Charles Bobuck-Maxine (2014)

Charles Bobuck, an alias of one of the members of the anonymous avant-garde music innovators, The Residents, was known for releasing solo albums during this decade. As his stage name indicates, this Resident took cues from the Name Game.

Yesterday, I decided to go to Bandcamp and listen to some of Mr. Bobuck’s solo work, and I ended up listening to his solo album Maxine, which was released in October 2014. Maxine is not an actual album, but it consists of one 33-minute suite that was the walk-in music for the Residents’s Demons Dance Alone Tour from 2002.

I can say that Mr. Bobuck is a pure Resident at heart. When I went to his “Codgers” blog on the official Residents website, he gave out the history behind the track “Moonman”, which was recorded on the day of the American moon landing in July 1969, before the Residents even had a name for themselves. Charles said he was recording a song about lasers when another soon-to-be Resident wrote a short poem and presented it to him. This was recorded on tape using cheap instruments, primarily an acoustic guitar and a sloppy electric bass, and became the track “Moonman”. Note that this track was uploaded on the Codgers blog, as well as being released on the limited-edition Residents rarities album Delta Nudes’ Greatest Hiss. Nowadays, he even likes to work on solo electronic projects using software synth programs for his iPad.

Let me describe the whole suite:

Part 1 (0:00-4:45)

This starts out with electronically-distorted voice samples, mostly sounding like a broken TV broadcast from the future. A simple piano melody develops with echoed ambient noise effects. A hip-hop drumbeat plays along to the piano, backed by some old jazz instruments. The jazz melody comes to mind of Dixieland jazz music. A distorted noise effect comes, leading to distorted, very nasally group vocals, backed by a woman singing. This woman’s voice sounds as nasally as the group vocals. As the woman continues to sing, a reprise of the piano-and-drum melody begins, with the ambient sound effects. A really campy electric organ solo pops up, sounding like old recordings from the 1920’s, with a really futuristic synth bass almost drowning out the other instruments as it slowly increases in volume.

Part 2 (4:46-8:22)

As the futuristic synth bass riff continues playing, other electronic sounds flutter all over, with a drum machine rhythm playing along. Strange machinery noises also show up, only to stop right when a drum machine is jamming along to some other synth effects and mechanical sounds playing in melody. A progressive rock-style synth melody opens up to some strange clanging and machinery.

Part 3 (8:23-10:22)

This begins with a really baroque string arrangement, accompanied by some clanging bells and weird sound effects. Another string arrangement comes, first with some electronic noises but then later accompanied by Southern folk instrumentation, primarily a banjo being played like an acoustic guitar. A string synth and drumbeat turns this into a lighthearted pop tune, with some high-pitched arena rock guitar soloing.

Part 4 (10:23-13:21)

This starts off with a modern-sounding trance tune performed with a synth bass and a drum machine. Later, there are some phasing electronic effects, which eventually becomes a reversed keyboard melody with droning ambient synth effects. A trance tune similar from earlier starts, but sounds like the Crystal Method’s theme song to the TV series Bones, albeit with a much faster tempo. Some acoustic guitar chords turns the trance tune into something more experimental with reversed sounds, which is later accompanied by wordless female vocals. This part closes out with some heavily-reverbed acoustic strings playing along to some shaking percussion.

Part 5 (13:22-14:16)

A really weird, speed-freak tune with barroom piano, saxophone and tuneless yodeling, with weird electronic noises appearing soon after.

Part 6 (14:17-15:52)

An industrial-sounding bongo rhythm emerges, accompanied by a really folky violin. A drum machine accompanies the bongo and violin, along with futuristic noises. The violin becomes slightly more dramatic.

Part 7 (15:54-17:48)

This consists of a reversed piano loop. At one point, you hear a dramatic choir sample, but it was really brief. As the piano loop continues, various electronic effects emerge, later followed by some classical violin. The same weird electronic noise effect from part 5 engulfs the track, accompanied by a long synthesizer drone that sounds identical to a clarinet, albeit with a phasing effect.

Part 8 (17:49-20:48)

A stereo-panned tympani rhythm treated with reverb becomes a surf rock electric guitar riff backed by synthesizer effects and a dramatic string synth. A weird buzzing noise shows up after a minute or so. Another guitar emerges, playing a distorted solo, which eventually becomes a distorted violin. A drum-and-bass drum machine rhythm comes later.

