Jandek
Jandek |
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Jandek is an outsider musician presumably from Houston, Texas. Since in 1978, Jandek has self-released 47 albums of unusual, often emotionally dissolute folk and blues songs without ever granting more than the occasional interview or providing any biographical information. Jandek often plays an highly idiosyncratic and frequently atonal form of folk and blues music, often using an open and unconventional chord structure. Jandek's music is unique, but his lyrics closely mirror the country blues and folk traditions of Eastern Texas.
Biography
Only a handful of people claim to have contacted Jandek, whose steadfast anonymity is legendary. Without any conventional attempts at promotion, he releases albums through his own record label Corwood Industries, which is addressed at a Houston post office box. Fans can write to Corwood for a typewritten catalogue and order Jandek’s albums, usually at inexpensive prices. Jandek’s work has been available on vinyl and on compact discs. Many of his albums feature pictures of the same young man (seen above) at various ages; in light of Jandek's live performances it is certain that the person featured on the album covers is Jandek himself.
Jandek is commonly believed to be the pseudonym of Sterling R. Smith, and probably lives in the area of Houston, Texas. (A review of Ready for the House in OP magazine — the first ever national press given to Jandek — refers to the artist as Sterling Smith.[1] Checks written to Corwood come back signed by Smith, and Smith is listed as the claimant in the copyright records for Jandek's albums at the Library of Congress. In the Jandek discussion group,[2] fans often fondly refer to the singer/songwriter as either "Mr. Smith," "The Corwood Representative," "The Man From C.O.R.W.O.O.D.", or simply "Janky" (after a song on Graven Image. Corwood is reachable at their post office box and by phone (they are in the phone book).
Smith has kept his personal history an almost absolute secret, revealing only one story about his pre-Corwood years: he wrote seven novels but burned them upon rejection from New York publishers.[3] Aside from that anecdote, nothing is known about Jandek's life. He is rumored to have grown up in Providence, Rhode Island. This suggestion, while typically rejected by fans, is not entirely baseless- a handful of Jandek songs mention either the state itself or the Rhode Island town of Point Judith.
Jandek's first album, Ready for the House, though obviously a solo work, was credited in its initial pressing to a band called the Units. As explained in an interview in the first issue of Spin Magazine, Smith was forced to change the name an indentically named Californian group who already posessed a copyright. All reissues of this first album and all subsequent Corwood releases have been credited to "Jandek" (a name combining the month of January and the surname Decker). Smith's initial use of a plural band name (and Corwood's curious tendency to refer to Jandek as "a representative from Corwood Industries") has led some fans to suggest that the reclusive artist intended his ouvre to be perceived as the work of an "anonymous collective" rather than that of a single man. And indeed, though roughly two-thirds of his records are solo affairs, the other third feature, on varying occasions: female vocals, different male vocalists, bass guitar, electric guitar, drums, and on two occasions accordion. These contributions are generally credited to outside collaborators, but in the Spin interview as well as a letter to DJ Irwin Chusid the artist admitted to having overdubbed parts himself on occasion, such as on the album The Rocks Crumble. At any rate, no proper credits list has ever appeared on an album, but song titles have included "Nancy Sings" and "John Plays Drums," though, curiously, both of those pieces turn out to be, in fact, the same song.
In the early days of the Jandek myth, one theory suggested that all the music was recorded in a single, feverish possibly manic phase and that after 19 albums the releases would stop. This appeared, for a moment, as if it might have some validity - the 21st album, Lost Cause, finished with a sidelong piece called "The Electric End," a crazed instrumental featuring shouted vocals. Instead, this seems to have marked the end of the "first band phase." Then the 22nd album arrived and returned to the acoustic and vocal sound that is found on most of the first six Corwood albums (often referred to as "the first acoustic phase"). This continued unabated for seven albums until, in 1999, The Beginning was released, which featured a side-long work of instrumental piano. This ushered in the most controversial period of albums in Corwood's history - three albums of unaccompanied voice. Seemingly recorded on a voice-activated tape recorder, these "spoken word songs" ran up to half an hour in length and taxed even the most devoted followers. Fortunately, the direction changed again and Jandek returned to a voice and guitar (with occasional harmonica) mixture, though things were different. The guitar was often electric and the voice was decidedly older than that on the previous albums. Further albums have continued the solo approach, though the instrument used has occasionally been a fretless bass, and the songs have stretched progressively longer and the lyrics have become even more personal, to some degree recalling the minimalist monologues of Samuel Beckett. Though Corwood still releases albums like this (the most recent is What Else Does The Time Mean?), they are now alternated with releases of the live band shows, which are remarkably different and feature unusually tight playing.
