Showing posts with label Jandek. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jandek. Show all posts

Tuesday, 2 April 2024

Jandek – "Baltimore Saturday" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0865) 2024



 Yet another Jandek recording from 2009.This one has got electronics on it,so it's quite unique in the Jandek canon. Also Susan Alcorn appears again making weird noises on her pedal Steel Guitar.
If that don't make you wanna hear this double CD then there's something wrong with you....well...maybe not? It's a good one though.

Here's that tit (I notice he has two of them) who regularly threatens the safety of your much valued scribe
He's the fat one on the right,meeting his hero......I wonder if this was taken in 2009?...still waiting for the Vancouver release.He says he's gonna 'find me' if I post that......which of course I will.

Tracklist:

1-1 It's All There 6:45
1-2 Love Relation 1:44
1-3 Gone On Me 3:04
1-4 Turn The Key 1:42
1-5 Make Me 1:50
1-6 On The Highway 1:51
1-7 Another Block 4:51
1-8 I Asked 2:38
1-9 Last Friends 4:03
1-10 This Other Me 2:09
1-11 The Minutes 2:58
1-12 The Moonbeam 3:38
1-13 I Talk To My Self 4:27
1-14 The Words 2:39
2-1 Splashing In The Streets 11:42
2-2 Drew On The Meadows 20:06

Friday, 16 February 2024

Jandek – "Nashville Friday" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0863) 2023


Another Live Jandek from the homeland of American music recorded in 2009 (again). Enough to make the Grand Ole Opry spontaneously combust.....so no bad thing.
On this outing we find one of spontaneous music's legends in Ladonna...er... Smith.....no relation I guess? Ladonna who played on all those batshit crazy Davey Williams records. And still scraps the viola in a complementarily warped fashion...as in both warped like a record,and warped like a mind.
One would love to see Jandek do a surprise appearance at the Grand Ole Opry one day,eh kids?
Here,we are treated to a singing Jandek avoiding tunes like obstacles in an obstacle race,skimming the jagged surface of every obstacle the sonic backing can conjure up.
Disc one seems to have a Horse theme running ,or should i say, cantering, asunder the rancid chunks of  dueling banjo's that accompany Jandek's dream of becoming a wild Mustang for the 8 long minutes this equine nightmare trots unsteadily along.
And we all like a nice Horse Theme don't we boys'n'girls?
And Yes, Sterling whips out the Fretless bass to further compound those heinous acts of violence against taste that occurred in the 1980's;but, Kajagoogoo this is most certainly NOT!

Tracklist:

1-1 Now That I Want You 10:37
1-2 Shadow Of The Horse 11:12
1-3 Tennessee Flower 9:20
1-4 The Mustang 8:04
1-5 Castigated To Be Free 11:02
2-1 Don't Be Seen 10:25
2-2 This Isolated Moment 7:08
2-3 It Don't Matter 9:17
2-4 Linden Row 7:21
2-5 When I Got You 15:30

Monday, 12 February 2024

Jandek – "Vision Of Jewels" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0864) 2023


While we is on the subject of Japan, I realised there is someone else who begins with 'J' that's been overlooked recently,and certainly never drives on the correct side of the road musically speaking.
Jandek innit?
He's got a new studio album out which sounds like a lot of his post - 2010 live output.but without the sparse applause. 
Its improvised,no vocals, no credits, no info,so i can't verify if it actually was recorded within the last 15 years. So no proof of the carrot topped bard's continued existence on this planet.
I presume that the cover art is a photograph of the Representative's home planet,whizzing around in one of the outer spiral arms of the Milky Way;.....either that, or Sterling R. Smith has just discovered image editing software?......Nah! That's Planet Jandek.
Its as good as anything The Scratch Orchestra did at least.Would have liked to have been around for that Derek Bailey Jandek collaboration that was never discussed.I suppose i could do a fantasy audio montage of this fictional event one day?
When i first encountered a Jandek record I thought it was Funny,but upon listening to subsequent releases I realised that he wasn't fucking Joking!? I thought it was just shite Self-released by a nutter with too much spare cash? Where he got that from I dunno,as i thought he used to work in a Machine Shop somewhere in Houston?
Nowadays I think its less Shite,and especially this stuff,which could pass for Free Improvisation in any number of pretentious enclaves dotted around the metropolitan Chumbawumba beer kellers of planet Jandek.

Tracklist:

1 White Quartz 16:16
2 Color Streaks 15:19
3 Star Specks 12:45
4 Viewing The Realm 23:59


Sunday, 8 October 2023

Jandek – "Brooklyn Sunday" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0859) 2023


Heeeeeeres Jonny!....on a crusade for truth justice and the unamerican way.....and a quest to make unpopularity popular again.
All that, played out to a soundtrack of atonal improvisation by the unpopularly popular JANDEK.....he knows she didn't do it,come and SIGN THE PETITION,before you read the facts,and wallow in the acidic bath of becoming ripe Troll bait.Satisfied in knowing you done good,perched on the right side of History.

There seems to be an actual theme to this recording,again from 2009,but featuring outsider Pedal Steel Guitar, Susan Alcorn.
It seems to be about a miscarriage of justice leading to execution,and eternal punishment.
Jandeks Harmonica and Alcorn's Steel Guitar seems to suggest the regular abuse of justice carried out in the old Wild West.
Of course this doesn't happen today does it?With all that technology ,foolproof scientific tests,and statistics? Nah!
That said I've got a bee in my bonnet about something......

