The Meat Puppets formed as a three-piece band in Scottsdale, Arizona circa 1979. The Kirkwood brothers, Curt and Cris, played guitar and bass, respectively, and Derrick Bostrom played drums.
Their early works (the In a Car ep and Meat Puppets I lp) were wholeheartedly punk, with unintelligible vocals and often sloppy musicianship. These sounds gave way to psychedelia, acid rock, and quieter tunes alongside the western-style thrash on Meat Puppets II, and to more intricate and melodic songs on 1985's Up On the Sun.
Over the next decade, the Meat Puppets released a series of albums, both on SST Records and finally on major labels, which hearkened back to ZZ Top and Led Zeppelin. In 1994, the band found themselves suddenly popular when Kurt Cobain played "Plateau" and "Lake of Fire" among other songs with Curt and Cris on MTV. Curt is the only original member left in the band as of 2002.
In December of 2003, Cris Kirkwood was arrested for attacking a security guard at a post office with the guard's baton. The guard shot Kirkwood during the melee. Kirkwood was subsequently denied bail, the judge citing Kirkwood's previous drug arrests and parole violations.