Part 9 (20:49-22:16)

Some weird reverbed noises starts out this segment, with some Jimi Hendrix-style guitar soloing that comes to mind of his performance of “The Star-Spangled Banner”. This guitar solo is also treated with reverb, and it is accompanied by some high-pitched whistling and a slowed-down voice sample.

Part 10 (22:17-24:24)

A Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood-esque piano boogie strikes up the track, accompanied by the same whistle from earlier and some reversed noises. The use of a saxophone makes this tune even more jazzy, also with a drum machine and watery synth effects. A distorted spoken voice closes out this segment.

Part 11 (24:25-25:41)

This starts out with a very short rock jam, but eventually a synthesized creaking noise engulfs it. Later, it becomes a much more bluesy tune with harmonica, futuristic noises, piano, and percussion. At one point, you hear something that sounds like a robot from Star Wars talking in reverse!

Part 12 (25:42-29:39)

A reverbed noise effect and tympani note introduces a jazzy tune performed with piano, with a rapid drum machine rhythm and industrial music-style synth sounds. As the drum machine rhythm continues, some long bleeps and drones starts to sound like a saxophone solo. After that comes some atmospheric synth washes, along with some synth bass and mechanical sounds to close out this segment.

Pat 13 (29:40-30:44)

This starts off with a classical melody performed with reverbed brass instruments, with one of them beginning to take up a more jazzy sound. A strange, continuous guitar surge opens up to a poppy acoustic guitar riff.

Part 14 (30:45-32:05)

As the guitar surge closes out, a deep vocalization leads into a folky electronic tune that is very brief, because it eventually becomes an industrial-sounding dance melody. There’s also a really funky guitar riff and a kitschy guitar solo thrown in there, too.

Part 15 (32:06-33:30)

This closing segment consists of a really old-school jazz melody with piano and drums that is accompanied by some crooning vocals, with some backing vocals that were sped-up and sounding like Alvin & the Chipmunks. What’s weird is that this segment cuts off abruptly right in the middle of the song, ending with about 5 seconds of silence.

This sounded interesting the first time I listened to it, but sounded 10 times better the second time!

This is by far Charles Bobuck’s best solo recording I had ever listened to. If you’re a die-hard Residents fan, then by all means, listen to it! You can easily download a copy or buy it on CD. The Bandcamp link is right here: https://bobuck.bandcamp.com/album/maxine

 

 

 

 

The Residents-Meet the Residents (1974)

Earlier, I did reviews of unreleased recordings by the Residents, but this time, I’m going to review their 1974 debut album, Meet the Residents. I have the original 1974 mono mix of this album in my iTunes collection, and it is one of the weirdest albums I ever had the pleasure of listening to. The cover art is a vandalization of the cover of the Beatles’ first American release, Meet the Beatles, but none of the songs on the album actually parody the Beatles.

Here are the tracks (note: these are a decription of tracks from the original mono mix):

“Boots”-A severe butchering of Nancy Sinatra’s “These Boots are Made for Walkin'”, consisting of tape distortion, out-of-tune lead vocals, bombastic horns, thumb piano, and doo-wop style backing vocals.

“Numb Erone”-This consists of an oriental-sounding tune performed entirely on a broken piano.

“Guylum Bardot”-This has the same broken piano from the previous track, this time with deep grand piano chords, bluesy horns, percussion, and nasally group vocals.

“Breath and Length”-This track starts off all ominous, followed by a piece featuring copy machine-like noises, animal-like vocals, chimes, female group vocals, and a tape solo that sounds like a malfunctioning paper shredder.

“Consuelo’s Departure”-Full of various tape effects and wordless hick vocals that were also processed.

“Smelly Tongues”-Beginning with plopping tape noises and distorted computer-like beeps, this track is filled with broken piano chords, tape effects, percussion, and doo-wop-style group vocals.

“Rest Aria”-A modern classical piece featuring piano, jazzy horns, percussion, and some Middle Eastern-like atmospheres.

“Skratz”-A strange spoken word piece featuring distorted jazz instruments.

