THE AMERICAN COMPOSER SERIES
UNCLE WILLIE'S HIGHLY OPINIONATED GUIDE TO THE RESIDENTS
It’s not been so long ago that I was forced to recall the
derivation of a particular Residents’ tune, theory, or
personification, but it has been a long time since I
thought about the origination of the American Composers
Series. The Residents’ version of ANYBODY ELSE’S music had
always made sense to me (Can you recall a time when you
didn’t want The Residents to do Elvis?). After The Third
Reich ’N’ Roll, I was always ready to hear The Residents
mess with other people’s music.
A Resident tells me now
that coming off the Mole Show tour, the rigors of winding
down, and the need to ignore the pressure of producing
something entirely from scratch, made them think about what
already existed that would be good to attack with
Residency.
I heard early-on the names of the possible
composers to be “done,” and was delighted at the first
combination: George Gershwin and James Brown. But I was
scared about the outcome of GG, what with the stuff being
closer to straight music than what The Residents had
tackled so far. (You answer: What’s the difference between
the straightness of “Rhapsody in Blue” and the straightness
of “Judy in Disguise?”)
Contrary to most other projects, I
heard the full Residents’ Gershwin only after most of the
finishing musical touches, and said, “Well, you certainly
did it, didn’t you?” and meant that the majestic GG was
there—plus, it was a young, sexy and non-righteous kind of
majestic. For me, appreciating James came more slowly: the
evolution of JB/Rez vocals, and getting over JB as a god
took time. You answer: Did you go searching for your old
‘Live at the Apollo’ album after hearing The Residents do
JB to refresh yourself re the original growling and
timing?
The next two, Hank Williams and John Phillip
Sousa, were treated less like honored house guests and more
like old, beloved flannel shirts that you wear til they’re
raw, but whose plaids you can’t change. So, Stars &
Hank Forever is more comfortable in presenting these two as
recognizable favorites, rather than brainwashing you into a
new opinion.
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Yes, you take some of this stuff as
cartoonie. Some goes the range from close, hands-on, heart
wringing to distance-in-drag; from an exploitation of new
recording equipment to dogged determinism to make a release
date; from “Great Risks that Work” to belabored, old
discordant discord; from sagginess to the very edge of
thralldom; from Perfection to the Melmac of Music. (You
answer: Do you keep your keyboard by your bed? What do you
jot your dreams down on?) The Residents aren’t just words
slathered on the tongue without benefit of pronunciation:
you can tell the difference between the words lying on the
salt buds, and the ones lying on the sweet and sour buds,
and somewhere along the way, you begin to rely on the
peculiar taste.
So you want the next American Composer
Series Combo to be Allen Toussaint with Moondog, Willie
Dixon with Leonard Bernstein, or Charles Mingus with Brian
Wilson? (You answer.) I’m asking for Rachmaninov with Perez
Prado, no matter what their nationalities.
-Nessie Lessons