Wasn't there a Nurse from the wild north west of England who was convicted purely on the strength of flawed statistics, and easily contested circumstantial evidence that her state funded defense team hardly bothered to contest? The stats said she was there every-time a very ill premature baby died,statisticians have shown it more to be a case of fitting the statistics to the person rather than,a person to the stats....They died of what, they never really established,despite The Coroner having already ruled the deaths as natural causes. There wasn't even a proven crime committed.But, oh no,like some people still refuse to recognise that Elvis could have died from natural causes, it seems that there are plenty more would don't believe a sick baby could die without being murdered.
Of course I am referring to the Lucy Letby case,who, along with other such cases involving health workers,has been stitched up like a kipper and thrown under the bus to save the NHS's blushes.
I mean,J.H. Christ, where do you want me to start!? The apparent ease in which the Police can change a cause of death from natural causes to Murder is deeply troubling,coupled with a trial that didn't seem to feel the need to present the science that explained why these very ill babies died,the Plumber the joke of a defense team called,tried his best;but he explained that the ward was rife with the permanent presence of pathogens and virus's,leaving the infants exposed to killer conditions like Sepsis.....in fact Lucy even complained on 17 occasions about the conditions....strange behavior for a murderer me thinks.
Lucy did overtime,so she must have murdered them because she was in love with a handsome Doctor. Such was the blatant misogyny in all areas of this case that this was put forward as the only desperate excuse for a motive ever heard in a British Court!? Yeah, that's right, she murdered babies to gain admiring glances from this dashing blade from the senior Doctors department.

The case against Lucy Letby has often been referred to by those of us who have looked closely at the evidence as a 'witch hunt', a crime that particularly impacted women,
When "Expert for Hire" Dr Dewi Evans was questioned about Lucy's possible motives, he gives Lucy's status as a "single woman"(?) in her late twenties and alleged 'infatuation' with Dr A as a grounds for suspicion, this after he mentions earlier in the interview that he remained single into the beginning of his career as a consultant. He considers himself career focused while she is suspicious.
I'm not sure how useful this comment is in terms of appeal, especially because flagrant sexism seems to be ignored or taken as a normal worldview especially in older members of the population, but in Dr Evans case I can't help wondering if evidence pointed to an unmarried, 'career- focused' doctor, his finding might have been a bit better informed?

But the Public are angry...yes the Fucking Public again,are foaming at the mouth like rabid Baboons,baying for blood,and revenge, like a 17th century Wytch trial.If you drown you're innocent, if you don't we'll hang you.

Jandek would have been burnt as a witch if he was around Salem back then.....maybe today he would just get away with a sound beating from a drunken Mob of Morons, or maybe not.Humans are dangerous.


Lucy Letby was convicted and sentenced to spend the rest of her life in jail for murdering seven babies and attempting to murder six others. She is facing retrial for one further attempted murder charge. On five other counts of attempted murder the jury could not reach a consensus. She has consistently maintained her innocence and some close friends and colleagues have supported her. No motives for the killings were ever put forward,except that she wanted to impress a Doctor she fancied. She was convicted almost entirely on circumstantial evidence from "expert" witnesses, who were often testifying on subjects outside their expertise. In particular, medical doctors were testifying about areas of medicine for which they were not specialists, or presenting their conclusions as "scientific", without applying correct scientific methods. As a result the evidence on which she was convicted was flawed and partial, and other likely explanations for the deaths, such as hospital infections, were not presented to the jury as part of the expert evidence. Flawed evidence was allowed to pass unchallenged in the court, or accepted as "uncontested fact" by the defense, who appear to have been out of their depth with the medical complexity of the case. Incredibly, given the nature of the evidence against her, no expert witnesses were called to testify on Lucy's behalf. This is a summary of some of the worst errors, identified by experts in their fields who able to be part of the proceedings. There are links to more detailed information available on the Science on Trial website. All this evidence was presented to the defense team during the trial, but,inexplicably, none of it was used or put before the jury?!


Lucy Letby was found guilty of killing six babies by injecting them with air. Again this was not from evidence gathered at the time. The post mortems recorded natural causes of death. Instead the prosecution relied on expert evidence from a retired pediatrician Dr Evans) through an investigation carried out several years later. The correct procedure for establishing death through air embolism should be a particular postmortem technique. But this was not done. The next best would have been a CT scan. But again this was never done. Instead the cause of death was inferred from X-rays taken before the babies died along with analysis taken from a study carried out in 1989 during the early days of ventilating preterm babies. The study used is entirely inapplicable as it examined babies with lungs damaged from high pressure oxygen, which is very different from injecting air. The expert witness in the case was not a pathologist or forensic scientist, and did not follow the correct methods for determining the cause of death, which could only have been done to any degree of certainty, through a comprehensive post mortem.