“Spotted Pinto Bean”-A low-budget mini opera featuring operatic female vocals, orchestral instruments, jazzy horns and drums, a parade field recording sound effect, and a field recording of what sounds like a Vietnam War battle to end it all.

“Infant Tango”-This is a mutant disco track featuring cheesy wah-wah guitar, electric bass, horns, and Muppet-like vocals. There is also a rising electronic crescendo in one part of the song.

“Seasoned Greetings”-This starts off in an arcane style with piano, horns, and accordion, before becoming an avant-garde progressive rock piece with psychedelic guitar, distorted electric bass, horns, and percussion. It later becomes out-of-tune before a reprise of the opening segment comes, with a Resident saying a Christmas greeting to his family.

“N-ER-GEE (Crisis Blues)”-This closing track is divided into 6 parts:
1. The intro consists of deep electronic drones with a silly-sounding voice talking about what’s happening during Christmastime.
2. This consists of piano, percussion, horns, and vocals.
3. A sound collage consisting of a skipping record featuring the Human Beinz song “Nobody But Me”, also featuring distorted growling noises, a cymbal tape loop, gobbling high-pitched wordless vocals, an explosion sound effect and a frequency beep that sounds like that of a station identification from old television networks.
4. A children’s music-style marching band piece.
5. A slightly jazzy number featuring instrumentation similar to the previous part of the song, this time with silly lead vocals talking about the energy crisis.
6. The last part consists of a tape loop of the Residents singing, “Go home, America. 55 would do”, as like a toll-taker on the road.

Residents Recordings Before Rusty Coathangers for the Doctor: A Study

The first documented Residents demo tape was 1969’s Rusty Coathangers for the Doctor. However, several reel-to-reel tapes, whose names are not documented, did exist, with only a very few of them being officially released.

According to the official Residents website, in the “Delta Nudes” section, the Residents began recording music “as early as 1956”. I’m not joking. That’s what I’ve actually read on the website! If the Residents made recordings at that point in time, I have two theories of what they might’ve sounded like:

1. Like Elvis Presley, but incredibly weird!
2. Old-school American folk

The first documented Residents recording was a track called “I Hear Ya Got Religion”. This was when the band was a no-budget folk combo, prior to developing an experimental sound that began in 1969. This track existed in three versions. I believe that the first two versions were recorded in around 1966. I can tell because of the audio quality and the way the acoustic guitar sounded. These two versions also had bleating, Captain Beefheart-style saxophones. NOTE: The same tape also had a short snippet of music and vocals. All three of these recordings were found on a Residents bootleg called 19 Mysterious Tracks. The third version was recorded in around early 1969. This time, it has the same formula as the earlier versions, but this time, it ends with a chaotic, Warner Bros. Album-style freak-out. The third version was first officially released, in an edited form, as an mp3 download from the band’s Buy or Die! website in 1999, before being released on the CD compilation Dot.Com in 2000, which comprised of all the mp3 recordings released on that website. Remember, this was before iTunes. The complete version also sought an official release, first in 2012 on the limited-edition mp3 ERA B474, and again in 2013 on the limited edition CD compilation Delta Nude’s Greatest Hiss.

Next, comes “Moonman”, which was recorded on the day of the first moon landing in July 1969. It is an abstract-sounding space rock piece featuring acoustic guitar, low-watt electric guitar, fiddle, acoustic bass, handclaps, and harmonica. The lyrics were actually a poem written by one of the Residents, sung in a high-pitched redneck voice. The piece is also filled with some ambient sounds coming from the room that the band recorded this in. When Charles Bobuck, one of the members of the band, told on his Codgers blog on the official Residents website that an early version of this tape was an instrumental, but had to be re-recorded. The first instrumental version was never bootlegged. “Moonman” was released on ERA B474 and Delta Nudes’ Greatest Hiss.

And finally, there is a very strange piece called “Blow Bluesy Balloon”. This track was also recorded before the existence of Rusty Coathangers for the Doctor. “Blow Bluesy Balloon” was an odd number that predates The Warner Bros. Album, featuring deep electric bass, ceramic-sounding percussion, springy, out-of-tune electric guitar effects, the sound of a latex balloon being filled up, jazzy drums, violin, kazoo (at the end of the track), and nonsensical, out-of-tune vocals. This was also released on the two aforementioned compilations.