Some of Jandek's allure stems from his small but devoted fan base that includes Sonic Youth, Kurt Cobain, Mike Watt, John Darnielle of The Mountain Goats, Low, Ben Gibbard of Death Cab for Cutie, Bright Eyes and K Records founder Calvin Johnson. In the 80's and 90's most fans stumbled into the world of Jandek after hearing his music on college radio or freeform stations like WFMU, but as the twenty-first century approached Jandek was just as likely to catch fans through the internet. An "unofficial Jandek website" was founded by Seth Tisue in 1997. tisue.net/jandek It includes complete descriptions of each album and concert and the archives of the Jandek Discussion List. Perhaps ironically, Smith himself claims to never use the internet at home.
Jandek has only given one phone interview in his entire career, conducted by fellow outsider artist John Trubee, for the afformentioned Spin magazine article in 1985. In it, he admitted to having had musical training earlier in life, and refuted an OP Magazine reviewer praising "May he never tune his guitar!" by stating that he did indeed tune his guitar, albeit usually to open tunings of his own devising. The Spin article was Jandek's first major press; as the 80's drew to a close, the magazine proclaimed him to be one of the Most Important Artists of the 1980's in a special end-of-decade issue. Outsider music expert Irwin Chusid brought quite a bit of attention to Jandek by including an account of his own dealings with Corwood Industries in his book Songs In The Key of Z: The Curious World of Outsider Music. Texas Monthly reporter Katy Vine tracked down the "Corwood Representative" and gave an account of her experiences in the August 1999 issue. At Smith's request Vine kept his name and address a secret.
In 2004 Unicorn Stencil Productions released the first documentary on Jandek, fittingly titled Jandek on Corwood. It was directed by Chad Freidrichs, and produced by Freidrichs and Paul Fehler. Amongst the extras on the DVD release of the documentary is the entire unedited tape of the John Trubee-conducted Spin interview. No one from Corwood Industries is represented on screen, but the label did suggest several people to be interviewed for the movie, including music critics Phil Milstein and Gary Pig Gold, and Katy Vine. Corwood's recommendation of Vine for the documentary is seen as essentially endorsing the contents and confirming the authenticity of the Texas Monthly interview. In October of the same year Jandek stunned the alternative music scene by playing live for what was probably the first time (see live section below for details).
In September 2006 author Danen Jobe announced the completion and forthcoming publication of the first part of his Corwood-sanctioned novel Niagra Blues. The book, representing Jobe's imagination of a possible biography of the artist, is almost entirely fictional; its protagonist shares with Jandek only his stage name, song catalog, and a few other facts.
There have been a handful of live shows each year, and Corwood intends to release all of them on CD in addition to his studio albums. As a result, Corwood puts out more Jandek product now than ever in its history- in 2005 alone it released five albums. Summer 2006 saw the release of the first Corwood DVD, a video version of Glasgow Sunday, Jandek's first live performance. Where Jandek goes next is known only to the man behind the music, and it's safe to say he's not telling anyone.
Live performances
The mystery of Jandek's identity was partially resolved in October 2004 when Jandek performed live in Scotland, at the Instal 04 music festival in Glasgow. This was Jandek's first known live appearance and he performed with Richard Youngs (bass) and Alex Neilson (drums). The man on stage was obviously the same man who appears on the album covers. Corwood stipulated that the performance was not publicized in advance.