There were two babies Lucy was convicted of attempting to murder by injecting insulin. These cases were presented as "the smoking gun" which showed there was a spate of murders in the unit, rather than the more logical explanation of an uncontrolled series of infections. In the notes of these two babies investigators found (a couple of years after the event) entries of very high levels of insulin and very low levels of C-Peptide. An expert witness from the lab where the tests were done at Liverpool University NHS trust, said this pattern could only come about through injecting insulin. To the jury this was presented as proof of insulin poisoning - while Lucy Letby was the one on duty.  However the lab that did the tests specifically says in its online information that the lab test used was not designed to determine cases of insulin over-dose, and that if exogenous insulin were suspected then a different test at a different lab would be necessary. Lab experts say the type of assay tests carried out by the lab are prone to error and that the extremely high figures in the notes, which was many times the level required to send an adult into a coma, was much more likely a false result. While the result is recorded in the notes, no further tests were ordered, nor was a more accurate test by photo spectrometry carried out. Instead two hours later one of the babies (both of which survived) recorded normal glucose levels, strongly suggesting the insulin test recorded was indeed a false result. Unfortunately Lucy's defence, who seem to have been out of their depth, made an agreement early on with the prosecution where they conceded that insulin poisoning through injection of insulin into fluid bags was "established fact", based testimony of one professional expert witness:Dr Dewi Evans.


These and many other aspects of the case are covered in a more comprehensive critique of the evidence which you can read at your leisure HERE!. It was put together during the trial and sent to the defence lawyers who said they read it, but then failed to follow up or use it?????


Then we have to mention the "I AM EVIL" post-it note.On which the prosecution seemed blind to anything else except the "I AM EVIL I DID THIS" line at the end,taking it totally out of grammatical context.

The "They" she refers to is obviously The Police and her accusers.

"THEY went I DID THIS,I Killed Them on purpose because I'm not good enough to care for them,I am Evil I did This."

She is writing about her finger pointing accusers.A simple case of self-flagellation, Absolutely nowhere near a Confession.

The note is dissected expertly HERE!  




Much was made of the fact that Lucy Letby was the only one present during the deaths or sudden collapses of all 19 babies in the case against her. This was presented as too much to be co-incidence. However it also very misleading. She was not only present at all the deaths and collapses presented in the case. There were many other deaths in the unit where she was not present, and the unit suffered a higher than normal death rate over a five year period. There was no statistical analysis as to whether the proportion of deaths she was present at could have been  the result of chance or not. Neither was there a statistical comparison with other spikes in deaths in other NHS units, known to have other causes than a series of deliberate murders, to see if what happened in Chester was comparable.  It is this omission to investigate other possible causes which is most worrying.  This increase in deaths over the five years followed a similar pattern of sudden collapses, whether Lucy Letby was present or not. The most likely culprit for any spike in unexpected deaths in a hospital is an outbreak of infection. Yet this was not investigated. Nor was there any evidence from an epidemiologist or infectious diseases expert during the trial, to rule out this possibility. Yet all the babies in the case had "suspected sepsis" written in the notes. Some had confirmed viral and bacterial infections. All but one were preterm. They covered a wide range from the smallest three babies who were less than 28 weeks and below a kilo, to others who were more mildly premature. There were several multiple births. As such they were a group who were extremely vulnerable to infection. In addition most of the babies in the case were on ventilation. Everything suggests that these were a very sick cohort of babies. The high mortality in the unit led to outside investigations, one of them by the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) which was critical of the senior leadership of the unit. 

Exactly the same thing happened to another Lucy in the Netherlands, Lucia de Berk, at the appeal trial of which Statistical expert Richard Gil, exposed the glaring inaccuracies, leading to a total exoneration of Ms de Berk.......Check the de Berk case out HERE!

And Richard Gil on the  Lucy Letby case HERE!

These and many other aspects of the case are covered in a more comprehensive critique of the evidence which you can read at your leisure HERE!. It was put together during the trial and sent to the defence lawyers who said they read it, but then failed to follow up or use it?????

Oh Yeah....if you've made it this far(?)...The Jandek record is great,and relevant only in the fact that he is an Outsider,as is anyone who supports justice in Lucy Letby's case.Which just might be the greatest miscarriage of justice in British legal history.
BASTARDS!


Tracklisting:.

1-1 Sacramento 16:39
1-2 The Trial 9:48
1-3 The Sentence 3:47 
1-4 The Chamber 11:01 
2-1 Deep Thought 10:22
2-2 Resurrection 14:06
2-3 Eternity 18:52

and

Friday, 6 October 2023

Jandek – "Vienna Wednesday" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0862) 2023


As Hitler roamed the streets of pre-war Vienna searching for his raison d'etre,destiny would dictate that a professional nobody called Sterling Richard Smith would plough a similar furrow so often gouged by the talentless. 
Adolf Schiklegruber would go on to adopt a single word as his nom de plume, just as Richard Smith would do a hundred years later, as a tradename for the clueless artwork they offered a disbelieving world.The Hitler one, was not gifted in the art department,even though he could paint an entire apartment in one afternoon.....TWO COATS! I think he sold even less paintings than Van Gogh....meaning ZERO.
But....Hitler committed the cardinal sin of the arts,...he gave up!? Then took out his frustrations as a narcissist down on his luck out on humanity......and we let him do it!
One thing Jandek certainly did NOT do, is give up. His art is...let's face it, total kaka, unless viewed in the whole, as a Gilbert and George style living concept. He is the Art,whereas Hitler was too stupid to realise this concept within himself.
How conscious The Corwood Representative is of this is debatable,but it can all be an acquired taste that becomes almost.....I said 'Almost'.....an addiction.He IS the Gilbert and George of Outsider Music.
And here he is,one hundred years on from the Bier Keller Putsch, almost to the day, and The Ginger Bard of Outsider-dom Jams with the Viennese locals,putting together another two CD's worth of tuneless noise,augmented by Jandek's painful moan. Again recorded in 2009,along with nearly 100% of his most recent output,fueling more rumours of his secret demise. He's dead, and whoever he entrusted his estate to has a dumpster full of Jandekian free Improvisation  ready to release on the public,stretching into the next century.
The question is often asked as to would the Holocaust have happened if Hitler had been accepted as an Artist?.....well knowing quite a few artists,the answer is a deeply harrowing 'Yes'. Of course it would,this planet is covered with Human's,and they can't help but do stuff like this, Artist or Not?
Another Question has to be asked concerning the Ginger One,as to whether he would have become a mass shooter if idiots like us didn't read too much into his music,which he undoubtedly would have. So,in conclusion, nerds like us save lives.Start by telling your kids that their awful paintings are works of genius,and you may just have saved the lives of dozens of college students. Or better still make them get a job, or don't live in the USA........No Guns, no shootings.....a slogan of pure logic that yer average American Republican is totally blind to!?


