Pigdog Journal (Crazy But True) -- Screamin' Jay Hawkins: He's My DAD

Sad to say, for all you freaks who've been too whacked out on goofballs to hear, but Screamin' Jay Hawkins is DEAD DEAD DEAD. But check this: a Web site has been set up to try and contact SJH's alleged 57 illegitimate kids so they can get a chunk of his inheritance. Now whaddaya think about THAT?

It turns out that SJH was kind of a big sleazo slut who slept with a lot of women over the 40+ years of his professional life. But name a professional musician who doesn't cat around! Name one! I dare you! So don't judge Screamin' Jay.

I guess he was also kind of averse to birth control, because by his personal account he had 57 children over that time period. That's about 1.5 children a year, give or take a quarter of a child. Screamin' Jay kind of moved around a lot, so he never really had much of a permanent address or phone number for folks to keep in touch with him, but he kept a mental tally of gals who had called him to say, "Hey, I'm having your shortie." And now that he's gone, his friends and estate are trying to contact all those kids and get them some $$.

I kind of question the 57 kids number, though. I mean, if Screamin' Jay was hard to contact for that long, how does he know there wasn't more shorty-producing where he forgot to leave a forwarding number? And by the time you get to the mid-thirties, isn't it hard to keep all those kids in order? ALSO, and here's the key problem with this, isn't 57 kind of a good number to pull out of your ass, if someone asks you how many love children you have? 57 is the second most well-known number between 25 and 100, being the number of Heinz pickle varieties, etc.

Anyways, it's probably just as well that SJH was out of the picture for so long in those kids' lives. Can you imagine getting your once-a-year absentee Dad phone call from SCREAMIN' JAY HAWKINS? "AAAAAAOOOOWW! How you doin', Bobby? UNNGH! I mean Jake, yeah, Jake. WHOOOOO-OOO-OOOO. UNH. Working hard in school? OOOOAAAOOW! Good, good. You help your HUH mother and be a good boy, OK? UUUNGH! SQUISH! Goodbye now. FLURTH! OOOOOOOH!"

Whatever the deal is, if you think you're one of the lucky 57, or even if you're not, you should go check out this Web site. It's got lots of Screamin' Jay pictures and a bio and stuff. No MP3s, though. BUMMER! Anyways, good luck. If you're a certified child of Screamin' Jay, I'll see if I can get you a free Pigdog Journal sticker, OK? Go crazy.