That’s pretty much all I know about pre-pre-Residents recordings.

An Analysis of The Warner Bros. Album by the Residents (1971)

Here’s another review of a Residents demo tape. This time, it is not an actual review. It is an analysis of the band’s most anarchic-sounding psychedelic work, The Warner Bros. Album. The picture above was the cover of the actual tape box. Allow me to explain its partial history.

From late 1970-mid 1971, the band that became the Residents recorded an album of 40 songs, all of them on a reel-to-reel tape, made with a very low budget and with crude instruments, and sent it to Warner Bros. Records in hopes of getting a recording contract with the label. The band sent it to that label because the label’s A&R manager, Hal Haverstadt, helped signed Captain Beefheart, who was a major influence for the project, to the label. When listening to the tape, Mr. Haverstadt was horrified, and probably psychologically-scarred, when he heard the music, and wondered what was the reason behind it. So, Hal rejected it, and since there was no name given on the return address, he sent it simply to “The Residents”. The photo below is the actual back cover of the original tape.

Let me try to give a theoretical history of this mighty weird album.

In 1969, Captain Beefheart & the Magic Band released what was their most critically-acclaimed work, Trout Mask Replica. The album was considered to be one of the weirdest albums in rock music history. A year later, the Residents just finished recording a demo tape of desolate experimental psychedelic rock called Ballad of Stuffed Trigger. When the Residents bought a copy of Trout Mask Replica and listened to it for the first time, the band really liked the music, and thought that they could do the same. The band were recently discovered by Philip Lithman, a British musician who later became known as Snakefinger, as well as the Bavarian avant-garde composer N. Senada, whose existence is widely disputed. In fact, N. Senada was rumored at one point to be Captain Beefheart (real name Don Van Vliet) because the same house that Trout Mask Replica was recorded in was located on “Ensenada Drive” in Woodland Hills, California. When 1969 ended, Flower Power and the hippie generation were still becoming popular even as the 1960’s ended. Charles Bobuck, a member of the Residents, did gave out on the Residents website the history of “Moonman”, a pre-Residents track recorded on the day of the moon landing in July 1969. He said that at that time, the band liked to go to Psilocybin Beach and take psychedelic mushrooms, run around naked and then completely losing their minds. So, I think that this could mean that drug use played a role in the making of The Warner Bros. Album. When Snakefinger joined forces with the Residents, he took a violin with him, and the band began to make music. N. Senada also helped the Residents in their music at this point, too.

When the band tried to record something for Warner Bros. Records, I think stuff such as William S. Burroughs, Looney Tunes cartoons, Richard Nixon, The Beatles, guerilla art and grindhouse films all played a key role in the making of this tape. The Residents were a bunch of hyper-hippies at this point, and maybe the recording studio that the tape was made in was a living room that was covered in a bunch of psychedelic posters and strange junk. I also read on Discogs that the artwork, perhaps the back cover art, was done by N. Senada himself. The instruments used for the album included detuned acoustic guitar, violin (played by Snakefinger), drums, various percussion instruments, harmonica, low-watt electric guitar, distorted electric bass, kazoo, saxophone, barroom piano, upright bass, and tape effects (I’ll explain them later). According to The Cryptic Guide to the Residents, “strange liner notes” were designed for the inside of the tape box, and I guess the liner notes were a stream-of-conscious rant that was literally typed.

If Warner Bros. Records considered releasing The Warner Bros. Album, they would probably market it to stores under the label’s own categories, such as “Free-Form Comedy Noise”, “Sub-Surface Infiltration”, “Hillbilly Dada”, “Velvet Waste”, or “Discombobulated Country”.

I also have two theories about the album’s artwork:

1. The back cover of the tape shows guerilla-style artwork with figures that are (1) a schoolgirl who was one of the Residents’ friends when they were very young, and (2) Richard Nixon’s head on Mr. Peanut’s body, who is holding a plate with what appears to be a skyscraper. I’m thinking that this was a political statement, talking about Richard Nixon’s policies during the Vietnam War.
2. The inside artwork, which could be for the gatefold, consists of what I think could’ve been either: (1) Looney Tunes cartoon characters looking completely stoned, (2) various doodles of weird things, or (3) a group photo of the Residents during the recording of the album.