Tracklist:

1-1 Sidewalk 11:44
1-2 I Go To You 12:43
1-3 Cloud 8:46
1-4 Intensity Of Love 12:52

2-1 Galaxy 8:34
2-2 I Never Dreamed 12:16
2-3 Everywhere 7:22
2-4 Still With You 15:55


Wednesday, 5 April 2023

Jandek – "Manhattan Thursday" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0855) 2022


Another recording from 2009? Sterling and downtown scratch band sound like no-one knows how to play any instrument, and they're playing four different tunes at the same time but in different time signatures......That's Jandek in Manhattan,a place where nobody is allowed to say that Jandek is Shit. It's a challenge for the Downtown NYC muso's to improvise with someone who has not the slightest clue or interest in conventional tunings,musical notes, or technique.The downtown elite would give their eye-teeth to be this close to the year zero of music without their muse,the Corwood representative.
There are some awful moments when the Saxophonist begins to sound like a Blue Note session player from 1959,but thankfully this is brief. If you wanna listen to some self-identifying sophisticate's standard Jazz boredom, then go and worship the Bird in your own privacy.
We do get treated to more of Jandek's improv sixth form poetry,which makes up for the crowd pleasing moody be-bop somewhat.....I can almost see audience members nodding their heads,eyes closed digging the poetry like a beatnik coming out of a vegetative state. Coooool.
It also appears that Jandek don't do encores, even to persistent trendies applauding post-ironically to tempt the ghostly face of the representative back into the limelight.Even the sarcastic screams of a very misguided lower Manhattan hipsterette could not,and correctly Not, move the Rep to cede to the audience's fake demands.....coooooler.
 
Tracklist:

1-1 Taken Out The Numbers 11:01
1-2 Where I Find You 14:47
1-3 Crossroads Of Life 15:11
1-4 Your Little Sister 12:11
2-1 What Really Matters 9:36
2-2 Outside The Way 12:08
2-3 Mystic In The Nothingness 24:10

Monday, 3 April 2023

Jandek – "Tilburg Saturday" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0860) 2022


Oh Shit! Jandek on piano warning!!!!!
As recorded in a Dutch recording Studio,with audience of eager applaudees, in Holland, the Netherlands,in somewhere called Tilburg,which, obviously ,is in the Netherlands.
He may not pass for an Irishman(he does),but if someone told me he was Dutch I'd say absolutely Dutch,... deeply Dutch.
Thankfully, its not just solo Piano tinkling, the man does his lo-fi improv poetry atop the bloody awful piano shit. Not kidding, but i reckon he should stick to the poetry a lot more.That stuff can empty any room of any normals, and leave only the kind of people we can get along with, pretentious art posers excepted....bastards!
This is also recorded in 2009,the most prolific year in Jandeks entire recorded life. So,did he die in 2009? It looks like it!?....are there any pictures of The Representative walking barefoot anywhere? Is he actually Paul McCartney? Probably not...its the voice, and probably the total lack of melody in his entire canon.
Yeah, he's dead alright, but don't think that's the end of jandek. There's a massive vault of jandek improv's that will take us clear into the next century. This guy is immortal.

Tracklist:

1 The Evening Starts 10:32
2 Like A Dot 6:05
3 Altar Of Chance 7:12
4 Flying Past Mountains 6:43
5 Outside Of Me 6:10
6 Dance The Trance 7:07
7 Reluctant Aversion 7:03
8 Shadows Of The Stars 11:29


Sunday, 2 April 2023

Jandek – "Northern Ireland July" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0857) 2023


More recordings from 2009?...was that the year he died?.....don't worry Jandek Saddoes,I'm only speculating. I'm sure he's real......and by all accounts rather good at this spontaneous music malarky.
Northern Ireland is too important a hotspot to only get individual concerts released on corwood.This is a whole Tour in a box!?
This ain't Outsider music, but it is made by an outsider,that being the  ginger post-reclusive Richard Smith.
He does indeed look like a member of the Real IRA, but is too pale to be in the continuity IRA, and too Ginger for the INLA. Most of these IRA splinter groups consisted of no more than minus one to one nationalist idiot as a rule, rather like all the so-called 'Groups' on Bandcamp. Its like the USA labelling the UnaBomber a terrorist group.
Maybe Bandcamp should be labelled a terrorist group too?
But,Nothing gets on British peoples Tits more than some senile American getting involved in things they don't,can't,won't understand....like Joe 'I'm Irish Me' Biden. 
Hopefully Jandek's lack of interest in this crass stupidity will help cancel out Irish Americans once and for all.
Good stuff this maybe,but the drummer sounds like he was recruited from an Orange Order marching band......yeah,its gonna happen.....on Drugs....Hahahahahaha.
I'm so funny.
Americans can't really get involved,mainly because most of them think Northern Ireland is somewhere in the Bronx,and native Americans are restricted to outdoor concentration camps called Reservations for their own good.Then they start slagging off China for doing what they were doing.
Its seems wrong to label Jandek an American,but there is no other place on the planet that he could have possibly come from.

