Pig Charmer

This is clearly about how jerry cantrell thought of himself at the lowest point of his drug addiction.

He caricaturizes himself as this disgusting loathesome animal-person. A thing that is only so loathesome, because in the grip of sickness one ceases to be fully human. There is a compulsion that comes over you and everything else goes to shit. It is said with a bit of humor, perhaps to make what happened more palatable to the conscious brain... but really there's nothing funny about it. It's tragic and deeply sad. You can almost hear the "moment of clarity" when human consciousness cracks through hellishness of such an irrational dejected greyed out existence...

"Man I don't really want to die... ...Pretty sure I'm gonna fry"

Yea. Perhaps because I've been so low so many times myself I am all too familiar with that "moment" of humanity... the one that only comes when you are just so grossed up and fucked up that humanity has become so alien, so coldly alien that when a human thought overcomes you, you're awake like cold icewater. You're like "oh my god look at me". But then it's back to "pig charmer" really because ultimately ... you're sick. The song plods along and dissipates.

Awesome song yea.

It's about Jerry staying in his house and not showering for months, period.

The song is about Jerry in his maximum degradation - nothing left to care about phase. Seems like his rock bottom, the one when the instinct to survive starts to break through. Interesting part: Layne used to call him "Satan Hoof" for apparently, a foot odor issue, and he quotes Satan Hoof in this song about the fact that he hasn't showered in two months.

sounds like me when i used to get high... ya its definately about someone jerry knew who was in a very poor state, it could be layne, but could be about anyone who is severely doped up and doesnt take care of themself. Which could be a lot of people. Just because layne is an easy target doesnt mean its him.

I absolutely agree with Noonie 100 percent. It says it in the cd booklet on degradation trip.

You never know, cataclysm0. I actually figured this song was about Jerry being a shut-in while writing the album until you guys started talking about the drug addiction connection. That definitely makes sense, considering Jerry and Layne's past addictions. I remember reading about how "Psychotic Break" is about Jerry slowly losing his mind while writing "Degradation Trip," and my first image about this song was Jerry holed up in his apartment for months writing songs, never showering or changing his clothes. Of course, he easily could have been drugged up on something at the time, so maybe both interpretations apply here.

I have never actually been high, but my guess is that ths song was written about somebody (Jerry,Layne or any of the hundreds of people that Jerry knew) The way I understand drug use is that an addice eventually does look and feel like an extremelu ugly and loathsome individual.

Probably about Jerry...not very likely it would be about Layne for this reason: 'lie in filth getting off'. Heroin takes away your sex drive. According to a friend I knew that was on it (clean now :D) "The hottest chick on earth could be standing naked in front of you and all you'd care about was that she's blocking your cartoons." Dunno though...could just be artistic embellishment and all. Good song no matter what.

How low can one go? About as low as Jerry Cantrell wallowing in the mud of his own self-pity party. Low...then crawl on your belly thru the muck, over broken glass, drug-fueled, peeing in bottles, low. Scraping the bottom, low. Wow.

A correction to the lyrics, hilarious should be halitosis. Listen to the song closely and you'll hear it right. As for the song itself, I honestly don't know but my guess is that it's Jerry angrily commenting about Layne's life in the time before his death. The lyrics just seem to be about a grotesque thing living in filth. Mr. Yuk Mouth is the green label put on many dangerous chemicals to warn children too young to read that they are harmful to ingest.