Let me give an analysis of some of the tracks heard on The Warner Bros. Album. However, I’m not going to describe all of them, since that would be a big waste of time.

“The Mad Sawmill of Copenhagen, Germany” is a piece full of droning electric guitar, ukulele, jazzy drums, electric bass, harmonica and piano. The way the electric guitar was played sounds like it was fed through a broken fuzzbox, making it sound like an out-of-tune Indian instrument.

“Baby Skeletons & Dogs” features rather cartoonish lyrics, which describes things such as “an American dream” and a “washing machine”. I think the song was referencing America in the 1950’s.

“Stuffed Genital” is a short instrumental that consists of a recording of metal percussion and a cheap horn, and then the recording was gradually sped-up.

The track “A Merican Fag” has a little kid singing along with the Residents to this song. It sounds a bit creepy if the lyrics are any indication! Maybe the little kid is Lana Flynn, the daughter of Homer Flynn, one of the founders of the Cryptic Corporation, the Residents’ business management.

“Going to Arcata Blues” references Arcata, a city in Northern California that is located in Humboldt County. This track has a sound collage consisting of random hippies in the studio shouting random slogans typical of the Counterculture. You can also hear a couple of women’s voices, which could perhaps be girlfriends of a couple members of the band. At the same time of the recording of this track, Snakefinger and N. Senada appeared on a college radio station in Arcata, where they were performing a composition composed by N. Senada himself for saxophone and violin. This live broadcast was officially released on the Residents’ 1991 rarities compilation Daydream B-Liver, which was released on CD by Residents fan club label UWEB (Uncle Willie’s Eyeball Buddies).

“Black Velvet Original” can be best described as a hillbilly tape speed experiment, featuring violin, acoustic guitar, and percussion. Note that when the violin is sped-up, it sounds like a fiddle.

“Christmas Morning Foto” was an instrumental that was a free jazz piece featuring out-of-tune saxophone, acoustic and electric guitar, and percussion. This also experimented with tape speed effects because a majority of this piece, particularly the guitars and percussion, sound a bit warped.

“Snot & Feces Live at the Grunt Festival” is an instrumental consisting of a recording of acoustic guitar and drums. This time, the tape was gradually slowed down to achieve a desolate effect.

“Oh Yeah Upp Bop Shu Bop” is a free-form mix of country noise and doo-wop that sounds like an extreme attempt at impersonating both Dion & the Belmonts and the Legendary Stardust Cowboy all at the same time. The way the instruments were played sounds like the tape was warped and distorted a little, and had new vocals overdubbed on top. The lead vocals sound like a teenage hippie, and the background vocals sound like characters from The Simpsons.

The lead vocal on “Ohm is Where the Art Is” sounds strangely like Paul McCartney. A rumor was told thousands of times, particularly in Australia, that the Residents were in fact the Beatles!

“Concerto in R Flat Minor II” has a faint spoken word segment that is partially unintelligible. Some of the stuff I hear in the monologue include “Minnesota”, “special impact”, and “defective”. I posted the song to a Facebook group I made called “The Pre-Sidents: The Residents Before 1974”, and a person named Gary Childs commented:

“It sounds like he’s reading a product warranty. He’s saying the product will be replaced if it is defective.

This sounds like an example of “found object art”. He is reading the warranty label from some product. It’s like a boiler plate legal statement written by a lawyer from some corporation.”

Similarly, the album Music to Eat by the Hampton Grease Band, also from 1971, had lyrics read from encyclopedia pages and a can of spray paint.

Good ears, Gary! I’m very proud of you!

“Love Theme from a Major Motion Picture” is perhaps the only piece on the album to be more “commercial”, because it is a majestic piano tune. Since the album was rejected by Warner Bros., it counts as a failed attempt at a film score.

“Prelude for Accordion, Sousaphone, and French Horn”, a piece made for those three instruments, sounds like a mix of Louisiana carnival music, Captain Beefheart, and cheap parade music.