Tracklist:

1. Larne Sunday 1:15:50
2. Bangor Monday 1:07:09
3. Belfast Tuesday (Afternoon) 23:13
4. Belfast Tuesday (Evening) 1:15:48
5. Londonderry Wednesday 1:13:55

Thursday, 30 March 2023

Jandek – "The Wizards Hour" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0858) 2023


Is it me or is Jandek's output lessening? Only two albums in the first three months of the year so far....so I guess the answer is an emphatic NO! However, most of his recent releases seem to be recorded in  2009...a seemingly very prolific year for the Bard of Corwood.....I wonder if Corwood (Jandek) ever thought about issuing someone other than The Representative himself. If they(he) did,how would we know it wasn't Jandek pretending to be a group or something similar? He has form in that area......The Units,as credited on the debut Jandek,before it was credited to Sterling's alter-ego, after he got threatened by the similarly monikered synth-punk bands the Units.He changed names pronto as soon as legal action was mentioned....lightweight!
The Wizards Hour,dunno if he was refering to himself,benefits from being a recording made for WNYU 89.1 FM and having a strict time limit,so no 6 cd's worth of stuff here.......thank fuck.
A shimmering but scraping yet juddering note-less meander through the ox-bow lakes of The Bardo Pond outtakes bin.
The Rep and uncredited chums make ,what normal people would call a Psych-Drone journey into Outsider Space. That's all well and good,but with tunes like this our favourite Outsider is rapidly becoming an Insider. If you took away his entire pre-2000 lexicon of Outsider-dom,he would be now be filed alongside The aforementioned Bardo Pond, Loop, SkullFlower, and Ascension.Largely due to his unnamed guests I would suggest.It was about the time they appeared that things started to go downhill Outsider-wise. Musically, No-longer an Outside,but maybe, personality-wise,he still retains that threat to Bigots and Fools everywhere...in other worlds not us!?.Sometimes the Emperor needs to look into the mirror,and realise he's wearing new clothes that are no longer invisible. I blame the Internet and that cunt who wrote that book ....you know, the one that inexplicably puts Syd Barratt and Don Van Vliet in the same category as.....coff...Jandek?.......maybe he's right about Syd, but Don?...an Outsider he most certainly was NOT!

Tracklist:

1. The Wizard Awakens 20:44
2. The Wizards' Afternoon 24:51
3. The Wizards' Dream 16:34


Wednesday, 11 January 2023

Jandek – "Diverseworks" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0856) 2022


After a lengthy series of stuff about recently deceased musicians,I will risk my life by returning,briefly, to the possibly Dead Jandek,with another pseudo-classical improvisation from the seemingly infinite vaults of old recordings.Rarely do we hear anything from contemporary Jandek. I suspect there's enough in storage for Richard Representative to achieve musical imortality.We will all be long dead by the time the Rep and his helpers exhaust the well.....that is, unless he has expired and they are doing this already.
Here we have Outsider music turned inside out.This is as far as one can get from that creepy guy in his mum's cellar banging out deranged versions of the human condition on an old piano.
Jandek,once a ginger mist with an out of tune guitar that drifted around various suburban parts of Houston,howling like a slow wind across freshly laid barbed wire;alas he is now a trilby wearing version of Nosferatu,hanging around the toilets in the music department en campus somewhere in the Texas system for further education.
His purpose?...Recruiting insider studentia to help him make this very seriously experimental music.Rather like how Madonna and Bowie used to 'look for ideas'by stealing them off starstruck upwardly mobile producers and musicians.
I doubt any student of modern composition would be Starstruck by the appearance of Jandek in their campus toilets,more likely they would run away,unless they knew better.
The ones who did know better,saw this as an opportunity to get on an avant garde record with a guy would would pay for everything.
Jandek does virtually nothing on this record,except for twanging his detuned bass somewhat furtively .Leaving the recruits to make it sound like one of those spontaneous improvisation records he spotted in the 'Other' section of his local record store,thinking, 'Hey, I can do that'!...or rather, 'i can get someone else to do that and i'll credit myself' on the traditionally credit-less Corwood jewel case artwork.
It has now got to the point where Sterling the Corwood representative is no-longer listed as an Outsider Musician on Discogs, but has joined the much despised ranks of the "Free Improvisers".
So now any collective gathering of Avant Garde improvisers can be heard to scream:
"Lookout! It's Jandek...and he's looking for musicians!"
Whatever the collective noun for a gathering of Free Improvisers is....maybe a 'Scrape' of Improvisers perhaps?

