[ aquarius records — Rock Pop ]

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Showing results 8451 through 8500 of 19388.

The Jandek onslaught continues unabated. So much so that we have been forced to actually go back in time and review albums released within the last few years that somehow flew under the radar when they first came out. Jandek's recent direction with melodically rich collaborative albums like Where Do You Go From Here? and Maze Of The Phantom has been enthusiastically received by aQ customers and staff alike, we just can't get enough. Canticle Of Castaway dates from 2010, and unlike those previously mentioned albums, this is the kind of material that probably separates the casual Jandek listener (if there is such a thing) from the true acolytes. Featuring the most enduring of Jandek recording approaches - the man and his sourly tuned guitar - Canticle is almost jarringly "out there". So if you dig that stuff from the mid-2000s, like the Ruins Of Adventure and When I Took That Train you should find plenty to love; if you found yourself pleasantly surprised by how much you actually liked the past few releases after never really being a fan, you may find yourself cowering in terror. We think it's great that Jandek's still got the old fire within to create such awesome and bizarre tunes that are completely unique to him. Starting with the 29 minute "Don't Go Out", the feel is similar to what you get on the earliest records, but more upfront and less distant sounding, the voice older and more secure sounding in its delivery, but perhaps even weirder in the lyric department (a good thing for sure). Occasional slashes of conventional chords show up, but it's mostly free form strumming and wandering single note melodies. Things follow a similar path with "You Weren't", a brief 6 minute piece before closing with another monster, the 17 minute "Boys Like Blue", which has slightly sparser instrumentation, perhaps hinting at the restraint we've heard on some the recent live stuff. Or perhaps not. It's Jandek, so you'll probably never know. So yeah, we're definitely giving this our highest recommendation, and we know there are plenty of you who will agree with us. Of course, it wouldn't be a Jandek record without confusing the living fuck out the majority of the human population, so approach at your own risk!

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Now back in print on vinyl, Chair Beside A Window was album number four in the massive Jandek discography, recorded and originally released back in 1982. Jandek's recordings are always self-contained, self-referential, and willfully difficult excursions into anti-folk aesthetic that deconstructs every blues-based archetype through freely tuned 'songs.' It was never clear at all if Jandek was the work of one mystery man who lived in Texas, or if he employed help from anonymous musicians. The early records allude to a nearly hermetic form of creativity, but given the model for Jandek's live performances in the 21st Century (with only a couple of a notes handed to the backing musicians and no introductions whatsoever), it's entirely possible that Jandek brought in a couple of musicians under similar instructions back in the day. That said, Chair Beside A Window is an exceptional record for Jandek, not just because of its cracked genius, but also because of the appearance of two outside vocalists, a woman presumably named Nancy and another woman who might be Nancy's sister named Pat. There had been speculation that Nancy was Jandek's girlfriend, although there's nothing to prove (or disprove) that notion. In any case, Jandek's "Nancy Sings" is something of a freak-folk classic with Nancy adopting more of a classic Patsy Cline delivery of fragile beauty, as a counter to the lithium warble and growl from the man himself. Jandek also reprises his track "European Jewel" which is as close to a Jandek standard as you can get, given the recurrence of this song on a handful of albums. This song appeared on Ready For The House but here gets an electric guitar arrangement instead of the treble happy acoustic found on the debut. There's still no end to the mystery of Jandek, even after he's been touring the globe as a very unlikely troubadour. Pretty much all of Jandek's records from the '80s are awe-inspiring / confounding documents, Chair Beside A Window included!

While there have been a number of theories floating around about Jandek, his identity, the unwavering continuity from album to album, the input from his collaborators, and the personal histories that seep through his recordings, the reclusive nature of the Texan known as Jandek (and possibly Sterling Smith) will always keep the truth relatively hidden. Nevertheless, a few facts about "Follow Your Footsteps" are certain: this is the 13th Jandek album, it was recorded in 1986, and the woman who has been referred to as "Nancy" makes another very brief vocal appearance and may have been Jandek's girlfriend. While the last couple of recordings demonstrated a celebratory silliness (especially the odd vocal duet 'Governor Rhodes' on "Telegraph Melts"), Jandek's "Follow Your Footsteps" exhibits greater tendencies towards introspection and musical isolation. In the aforementioned "Telegraph Melts," Jandek punctuated his avant-folk strum and cracked vocal strain with the heavy plod of arrhythmic percussive stabs. Here on "Follow Your Footsteps," Jandek utilizes such drum signatures on only a few tracks; yet what is most striking about this album is the genuine blues stucturalism of the guitar chords. Melody, even if it's just two chords rhythmically strummed on an acoustic guitar, has become an important element in Jandek's oeuvre. Of course, the songs utter the mythologically oblique imagery of preachers, time, reality, and nature - all typical of Jandek's epistomological inquiries. It's a cold world where Jandek lives.