“Short Circuit Comes to Town I” is a 7-second snippet of noise that always intrigued me as if what was used to make the strange noises heard in it. I posted the whole snippet to a Facebook group I joined called “WIERD INSTRUMENT TRIBE”, and I was told in the comments:

“Off the top of my head, sounds like metallic friction (like a brake disc) taped at 7.5 ips and played back at 15–or something like that.”

“It sounds like an overdriven electric guitar picked way up near the pickups”

“Cymbal, tom and a guitar played between saddle and bridge plus the recording is played back faster and its distorted like hell.”

“Short Circuit Comes to Town II” is a 6-second snippet of noise that sounds similar to the first, but this time it sounds like the Residents played a duel between a slide guitar played Hawaiian style and an electric guitar that sounds like it was played on the 5th and 6th strings, muted and distorted. This recording was gradually sped-up with a violin and jazz drums overdubbed on top of it.

There’s also a short untitled track near the end of the album which consists of distorted electric guitar, percussion, violin, and tribal chanting. I think this was the Residents trying to channel Frank Zappa’s 1966 track “The Return of the Son of Monster Magnet”, but only by under 30 seconds.

And finally, the intro to the noise track “Psychedelic and Orgasmic Finale I” has a strange grating noise. I posted the song to the same “WEIRD INSTRUMENT TRIBE” Facebook group and asked what was used to create that sound, and a person commented:

“Sounds like they’re bowing a violin’s strings with a rusty warped hand cranked wheel.”

The rest of the track consists of grating violin, drums, sloppy electric bass, out-of-tune penny whistle, and a bunch of free-form guitar noise that sounds like the guitar player turned up the volume of the amplifier all the way up, complete with the drive setting, and just made out-of-tune noise and mechanical feedback. An extreme attempt at trying to overcome the Velvet Underground!

In the “The Pre-Sidents: The Residents Before 1974”, Facebook group, my Facebook friend William Reinhardt commented on my Warner Bros. Album-related post:

“BTW, my ‘falling out’ with the Residents was over selling ‘WBA’ & ‘Baby Sex’ Reel-to-Reel dubs from the masters in the original silk screened tape box boxes (as shown above) a special gift to me for radio play on my KBOO show.\ I was in a desperate period for cash and is something I have regretted ever since! (Whoever is in possession of these one of a kind tapes has the rarest of collectibles). Their early Sycamore St. studio was simply a mixer and a 2 track and 4 track 1/4 inch recorders, as i recall.”

Mr. Reinhardt was a radio DJ who worked at KBOO FM in Portland, Oregon. He was one of the guys who helped the Residents become popular. He even broadcasted the entire Warner Bros. Album on radio in 1977!

That’s pretty much my analysis of The Warner Bros. Album.

Homer Flynn, Hardy Fox, & Roland Sheehan-Rusty Coathangers for the Doctor (Unreleased, 1970)

UPDATE: This cover was shown to me by one of my Facebook friends.

For my first Residents review, I reviewed their second demo tape, 1970’s Ballad of Stuffed Trigger. This time, I’m going to review their very first demo tape, also recorded in 1970, entitled Rusty Coathangers for the Doctor. This is basically the holy grail of Residents history, and I wished that the band would release this! However, in a Residents-themed Facebook group, I was told by one of my friends from the group, who was from Germany, that the reason why the Residents refused to release all or part of Rusty Coathangers for the Doctor is because it has “no artistic value” and that it just consists of “uninspired fuzting around with musical instruments”. Also, this was not made by the actual Residents, but by some guys who later formed the band. Their names were Homer Flynn, Hardy Fox, and guitarist/organist Roland Sheehan. Upon hearing some of the results, however, I would have to disagree, because out of all the demo recordings I’ve been listening to that have levels and levels of uninspired fiddling around, Rusty Coathangers for the Doctor is what I would say to have the most least amount of uninspired fiddling out of all of them. I’m going to give you a description of the first track out of the two tracks on the whole tape, since that was the only one uploaded by someone on YouTube so far.

“Rusty Coathangers for the Doctor”-A 12-minute suite in several parts, all of which I’m going to give a name, since the movements in the suite doesn’t have any actual titles.