Tracklist:

 Rehearsal:

1-1 Part One 16:01

1-2 Part Two 28:28 

Concert:

2-1 Part One1 9:05

2-2 Part Two2 6:22

2-3 Part Three 16:03

DOWNLOAD this diverse insider crossover moment HERE!

Saturday, 26 February 2022

Jandek – "London Sunday" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0847) 2021


This one's from 2008.......he is dead isn't he?......Recorded in front of a full house of London metrosexual trendies. If it wasn't enough to have the Representative on stage as your performing monkey, there's a bloke form the No-Neck Blues band on bass to make any avid Wire magazine subscriber cream his jeans....and believe me, it is always a he/his when it comes to stuff like this,no further pro-nouns required.
Whether it be making unprovoked warfare, unlistenable clap-trap that you are told is 'good'.or appreciating paintings by kneeling down on one knee and tweaking ones chin for twenty minutes, it's all done by the male of the species. Women are only now saving us non non-binary types from the joys and pitfalls of association Football,now we XY chromosome nerds need the fairer sex and their derivatives, to help save us from the joys and pitfalls of rubbish music passed off as works of genius...(something I am regularly guilty of?)....if that's successful,and this is the big one,maybe the onslaught of non-binary humans can save us from War?.......I doubt it very much, especially as its becoming increasingly clear that we maybe on the wrong end of a tactical Nuclear weapon or two very shortly thanks to the distinctly binary,as in split personality,self-elected president of the shithole that is Russia. He certainly has a split personality,and I hate both of them....i can sum up how i feel about this Phil Collins look-a-likey in the verses of one of England's finest poets:
Mr John Cooper-Clarke's "Twat":

Like a nightclub in the morning, you're the bitter end
Like a recently disinfected shithouse, you're clean round the bend
You give me the horrors
Too bad to be true
All of my tomorrows
Are lousy 'cause of you
You put the Shat in Shatter
Put the Pain in Spain
Your germs are splattered about
Your face is just a stain
You're certainly no raver, commonly known as a drag
Do us all a favor, here, wear this polythene bag
You're like a dose of scabies
I've got you under my skin
You make life a fairytale
Grimm!
People mention murder, the moment you arrive
I'd consider killing you if I thought you were alive
You've got this slippery quality
It makes me think of phlegm
And a dual personality
I hate both of them
You're bad breath, vamps disease, destruction, and decay
Please, please, please, please, take yourself away
Like a death a birthday party
You ruin all the fun
Like a sucked and spat-our Smartie
You're no use to anyone
Like the shadow of the guillotine
On a dead consumptive's face
Speaking as an outsider
What do you think of the human race?
You went to a progressive psychiatrist
He recommended suicide
Before scratching your bad name off his list
And pointing the way outside
You hear laughter breaking through, it makes you want to fart
You're heading for a breakdown
Better pull yourself apart
Your dirty name gets passed about when something goes amiss
Your attitudes are platitudes
Just make me wanna piss
What kind of creature bore you
Was it some kind of bat?
They can't find a good word for you
But I can
Twat!
 

The Jandek album is very good by the way,a return to old skool electric Jandek...but then again what do I know? I'm one of those Metrosexual Trendies who I referred to earlier, who would say that wouldn't he?
I also referred to myself in the third person,something I have yet to hear Vlad the Pute do,but if he did I'd hate all three of him.

Nazi Russians Fuck Off!

Tracklisting:

1-1 Torrential Blues 12:59
1-2 These Blues 8:49
1-3 Incapacitation 10:15
1-4 If I Can’t Lay Down 8:29
1-5 Deep Deep Blues 9:03
2-1 Throbbing Pain 9:10
2-2 Savage Pain 9:11
2-3 It’ll Be All Right 10:17
2-4 Come Over Here 18:09
2-5 The Dawn 12:04




Friday, 25 February 2022

Jandek – "Chapel Hill Sunday" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0853) 2022


Yes, I tried living too,believe it or not,but then I started to listen to Jandek records again. This is time I'll never get back,and will probably rue this irrational decision to listen to all of Jandek's albums, on my death bed surrounded by any loved ones who will still have anything to do with me.
So,here's another hour and a half where i could have been making love to a beautiful woman...or their alternatives (I'm Hip ain't I?)...meaning one of the self-identified represented by the extra letters tagged onto the popular and ever lengthening acronym that begins with LGBTQ...etc......so maybe i wasn't wasting my ever decreasing allotted time in this reality after all?
Would I sooner be making sweet luuurve to a beautiful lady, rather than listen to endless Jandek?....well....er....yes please. I think Jandek would too,although, his lady,slash, victim, would undoubtedly be of the Prince Andrew variety.
This one was recorded in 2009,so Jandek may still indeed be dead? Which is a pity, because we could have tried threatening Putin with endless Jandek pumped into the Kremlin. Vlad has promised us "Something We Have Never Seen Before",but we westerners have got something He has never heard Before, and far more lethal than the nukes he was alluding to.By the time this double CD has finished its first few tracks Putin would be grovelling to be sent to the Hague,and plead guilty of waging an illegal war of aggression. 
I suppose i should turn my attentions away from imminent nuclear annihilation,and turn to something far more important....the music....if indeed ,music this may be?
"You wanted my Body" whine's the Corwood rep in the opening improvisation, cosily entitled "I tried Living". I can also now go on record and say in all honesty, that I have NEVER wanted Jandek's body.
A trio of new buddies make stuff up around Jandek's guitar abuse,and I have to say I have heard better.The drummer in particular seems to be struggling to come up with anything we haven't heard a thousand times before,treading water in an 'i've got a Free Jazz collection' kind of way.Incredibly, the guitar player seems to be the one with the most clue here.....wait a minute, Thats Jandek innit?....blimey he's found musicians who are almost as bad as himself.Now that's something to be applauded.....we came here to hear the ginger mist in person,not the pale one and a bunch of trendy jazzers who would be better off on ECM records than Corwood,which is what we usually get for these live performances since 2004-ish.They're not quite there but,at least this selection approaches somewhere near the nebulous standard required to make a cohesively uncohesive Jandekian outing into the outside.