RealAudio clip: Didn't Ask Why
RealAudio clip: Jaws Of Murmur

"Foreign Keys" is the eleventh album from Jandek, recorded back in 1985 and just re-issued on CD. Here, Jandek has figured out a couple of standard blues progressions, but it's rare to find him actually following any of them. His guitar playing remains an angular proposition, manically stabbing at notes then plaintively bending them. The percussion likewise is an erratic skitter across his drum kit, occasionally keeping time, but usually complementing the guitar splutter and his emotionally cracked voice. "Nancy" -- or perhaps better stated, the woman who sang on "Nancy Sings" on Jandek's "Chair Beside A Window" and cited by some Jandek commentators as his girlfriend -- takes up vocal duties on a couple tracks, with her comparatively commanding Patsy Cline / Tammy Wynette voice over Jandek's instrumentation.

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RealAudio clip: Oh No

Holy geeze. 'Nother day, 'nother Jandek. We reviewed the representative from Corwood's fine new studio album The Myth Of Blue Icicles just last list, now here's another in his series of live recordings. It's Jandek album number 53 overall!! As the title indicates, 'twas recorded in Glasgow, Scotland, on a Friday. Specifically, Friday 10/14/05. His usual Glasgow crew of Richard Youngs (bass) and Alex Neilson (drums) backs him up. The all new tracks include "This Wasted Life", "Slave Of The River", "If I Could Be With You", "My Plan", and eight more, all ditties in the Jandekian stylee of extreme outsider rock improv, the music atonally skronky and stompy, or hauntingly spare and strummy, the man's vocals a dismal and disturbed presence. This is THE perfect purchase for anyone looking to add a 53rd item to their Jandek collection. And even if you don't have that many Jandek discs, we'd recommended it merely for the presence of AQ fave Youngs. How 'bout a full-on Jandek/Youngs collaboration next time, guys?

MPEG stream: Walking Blues
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Just when you think you have Jandek figured out. Nearly fifty releases, several this year, you sort of figure he has his 'thing' and does it when the inspiration strikes him. But then along comes Glasgow Monday and we are totally thrown for a loop. Where to begin. First off it's a single track, spread out over TWO discs, a track called "The Cell" nine parts, near ninety minutes. Recorded live in Scotland, May 23, 2005, this is the 47th Jandek release, and FOURTH of 2006. BUT, gone is the strangled blues guitar that pretty much defined Jandek's sound, and its place, piano. Just piano. And vocals. Some strange scraping buzz and subtle percussion, some rumbling cello way in the background, but this is almost entirely piano and vocals, and you know what? It's absolutely gorgeous. This just might be the disc to win over all you Jandek haters out there. The piano is lilting and lovely, strange melodies hover and dissipate, notes and chords trail and drift, hands wandering along the keyboard, slightly melancholy, the sound just glistens and shimmers, while Jandek sings over the top, a sort of spoken croon, tentative, hushed, almost whispered, very dreamy and delicate. This is really nothing like any of the other Jandek records you have ever heard. A dark and mysterious, lovely and dreamlike record. Intimate and inspired, gentle and delicate, without a doubt the loveliest Jandek yet...

MPEG stream: The Cell: Part One
MPEG stream: The Cell: Part Two

After 26 years of cultivating an identity of secrecy, Jandek emerged on October 17, 2004 to perform live for the first time at a festival held at The Arches in Glasgow, Scotland. Many have expressed disappointment at the fact that the famously reclusive Jandek has "thrown away" his cultural cache by making a public appearance; but if you consider that Jandek declined to speak to anyone before or after the show and only spoke in undisclosed communications with the promoter and his collaborators, Jandek continues to take considerable efforts to maintain his distance from the public. So don't fret. Even though he has made this public appearance, do we really know more about Jandek than we did prior to this event? No, not really. The only thing that we can know for sure is that he's more clued into the avant-garde that had been previously thought since his collaborators were Richard Youngs and Alex Neilsen, though that could have been the doing of the festival's promoter. Plus Jandek's whole career makes it clear that he should, can and does do what he wants. Glasgow Sunday is the recording of that historic Jandek performance; and no matter what your opinion is of Jandek's decision to make a public appearance, this recording is fantastic. Youngs and Neilsen keep their input strictly as a rhythm section never to upstage Jandek himself. Throughout the entire set, Richard Youngs keeps his bass within a controlled variation of an elliptical throb and Neilsen does the quiet tumble down the stairs thing on the drum kit. But it's Jandek who really shines. His strangulated blues chords have the same jangling atonality of his earliest records (i.e. Ready For The House), and his deepened baritone voice snakes through his signature revelatory darkness: "I'm floating in a sea of red / Drowning down, can't get no air / And you done told me / I've got no life / I'm rolling my eyes / The last gasp is coming on." If Jandek's going to come out of his shell to make records this good, who are we to complain!?

