Go Go Cactus Man is a song from Cowboy Bebop Blue, performed by the Seatbelts.
The song is featured in the preview for Cowboy Funk,[1] and multiple times when Andy arrived to make Spike Spiegel's life difficult.[2]
Several versions of the song appear in the episode. Andy's first appearance in a sequence is typically noted by the character simply whistling the main theme of the song diagetically off-screen. The full arrangement of the track as heard on Cowboy Bebop Blue is then used non-diagetically immediately after Andy's whistled introduction.
A short alternative performance of the song, called Go Go Cactus Man (Guitar Version), was released in the Cowboy Bebop Boxed Set. This variant is performed with just acoustic rhythm guitars, the whistlers, and the jaw harp. It is used only during Andy's final scene, after he's reappeared as a space samurai.
Notably however, there's a fourth version of the song, and this is used in the preceding two music cues: when Andy and Spike have their spaghetti western-style showdown on the rooftop, and then again moments later while actually fighting. Though it may, on a casual listen, appear to be the same Go Go Cactus Man (Guitar Version) as available on the Boxed Set, this is a different and unreleased mix which has an extra guitar track: an acoustic lead guitar.
Influences[]
For an episode that draws heavily on the tropes of spaghetti westerns, and especially those of Sergio Leone, Go Go Cactus Man is written and performed as a pastiche of Ennio Morricone's well-known scores from Leone's A Fistful of Dollars[3] (note the lead whistling and the style of guitar playing) and For a Few Dollars More[4] (the jaw harp as well as the repeated whistling motifs).