Tracklisting:

1.I Tried Living 29:52
2. Broken Sky 12:49
3.I Think I'm Unstable 9:03
4.The Slide 15:14
5.All My Time 13:15
6.Just As Well Off 11:46

Thursday, 24 February 2022

Jandek – "The Mountain Step" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0851) 2021


Another Studio album by the black clad ginger whinger,....we are not worthy....well...we are very worthy actually. Just wish Corwood would get on the vinyl reissue trail. Trouble with that is that none of modern Jandek would fit on one disc,a double albums at best. They would however be a thing of great beauty,clad in Gatefold sleeve,and four of Sterling's inexplicable photographs adorning the available spaces.
We will wait and see if that Canadian 'superfan' (forgot his name) who sporadically threatens me with violence could possibly suggest that to the man himself,as he reckons he's his manager whenever the Jandek visits Vancouver.
This very acceptable droning atonal scraping violin stained epic, suggests overdubs,which I can't recall The Representative ever doing before.....of course he likely has,its just hard to pinpoint any particular recorded event from the ever widening canon of the king of all things Outside.
This is The Corwood Representative's version of Tony Conrad and Faust, even further outside the Dream Syndicate, with the best violin abuse this side of 'Danny and the Dressmakers' all encapsulating violin solo in "Don't Make Another Bass Guitar Mr Rickenbacher"...except Sterling has managed the impossible and stretched that out over the course of a very entertaining fifty fun packed minutes.
It also appears that Jandek is the only (uncredited) musician, unaccredited, in the recording process of this, one has to say, very good album indeed.**** out of *****?
The date of the recording also seems to be absent,so I can't decipher if it's a recent recording or not.So, as a result one cannot ascertain if this disproves my increasingly tenuous Jandek is Dead theory. Someone working down my local Chip shop however, is a ringer for Sterling Smith,but he insists that he's never heard of Jandek......his pupils dilated as he said it,then after serving my Savaloy sausage,chips and curry sauce,promptly disappeared into the back room,from whence i'm sure i detected the muffled cries of a young woman.I could have reported this to the police but I was pissed out of my brane and had to drive home!

Tracklisting:

1 The Mountain Step 3:56
2 The Linger 13:03
3 The Ladder 10:51
4 The Languish 20:33

Wednesday, 23 February 2022

Jandek – "Motion Energy" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0854) 2021


Out of pure laziness,i'm gonna take a restful sidestep from French Prog, yet make a tenuous connection with Jandek, who sounds exactly like Mahogany Brain, a French Prog band who incidentally sound like Jandek. However, unlike Mahogany Brain, Jandek did more than a couple of albums,in fact this recent release from 2021 has enough material on it to make two new Mahogany Brain albums. I hear Corwood are releasing another eight albums this year alone,as the representative's back catalog approaches the 150 mark.
Incidentally Has anyone seen him recently? He may be dead for all we know,and a massive stash of Jandek recordings are waiting to enter the market spaced over the course of the current, and maybe even, the next, century? In fact, even if there were no more fruit left on the tree it would be fairly easy to make new Jandek albums without the man himself. Even his voice could easily be mimicked. 
To achieve this post mortem creativity it is essential that one's public exposure is kept in the shadows .A lack of gigs could be explained away as a return to his reclusive years.....which I wish he would do anyway. Simply put, Jandek could become immortal,artistically at least. The same could happen to The Residents, and others who would shun the cult of personality. I hear that Daft Punk have decided to come out of retirement,or at least 'someone' has come out of retirement,we would never know who it was under those shiny helmets.It could be Putin and Lavrov for all we know,other wise known as Chuckles and Laughing Tammy to their adoring friends . For example Phil Collins couldn't carry on in secret after his death,because he didn't wear a mask.Schoolboy error. Anyhow, the wheel chair would give the game away if he started now.Always plan ahead..but...maybe Philip is one step ahead of all of us and really he's Vladimir Putin,and Putin is Phil Collins? This could go viral,and explain a lot of unanswered questions?

Vladimir Putin

Phil Collins


This double CD seems to have been recorded in a studio,hence the title lacking a day of the week and a place name.Its basically the same improvised stuff,otherwise known as Mr Smith pissing about for an hour or so,that he's been doing,with his talented friends, for the best part of the last twenty years.Really it could be anybody from the vast world of improvised music playing on this record for all we know. The give away is that there's only one person playing who doesn't really have a clue what he's doing......ahhhaa that must be Jandek......or,someone pretending to be Jandek, or even a representative of Jandek? We may never know.....or care?

