Sunday Music: "Scooby Snacks" By Fun Lovin' Criminals

I love a one-hit-wonder that doesn’t surprise you because you were living in the bullseye of the target it was aiming for. Oh, 1996. You were a good year.

Three buddies are working at a New York City nightclub together. They find out that one of the other clubs their manager handles has a fighting problem. Not just little fights. Sunday night trash the place brawls. Chaos level stuff. But they have a solution.

When people walk into the club, the bouncers start handing out pills. I imagine the exchange going like this,

“Come on in, but here, take one of these.”

“What? Why? What is this?”

“You came here to party, right? Take one. It’s a Scooby Snack. On the house.”

(Thinking, “Well, I did come to party, and, free drugs from a trustworthy source like the doorman seems cool, so…”) “Sweet. Thanks man.” (Pops pills)

The Scooby Snacks were valiums. The idea was, if you get the partiers good and sedated, they can’t get so violent. Apparently it worked.

One of the friends is super amused by this and also super into music. In his off time, he likes to make beats and song ideas in his Brooklyn apartment. He especially likes to work with movies on in the background.

Because it’s the mid-90s, his favorites are period classics like Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs. Also, he’s really into sampling his favorite quotes from movies like this too.

One night, while working on a Tones on Tail sample with Quentin Tarantino flicks on in the background, he gets a flash of genius. What if the bouncer dude, the club owner, and some of the crazies from the bar were out there robbing banks all high on those scooby snacks?

He hooks up some ideas, shows it to his friends, and their group - The Fun Lovin’ Criminals, were on their way to a one hit wonder.

They made the song because it was fun. They made the song because their influences just all fit together like puzzle pieces. They made the song because what else were they doing?!

The song didn’t chart high in the states. BUT. I remember it.

I loved those movies. I loved Beastie Boys and “Sabotage” and got immediately caught up in the video they made for “Scooby Snacks.” It didn’t change my life or the world in any meaningful way, but it never fails to put a smile on my face.

Now when I hear it, it's a reminder: do what you love with your friends, and don’t be scared to ship the work. You never know who else is going to smile just because you made it and shared it.

If you’re into deep cuts, kudos to this account for adding some footage from an MTV special and synching up the uncensored version:

This is pretty cool too. Tones on Tail had some neat stuff. It was the guy from Bauhaus too - crazy, right?! I had never looked up the sample for “Scooby Snacks” before. It doesn’t even show up until 2ish minutes in (great work FLC).

ps. the less than happy but not the worst-ever ending is Quentin Tarantino sued them to force them to share 37% of the revenue with him over the movie samples.