MPEG stream: Sea of Red
MPEG stream: Blue Blue World

The drums stagger forward in a drunken lurch and a pseudo-bluesy rocktastic bass line oozes forth occasionally reaching towards brassy moans in jazz-not-jazz pools of structural devolution. Here is the anonymous rhythm section for Jandek's Saturday performance back in June of 2013 in his hometown of Houston, Texas. Anchoring all of this activity is Jandek himself, firing off taut, sharp, yet meandering phrases and notes from his guitar with the stream-of-consciousness poetics that wax and wane unintelligibly as he warbles through the notes. His freeform live shows are always without practice and with his backing band given only the instructions for 'blues', 'ballads', or 'brutal.' The Houston gig seemed to fall into none of those categories, although it seems to slant closest to the blues in a super abstract, Jandekian way. The overall feel is closer to the completely wasted sessions that The Stooges belligerently recorded while completely fucked up as they struggled to work through Funhouse between bottles of alcohol and heroin fixes. The crack from reality that Jandek describes is not through the delirium of bacchanalian excess but rather through an exasperation with existence itself. Jandek huffs and heaves his lyrics about his excitement and physical obsession with an unnamed dreamtime figure, betrayed by a throaty voice and old age. It's long been a compelling journey of non-representational songwriting, and here's to many more years to come!

MPEG stream: I Know I'm Alive

What more to say about Jandek? Well, obviously he's got more to say as he's reached album number 33 with the "Humility of Pain." There's still the detuned open chord guitar strum with all of the notes clashing in a completely atonal fashion; and his voice which previously hovered in the upper registers no longer defies gravity on lithium and depression, as Jandek's voice has dropped an octave as was also indicated on his last album "I Threw You Away." While the clarity of Jandek's vocals has never been his strong suit, his voice takes on a drunken slur, possibly an emotional affectation or maybe he really is just drunk, which never the less makes his words even harder to decipher than before. What's curious about these recent recordings (and this one in particular) is that the quality of the production has drastically improved from the 'stick-the-mic-in-the-middle-of-the-room' technique which dominated so many of the early recordings. "Humility Of Pain" is tough record to take even for Jandek fans like me, but it raises some interesting questions as to why he's taken such care to record such damaged music.

RealAudio clip: You Know You Need

Jandek preceded I Threw You Away with three a capella / spoken word albums that were ultimately forgettable detours from his signature sound of damaged folk music. Here, the Texan mystery man has returned to the open chord guitar strum and meandering finger picking techniques while he unleashes that desolate moan of a voice revealing staggering visions of any number of inescapable existential truths. Musically, Jandek's "I Threw You Away" is a very obtuse (even for Jandek!) maze of untuned acoustic dissonance and emotional caterwauling. As with most Jandek records, the differences are the key to discerning meaing. The Jandek cover art -- which had been as uniformly uncompromising as the music -- displays a noticeable change. It's a recent photograph (badly taken of course) of a street in Europe, rumored to be from Cork City in Ireland with St. Mary's Cathedral emerging in the background of the desolate street scene. Has our Texan moved?

RealAudio clip: Blues Turned Black
RealAudio clip: The World Stops

Released originally on LP in 1984, "Interstellar Discussion" is a mild detour from his first few records which transformed an agitated guitar jangle into damaged blues chords. Here, Jandek and the drummer "John" (which of course could just be Jandek) are

