The Real Story Behind That Viral Goat at a Punk Show

Quick Take

• A retired milking goat was facing the slaughterhouse, but then a van full of punk rockers made her an offer she couldn't refuse. Meet Biquette's rescuers →
• Her taste in snacks was somehow more extreme than the music she was moshing to. See her wild diet →
• One band's manager snapped a few throwaway photos at a French DIY venue, in the process accidentally creating one of the internet's most enduring animal memes. See the viral photos →
• Her caretaker's parting words about her lifespan say everything about how hard she actually lived. Read her final years →

If you’ve spent enough time on the internet, you’ve probably seen this famous photo: A punk rock band plays in a dingy room to a crowd of equally dingy-looking fans. At the front of the crowd, however, stands an unlikely patron: a goat. While the band’s singer screams into the microphone with a snarling expression, the goat stands at attention. It even seems to be enjoying the show. This photo has gained a legendary internet reputation, but the story behind it is even stranger. Meet Bisquette, the punk rock goat.

The stories that come out of punk rock lore are wild, dirty, and often soaked in alcohol. So is the story of the punk rock goat, but with a very tender aspect that can be hard to glean from a couple of choice photos that have spread around the internet for the past two decades. Biquette, once a milking goat no longer useful to the farm, was slated for the slaughterhouse. Instead, a group of unlikely heroes stepped in to give her a second chance at life—one with a decidedly more rock ‘n’ roll flavor. Let’s unpack this unlikely story: how Biquette became the mascot of a punk rock commune, and how a few iconic photos turned her into an internet legend.

Sell-By Date

The year was 2003, and a female goat was born, unaware of her future fame. She was a working goat, one that likely spent long hours at a milking facility. After about five years of steady milking, the goat had outgrown her usefulness as a milking goat. The owners of the dairy operation slated her for the slaughterhouse. Instead, a group of dirty punk rockers offered to take the goat off their hands. It was cheaper than sending her to the abattoir, so the milk factory owners agreed.

As the late author Cormac McCarthy once wrote, “You never know what worse luck your bad luck has saved you from.” Perhaps that sentiment crossed the goat’s mind as she prepared for her death, only to be whisked away by a van full of long-haired punk rockers. They took her to a communal farm called Ferme de Mauriac in rural central France. When you imagine a commune, certain hippie images might float through your head. Ferme de Mauriac, however, was more of a DIY punk venue and communal home.

Various people shuffled through the place, along with traveling punk bands eager to play DIY shows. One such wanderer who found their way to Mauriac was Flo, the photographer behind the famous photos and the goat’s caretaker. According to Flo, the goat took to the unconventional living situation immediately.

Number One Fan

By all accounts, the goat enjoyed the punk rock commune to an unexpected degree. Incredibly social and seemingly fearless, the goat (which the punks named Biquette or Lulu) often wandered in and out of all the commune’s activities. Whenever a new person arrived at the commune, she would follow them around like a puppy. As Flo told a reporter from Vice Magazine, “As soon as there was someone she had never seen, she stuck up against them for an hour!”

Another one of Biquette or Lulu’s favorite activities was attending the raucous punk rock concerts that often happened on the property. The laissez-faire attitude of the commune meant the goat could roam freely, and she often chose to come right up to the front of the crowd at various rock shows. Biquette enjoyed the loud music so much that she often spent the entire show at the very front. As Flo explained, “Seeing as the barn floor where we throw the concerts is wooden, I think that she felt the vibrations in her hooves. The majority of the time, she even laid down next to the speakers.”

Biquette also had a penchant for the more unseemly aspects of the punk rock lifestyle. She would drink the leftovers of people’s beers and all sorts of other alcohol left lying around. She would even drink the remnants from paint pots and oil drains. Biquette’s favorite snack, however, was tobacco. To the dismay of some concert attendees, she would even eat lit cigarettes right out of their hands. Suffice it to say that Biquette or Lulu took to the lifestyle quickly.

A Star Is Born

At one concert at the venue, during a performance by Singaporean grindcore band Wormrot, the band’s manager, Azean Rot, snapped several photos of Biquette standing at the front of the crowd. As he explained in an interview with Complex Magazine, the goat was an immediate fan of the ear-bleeding sounds. He said, “You would have never believed how tame the goat is. When we first arrived at the venue, the goat went up to us and rubbed its head against our hands.”

Like all great memes, the photos of Lulu standing with rapt attention at the front of the Wormrot show spread slowly at first. A meme would appear here or there, with no clear origin or context. Then, seemingly overnight, the pictures were everywhere, forever immortalizing arguably the most entertaining goat ever recorded.

Sadly, Biquette passed away at the age of ten, after living on the Mauriac commune for five years. Perhaps it was all those cigarette butts for breakfast. Whatever the case, the residents of the Commune from that time look back fondly on Biquette. As Flo explained to Vice Magazine, “What’s for sure is that she burned the candle at both ends! This type of biquette normally lives ten years longer. But ‘normally’ and biquette, that makes two. ‘Live fast die young!!!'”