In May 2005, however, Jandek made announced appearances at the Music Lovers’ Field Companion festival in Gateshead, England and at the Centre for Contemporary Arts in Glasgow, Scotland again with Youngs and Neilson. The Gateshead performance was another guitar/bass/drums trio similar to the performance as Instal '04 while the Glasgow show found Jandek playing piano with Youngs on bowed contrabass and Neilson on quiet drums. The performance was reportedly titled "The Cell" and lasted 90 minutes and has been described as being much more gentle than anything Jandek has done before with many of the piano parts resembling a strange version of Erik Satie. These first shows have since been released as Glasgow Sunday, Newcastle Sunday, and Glasgow Monday: The Cell.
On August 28, 2005 he performed in Austin, Texas (as scheduled) at the Scottish Rite Theatre and Temple to a sold-out audience. It was notably his first time ever to appear on stage in the US and performed with Nick Hennies (drums), Chris Cogburn (drums), and Juan Garcia (bass). He also did two nights of gigs in New York City. He was scheduled to play in New Orleans, Louisiana on September 2, 2005 but the show was cancelled due to the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. A Chicago show was announced only two days in advance, then canceled the next day because Hurricane Rita was approaching Houston. In October 2005, Jandek played three sets on 2 different days at Instal 2005 in Glasgow and also appeared solo in London. In November, he played in Hasselt, Belgium and in Helsinki. He also performed April 20th, 2006 at the Hollywood Theater in Portland, Oregon, returning to the UK in May to perform at the All Tomorrow's Parties festival at Camber Sands as well as playing 2 sets in one night in Bristol and making a low key, short notice return to Glasgow. A further London show was cancelled without explanation. Jandek has two performances scheduled for September 2006, one in Toronto on the 17th and one in Chicago on the 20th. A show in Seattle has just been announced for October 27th.
Concerts
- 17 Oct 2004, Instal Music Festival, The Arches, Glasgow, Scotland
- 22 May 2005, Music Lovers Field Companion Festival, The Sage, Gateshead, England
- 23 May 2005, Centre for Comtemporary Arts, Glasgow, Scotland
- 28 Aug 2005, Scottish Rite Theatre, Austin, Texas, United States
- 06 Sep 2005, Anthology Film Archives, Manhattan, New York, New York, United States
- 07 Sep 2005, ISSUE Project Room, Brooklyn, New York, New York, United States (7:30 pm show)
- 07 Sep 2005, ISSUE Project Room, Brooklyn, New York, New York, United States (9:00 pm show)
- 14 Oct 2005, Instal Music Festival, The Arches, Glasgow, Scotland
- 16 Oct 2005, Instal Music Festival, The Arches, Glasgow, Scotland (first set)
- 16 Oct 2005, Instal Music Festival, The Arches, Glasgow, Scotland (second set)
- 18 Oct 2005, Upset the Rhythm, Saint Giles-in-the-Fields, London, England
- 12 Nov 2005, Kunstencentrum Belgie, Hasselt, Belgium
- 19 Nov 2005, Avanto Festival, Helsinki, Finland
- 10 Mar 2006, Live Oaks Friends Meeting House, Houston, Texas (not as Jandek, but as a guest with Loren Connors and Alan Licht)
- 20 Apr 2006, Jackpot Records/Clinton St. Video Film Festival, Hollywood Theatre, Portland, Oregon, United States
- 17 May 2006, The Cube Microplex, Bristol, England (7:30 PM)
- 17 May 2006, The Cube Microplex, Bristol, England (9:00 PM)
- 18 May 2006, Mono, Glasgow, Scotland
- 17 Sep 2006, Centre of Gravity, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
- 20 Sep 2006, The Empty Bottle, Chicago, Illinois, United States
- 27 Oct 2006, Seattle, Washington, United States
See also
External links
- A Guide to Jandek by Seth Tisue
- Jandek on Corwood, a documentary film
- "JANDEK: The Great Disconnect" by Irwin Chusid
- 1999 interview with Texas Monthly
- Recent Jandek Profile from Halfcut Publications