RealAudio clip: Hey
RealAudio clip: Why Did I Change A Word In The Last Song

The 43rd album from the one and only Jandek is here! Doing his very distinct thing on acoustic guitar and vocals, a style that has become known to music nerds far and wide as "Jandekian", Khartoum is yet another dark, downer trip into this hermitic Texan's psyche. Well, maybe he's not so hermitic anymore, but even now that he's actually making public appearances (only 27 years after he released his first LP), his music remains as raw and mysterious as ever. And "Jandekian" hasn't lost its meaning. Khartoum consists of alienated, atonal strum-und-twang, teamed with loosely demented vocals, sometimes quietly spoken, sometimes pitched to a warbling holler, delivered with the stream of conciousness lyrical logic of a homeless poet. These songs, with titles like "You Wanted To Leave", "Fragmentation", "I Shot Myself", "In A Chair I Stare", and "Fork In The Road", seem fixated on past (broken) relationships, forgiveness, regret, and despair. Our attempt to transcribe the lyrics of "I Shot Myself" produced the following: "I shot myself I can't get up I am beyond repair I shot myself I'm over some hill beyond the valley stars in the black night sun filters through forgetting a mountain time slides in my mind and I know what it is its time to die..." Something like that. Or, from "New Dimension", another of Khartoum's eight tracks: "You're married, I presume I'm not looking but if you're not be careful I'm the vulnerable kind I love to hurt myself I hurt myself in love and I don't care and all the spirits in the spirit world don't equal you because you're gone and I took you for granted and I miss you so." It's a soul laid bare, speaking directly but in such an idiosyncratic manner that it will only be heard by those with a will to listen. Seriously, his scrabble of strings and chaotic chording provides almost a respite from his depressed words and sometimes excruciatingly miserable wail, one that at times reminds us of Oxbow's Eugene Robinson. So... another fine addition to any fan's sagging Jandek shelf!

MPEG stream: You Wanted To Leave
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44th Jandek release...

The isolationist. The neurotic. The one. The only. Jandek. In what may be a response to the queries about the status of his earliest work (which has been out of print for almost two decades), this hermetic Texan has now been re-issuing these records. "Later On" is his second album of lithium-soaked folk; a pseudo-jangle on the guitar barely carrying a tune and daydreaming poetry crooned with a creepier voice-crack than Will Oldham could ever conjur. The mysteries of Jandek, personal and musical, may never be fully revealed, but his peculiar genius is highly recommended none the less.

"Living In A Moon So Blue" is the fifth album from Jandek, long out of print on vinyl. Corwood Industries (the megacorporation from the United State of Texas solely responsible for mysterious Jandek recordings - all 26 (???) of em) has been slowly reissuing these lost records on cd. Avant folk noodling that is so delicate it certainly cracks and fragments, as with the questionable mental stability of Jandek. Required outsider listening.

Mysterious outsider songsmith (and former recluse) Jandek returns with Maze Of The Phantom, a new studio recording representing yet another reinvention in a career filled with surprises and no easy answers. It appears that the sheer energy accumulated during the past few years of fairly steady performances had a role in the creation of this double disc, which one can only imagine was captured live without overdubs. From the almost painful solitary nature of early solo Jandek records to the wild adventures of the first group recordings to the wide range of moods conjured on the live discs, the material here is some of the most harmonious and traditionally melodic material Jandek has yet produced, bringing to mind everything from Alice Coltrane to Harry Partch to Albert Ayler, as well as Jandek's recent Where Do You Go From Here. This album is comprised of six lengthy untitled pieces and two rehearsals that feel right at home here. The songs feature harp, cello, flute, organ, some sparse percussion, and most notably, wordless female vocals that add a beautiful and mysterious element that makes it hard to imagine these songs being from any specific time or place. The traditional Jandek elements of discordant guitar and scattered, manic drumming are nowhere to be found within the musical dialogue, where the players all appear to be operating on the same cosmic vibration. The shimmering harp runs and warm flute seem to meld together as simple percussion creates more of a mood than any sort of particular rhythm. Occasional stabs of organ punctuate things here and there as the jazz influenced vocals give things an exotic feel that make Maze a nice companion piece to Om's recent Advaitic Songs. This one is sure to please longtime Jandek devotees and is no doubt beautiful enough to win over some new fans we would guess. A wonderful surprise and one of the most intriguing things we've heard in a while.