Tracklisting:

1-1 Slow Walk 28:05

1-2 Amble21:11 

2-1 Picking Up The Pace 21:43 

2-2 Running With It 24:20

DOWNLOAD what may or may not be jandek HERE!

Saturday, 13 November 2021

Jandek – "Porto Saturday" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0852) 2021


The second most famous ginger whinger after Elvis "The Pelvis" Presley.....(he dyed his hair black if you didn't know).....could be, and I did say 'Could Be',Die or DIY?'s favourite copper-top,Sterling "Jandek" Smith. Clearly,sporting a rather dapper chemically enhanced hair-do, he was around when Elvis was in full throttle Ginger denial as a pre-pubescent with, seemingly ,very proud parents? The cover photo looks like it was taken in a photographic studio to place on the mantelpiece of the Smith family abode.Evidence, maybe, that Jandek was born,and didn't arrive from outer-space like a gone wrong version of the ginger alien from "The Man That fell To Earth".
Those proud parents obviously didn't provide piano lessons for their pasty faced progeny and the evidence is on this compact disc of Jandek tinkling about on a grand piano for just shy of two hours....HELP!
This is the reason why the era of "the Public Piano" is coming swiftly to an end in railway stations across the globe; probably under sentence of death in places like Saudi Arabia. Or you could try playing a piano in public in Taliban-era Afghanistan, to invent the much needed phenomena of the 'Suicide Pianist'...the fight back starts here!
Keith Jarret this is NOT.It's improvisation by someone who thinks improvisation is just moving your fingers at different speeds in random places,Keith Jandek?.....although if that was the actual concept then I take everything I just typed back....but I severely doubt it.
I can't listen to this,and that's saying something.I would even leave a Pub if some smart-arse put this on the imaginary jukebox. Although, if that Jukebox existed, I WANT ONE!
This is the Paradox that Jandek is.He is obviously pure unlovable Shite,but is it not that quality that makes him great? Most clueless bastards would have given up after album number one and a half, like The Shaggs nobly did.However, with shear bloody-minded insistence,he penetrates the psyche of some of those poor fools who dare to tread that unholy back passage more than just once.
I listen to Jandek infinitely more than Keith Jarrett's po-faced solo piano neo jazz-classical intellectual panderings.I don't even leave The Koln Concerts out when my groovy artist chums pop round of an evening....mainly because they never 'pop' round is the reason for that particular advantage of the friendless.They just stay at home listening to the Koln Concerts every evening;just in case someone 'pops' round.Also, I have Zero Jandek Vinyl to display,which is a rather inexcusable and tragic oversight by 21st century Corwood Industries. I certainly don't want any of those awful scratchy plastic CD cases anywhere near me thanks, not even a mint copy of "Porto Saturday" by Keith Jandek.....in any format.

Tracklist:

1-1 The Garden And The Monastery 42:41
2-1 The Grey City And The Museum 50:27


Wednesday, 20 October 2021

Jandek – "Ann Arbor Saturday" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0846) 2021


I've mentioned a much shared disapproval of the Fretless Bass as used and abused in the popular medium of music before. Even excluding Mick Karn's work with Japan and Dali's Car from the bracket of disapproval. Well, Mick, may their God rest his soul,is no longer alone in fretless bass limbo.For he is to be joined by none other than Sterling "Jandek" Smith,who wields said instrument like a harbinger of impending doom.Like the approaching helicopter blades as replaced by huge rotating crusaders broadsword's, slicing through the trees below radar in a densely foggy Vietnam,as if beheading Saracens.Piloted by drugged up Scientologists eager to deliver their cargo of Napalm on a school full of children whose parents didn't pass the eugenics test.This time they ain't playing 'March of the Valkyries:It's "Ready For the House" at full volume...which if used as a real weapon in the real Vietnam war, could have caused Ho-Chi Minh to throw himself out of the nearest window.Ushering in a much less pointless period of peace and love.Where Communism worked out just fine, and the Americans kept their fucking noses out of everyone's right to self-determination.
As the choppers,hip slang for not only Helicopters but also for the male member where I come from, slice their way through the solid air of this gloomy Jandekian rumble,we start hearing such complimentary incisions as an outsider Mile Davis,blowing his horn as if warning passing vessels of the rocky outcrops hiding beneath the black waters of these compact discs.What's more we are treated to a rare appearance of the Electric Harpsichord outside of the 1960's British television soundtrack.
Fear not, we do get the standard Jandek howl and moan, backed up quite ably by a young lady victim on back-up moaning.
Heavy stuff,thankfully lacking any pretentious aspirations towards the outsider classical chamber music that The Representative is often enamored with.
One things for sure, don't play this when you're feeling suicidal.You may use an ill advised method to stop that noise in your head.

This was recorded somewhere in Ann Arbor May 17th 2008...isn't that where that Who copyist Glam band The Stooges came from? I think they reformed round about the time of this Jandek gig to make that awful 'come-back' album.....not a popular point of view,but, I do wish Iggy Pop would just kindly go-away....or at least get his male menopause hair cut off.

Tracklist:

1 Rubbish In The Alley 16:56
2 The Trenches 12:12
3 Why 9:51
4 Loud Silence 12:24
5 The Cowards' Creation 9:04
6 Being A Body 10:52
7 The Blue Spell 7:41
8 The Conflagration 12:15
9 Quicksand 14:44
10 Rapture Of Now 15:27