1. “Majestic Introduction”-The whole tape starts off with guitar and keyboards that gradually becomes more and more majestic, perhaps in a classic movie-style manner. Drums also appear. The guitar in this part reminds me of Pink Floyd during their Atom Heart Mother period. No fiddling around in this part. The track ends by being altered with effects to make it sound like a broken radio transmission.
2. “Dialogue & Records”-This has some studio dialogue (that has some microphone feedback at the start) between a couple of the Residents and some girls. In several parts, you hear snippets of old records being played (one of them belonging to the soundtrack for the film Bye Bye, Birdie!), making this movement Plunderphonics-sounding in the process.
3. “Rusty Coathangers for the Doctor”-A really folky piece with lead and background vocals and acoustic guitar, kinda like Bob Dylan but with a more hick voice. More dialogue starts, then comes a reprise, this time in its full form with lyrics. The spoken opening describes how the singer’s “42-year-old baby sister” had a family member killed by soldiers during a battle. It soon becomes psychedelic with distorted bass guitar and Hammond organ.
4. “Freak Out!”-This is a free-form noise improv with distorted bass guitar and Hammond organ. The bass sounds like something from a 70’s or 80’s punk rock song, while the organ has a lot of strange mechanical wonkiness. It ends with a psychedelic chord that leads into a clock ticking with distorted electric guitar and high-pitched organ chords. Some percussive bass chords are played, followed by more organ sounds. A kitschy, NBC Chimes-style guitar melody appears leading to some strange experimental jamming, ending with a vibrating organ cord.

I also listened to a section of the second track of this demo tape (the whole track wasn’t on YouTube, unfortunately), and it is a Hammond organ-filled cover of the classic hymnal “Bringing in the Sheaves”. I absolutely loved the way the Hammond organ sounded, how it is all campy and cheesy.

I didn’t think that the Residents were fiddling around talentlessly with their instruments when they recorded this. Maybe they didn’t want to release anything from this tape because it just consisted of guys who later formed the Residents, meaning that this tape is not really from the Residents.

And, since I’m a musician who releases music online, hopefully I can buy a Hammond organ and a couple other instruments and try to make a clone of this tape, but with different tracks.

The Residents-Ballad of Stuffed Trigger (Unreleased, 1970)

We all know the Residents for being one of the most well-known and uncategorizable experimental music collectives in the history of popular music. With each era of their albums, they actually like to undertake stages of musical evolution going from tape loops and musique concrete-oriented Dada collage music to avant-garde minimal synth music all the way to futurisitic experimental electronic music. However, what would happen if there was a band that combined desolate electric blues with psychedelic fuzz rock, free jazz, and musique concrete and Dada weirdness?

That answer lies within one of the earliest stages of the Residents, on an unreleased demo tape from 1970 called The Ballad of Stuffed Trigger. This tape was recorded after their first demo tape, Rusty Coathangers for the Doctor, which sounded totally different from this tape. I listened to plenty of tracks from this tape, as clips of this were uploaded to YouTube recently. (One of them I remember listening to was on there along with others from the tape, but got taken down. It was a year back.)

The music itself has a very coarse, free-wheeling, and at times junky atmosphere. This doesn’t have the typical experimental electronic music that the Residents experimented with after 1976, and there were no synthesizers used. This is basically the Residents experimenting with what they have. This was all recorded with cheap equipment, which at times can max out into the red, like the track “Unknown Song”. Highlights include the desolate country blues that is the title track, the old-fashioned Dixieland jazz version of George Gershwin’s “Summertime” (the Residents would revisit Gershwin’s works 15 years later), and the experimental Dada-inspired freak out version of “House of the Rising Sun”.

 

 

Out of all of these tracks, the original title track was officially released by the Residents, first on their 2012 mp3 compilation ERA B474 (consisting of stuff recorded before the band’s 1974 debut album Meet the Residents), and second on their 2013 CD compilation Delta Nudes’ Greatest Hiss (Delta Nudes was the band’s name before the name “The Residents” was chosen).

The only way the full demo tape can be found is through bootleg CDr’s and mp3 downloads from file-sharing sites. However. Most bootleg CDr dealers want you to pay more than 30 dollars for their stuff, so I suggest you look up songs from the tape on YouTube, so you could do it more safely!