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MPEG stream: Part Two

In previously writing about "Follow Your Footstep," I had hinted at a progression of Jandek's music towards an isolationism and an introspection that would lead towards the theatrical bleakness found on "The Blue Corpse" (the album album that follows "Modern Dances"). Yet Jandek has never presented himself for easy interpretations, and "Modern Dances" is certainly not an easy record to listen to. Instead this albums showcase two sides to Jandek -- the comedically emphatic avant-blues from the "Jandek band" (with vocal appearances from the woman known as Nancy and the intrusion of percussive splutter which may be indicative of a third party) and the solitary arrangements for Jandek and his guitar. The former is a deliberate slop of off-kilter blues progressions, the aforementioned arrhythmic drums, and oblique duets between Jandek and Nancy (including an alternate version of 'You Painted Your Teeth' from "Telegraph Melts" called 'Painted My Teeth' -- reflecting the continous reworking of older material found in the numerous versions of 'European Jewel'). If Pussy Galore took themselves seriously instead of jokingly posturing through ill-tempered blues, it might have sounded something like this side of Jandek. The latter is what most people think of Jandek -- open chords aimlessly plucked and strummed while his fragile voice cracks in the construction of a painfully sad mood.

RealAudio clip: Painted My Teeth
RealAudio clip: Nothing Is Better Than God

45th release, 2nd of 2006, double disc, 90 minutes long, an amazing live recording documenting Jandek's live perfromance at The Sage Gateshead England on May 22, 2005.

After the raucous squalor of "Interstellar Discussion," Jandek's "Nine-Thirty" -- his tenth album dating back to 1985 -- is certainly his come-down record. It's always difficult to tell how much of the Jandek oeuvre is the result of a psychological

RealAudio clip: Faye
RealAudio clip: Georgia East

Oh boy another Jandek!

"On The Way" is a pretty abrasive album, although it also has the distinction of being one of the more technically proficient albums from Jandek. Working clearly with recognizable blues progressions, Jandek offers a range of expressive (albeit sharply mangled) guitar solos on top of a rhythm section that actually keeps relatively normal time. Yet at the same time, Jandek is really aggro, finding himself on the manic side of the bi-polar equation. I guess I like my Jandek depressed and morose, but if you're looking for a really fucked up alternate to Howling Wolf, and I mean *really* fucked up, "On The Way" is for you.

RealAudio clip: Sadie
RealAudio clip: Bring It Back To Seventy-Five

Jandek seems to be an unlikely source for nostalgia; however, "One Foot In The North" and the opening track 'Yellow Pages' in particular dot the soundtrack of my college days. While attending an unnamed midwestern college in the early '90s (I'll give you a hint, it was consistently voted America's Sassiest College by the now defunct Sassy magazine), I spent a number of hours at the college radio station, broadcasting a powerful 440 watts of raw radio fury to the cornfields and the few freshmen who hadn't figured out that my radio show was an unlistenable mess of post-punk obscurities, industrial noise, and grim dronings (no, not much has changed). True to our civic minded mission of being a community radio station, we produced a number of public service announcements on mind-bogglingly daft subjects. The ones that got the most airplay were of course, the incredibly bizarre ones, such as Rene Enriquez recounting the dangers of huffing glue, or the Clark Webber spots on leprosy. Also in heavy PSA rotation was a particularly haunting one on schizophrenia. Making the 30 second saga of this misunderstood teenager even creepier was the backing music which some smartass at the radio station had grafted onto the announcement. It was 'Yellow Pages' by Jandek. With its lazy electric guitar meandering through a series of painfully sad notes and the lyrics "You've got to help me dear / Because there's no release / From this tangled beast" which chimed in perfectly to the scripted dialogue, the pathos of abject failure and mental anguish was so perfectly realized, it was comical. Thus, for me the reissue of "One Foot In The North" is like listening to Joy Division, The Pixies, or Big Black. It's so familiar that a critique is difficult because the music seems so self-evident. I really doubt that many other people would have the same reaction to Jandek's incredibly difficult signature sound of deconstructed blues and folk into an often pained expression. Nevertheless, I can attempt to step away from my memories for a brief moment and place "One Foot In The North" (the 20th Jandek album produced in 1991) alongside his previous albums "The Living End" and "Somebody In The Snow," with more restrained, potentially resigned arrangements for electric guitar and Jandek's strained falsetto warble. As with those two albums, "One Foot In The North" is quintessential downer listening. MPEG Download: "Yellow Pages" [/audio/jandekyellowpages.mp3] MPEG Stream: "Yellow Pages" [/audio/jandekyellowpages.m3u]

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Three acapella tracks by the Texas mystery man (totalling in at over 50 minutes). Yes, a capella, no guitar, no piano, no nothing but Mr Jandek's voice. Very disturbing, and not in a good way.

