their third LP, The Third Reich 'n' Roll. Already people are speculating whether The Residents are hinting that Rock 'n' Roll has brain-washed the youth of the world. When confronted with this possibility, they replied, "Well, it may be true or it may not, but we just wanted to kick out the jams and get it on."

The Third Reich 'n' Roll consists of two suites, Swastikas on Parade and Hitler was a Vegetarian. Both are semi-phonetic interpretations of top fourty hits from the sixties. "Our roots", say The Residents, a bright orange carrot clutched lovingly in their extended hands.


Album credits
The Residents play all the instruments except for additional vocals by Zeibak and Peggy Honeydew, and some fancy guitar by Gary from Beserkely. Produced by The Residents 1974-75.

Important Message: The Residents freely admit that the riffs, words, and even sometime the arrangements found on The Third Reich 'N' Roll were shamelessly lifted from their memory of top forty radio of the sixties. We, as the parent company, support The Residents in their tribute to the thousands of little power-mad minds of the music industry who have helped make us what we are today, with an open Eye on what we can made them tomorrow.

-- The Cryptic Corporation / Ralph Records

Pop meets Dada on The Third Reich 'N' Roll. Has rock 'n' roll been distracting us from (or lying to us about) the ugliness of the real world, seducing us with the music's inherent mad little power fantasies? In 1975 The Residents released their first great parody album. It consisted of two LP-side-long suites, constructed out of almost unrecognizably ugly cover versions of rock classics of the 1960's. The first suite was called "Swastikas on Parade", the second was "Hitler was a Vegetarian."

The album kicks off with a Resident imitating Adolph Hitler imitating Chubby Checker singing "Let's Twist Again, Like We Did Last Summer." There's a rendition of "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag," sung in German, and recognizable only for its short blasts from a horn section. There's a wistful "Judy in Disguise," a tribute to their fellow Louisianian, John Fred.

There's a Kabuki rendition of "Gloria," a comatose version of "Good Lovin'," and an ugly "Double Shot of My Baby's Love" (a song which would take on major importance in their music many years later) among dozens of others.

This is certainly an album from their early, primitive period. Most of the songs' segues seem to have been created through tape editing. However the album culminates in a very sophisticated medley, musically combining "Inna-Godda-Divida," "Hey Jude" and "Sympathy for the Devil" into a seamless whole.

Releasing cover versions of other people's hits quickly became a major part of The Resident's repertoire. On their early interpretations, whether the songs are innocuous ("Flying," "The Hanky Panky," "It's My Party and I'll Cry if I Want To") or anti-social ("The Ballad of the Green Berets," "Psychotic Reaction," "Talk Talk," "Sympathy for the Devil") the lyrics are unintelligible or non existent suggesting that it is not the lyrics, but the mindlessness of rock culture which is tipping us on the brink of fascist apocalypse.

In the Eighties, The Residents would take the opposite approach. They would make the lyrics very clear proving that pop songs always have blatantly manipulative lyrics, but we never notice because we're too distracted by a bitchin' beat, and the good looks of groovy-guitar playing guys.

The Third Reich 'N' Roll's somewhat controversial cover art depicts Dick Clark dressed as a Nazi, clutching a tantalizing carrot. He dangles the carrot before the youth of America, just as Snuffy Smith had dangled a carrot before the nose of Barney Google's horse while leading him to the glue factory.

- Sinister Scratcher

While not on The Third Reich 'N' Roll, this was always regarded by The Residents as "the single from the album."

Satisfaction is a cover of the famous song by the Rolling Stones, recorded as a three-minute distillation of the ideas behind The Third Reich 'N' Roll. It features Snakefinger on guitar and backing vocals by The Pointless Sisters.

The Wire magazine had this to say about Satisfaction in their September, 1998, article "100 Records That Set The World On Fire (While No One Was Listening)":

If there was one record that told you the 60s were over, then this was it. The Clash may have crowed, "no Rolling Stones in 1977", but their rhetoric was just gasbag posturing compared to this, a blowtorch evisceration of Jagger and Richard's song that reduces their original to a piece of marketable rebellion fluff (Wham!'s "Bad Boys" with a better riff). The Residents start from the premise that there are rather more serious things to be unsatisfied about than romance or advertising things like total mental breakdown, a condition they proceed to delineate with unbearably off-key guitars and a vocal that sounds like the most haunted, driven, raging man alive. It's excruciating, purifying and hilarious, and if inflicted on friends it usually receives two of the highest possible accolades: "Take that fucking thing off", and "They weren't being serious, were they?" (vinyl 7" big hole)