"Raining Down Diamonds" is the 41st album for Jandek, who in recent years has stepped out of his hermetic existance and has performed several times in England with an upcoming show in the US. One of those performances found Jandek and Keiji Haino on the same bill; while it's never very clear when Jandek recorded any of his recordings, it seems that Jandek had been quite impressed by the oblique screams, howls, and ululations of Mr. Haino. As wholly self-contained as the Jandek ethos has been, it is quite unusual when other voices emerge within Jandek's primarily solitary artform (the notable exception being the guest vocal appearances by a woman referred to as "Nancy"). Obviously, it's impossible to confirm or deny if he has or has not been influenced by Keiji Haino (or anyone else for that matter), but "Raining Down Diamonds" sure does sound like a Keiji Haino record. Here, Jandek is only playing the bass and singing, although back to his more recognizably lithium saturatured waivering as opposed to his recent ventures into a baritone style. Oh so sad, and oh so bleak, it can only be Jandek.

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AVAILABLE ON LP!!! Well, it was an lp once before, long long ago, but Jandek's been cd only for years now... Here's our review of the cd version when we listed it way back when... The album that started it all was actually not released as Jandek but quite curiously as The Units back in 1978, although there is no denying that Ready For This House is the work of our beloved Texan mystery man Jandek. With Corwood Industry's CD reissue campaign which began several years back, Jandek claimed his rightful authorship over this record. From this album and onward past 34+ records, Jandek has crafted one of the most unique, incredibly personal bodies of music of all time. Within this huge catalog, Jandek (whose real name might be Sterling Smith, then again it might not) is painfully alone, even on those few records with enigmatic duets with female singers or possible collaborations with "John" the drummer. Where the archetypes of blues can accurately describe the sobering truths about hard drinkin' and hard livin', Jandek delves way deeper into the emotional pit of raw abjection and existential torment. His deformed post-blues of incredulously shrill notes, meandering monochords, and lithium saturated vocalizations are unbearable to the average listener. Yet, when given half a chance by the adventurous among you, the enigma that is Jandek will inevitably become revelatory. The mere fact that this was the first record does not in any way indicate that Jandek (or The Units, if you must) was fishing around for a sound. In retrospect, the Jandek signature was fully developed from day one, and Ready For This House still stands as one of the greatest in the catalogue. For the majority of Ready For The House, Jandek meanders through a single, slightly offkey, acoustic guitar chord with a half-strum / half-plucked style that emphasizes loud / quiet dynamics and a rhythmic laziness as the perfect accompaniment for his obtuse lyrics and delivery (i.e. 'Inside myself there is no question / Just the jangle of our brain / Three times four is twenty-seven / Only fragments still remain' from "First You Think Your Fortune's Lovely"). This musical signature dominated his first seven or eight records up through the mid-'80s. It should also be noted that Jandek also debuted one of the few actual tunes that he repeated on a number of later records in "European Jewel." This track broke from that single monochord with a comparatively musical descending set of notes heralding Jandek's warped vision of the blues. If you are new to Jandek or are looking to get a hold of one of the better albums, Ready For This House is marvelous place to start. Very highly recommended.

MPEG stream: Naked In The Afternoon
MPEG stream: European Jewel (Incomplete)

"The Rocks Crumble" - Jandek's eighth album which was originally released back in 1983 - find the Houston hermit 'rockin out' more than usual. There had been a number of theories that Jandek employed a drummer named John on some of his albums. While Jandek's correspondences have in fact stated that his drummer is named John, I'm not entirely convinced he's telling the truth. Rather, Also of note is Jandek's continued revision of "European Jewel" - a tune first performed on his debut "Ready For The House." Three very different versions of that song appear on "The Rocks Crumble."

RealAudio clip: European Jewel 613
RealAudio clip: Message To The Clerk (Part 2)

A while back we made a mistake in claiming that "Later On" was Jandek's second album, when in fact that title was his third album. "Six And Six" is really his second album. While this probably doesn't matter all that much in the grand scheme of things, we'd like to at least get our facts straight. Anyway, "Six And Six" is a raw glimpse into the hermetic soul of Jandek through his ultra-minimal, angular trance-blues soaked with lots of spring reverb and sprinkled with his waivering vocal neuroses.

Record number two, originally released way back in 1981, from this not-so-mysterious-anymore and not-so-reclusive-anymore mysterious recluse, finally available again on vinyl! Another raw glimpse into the hermetic soul of this unliklely underground troubadour, through his ultra-minimal, angular trance-blues soaked with as always, lots of spring reverb and moaned wavering vocal. An acquired taste for sure, but those who do acquire a taste for Jandek's unique twangy murky off kilter caterwaul, often end up completely obsessed.

"Somebody In The Snow" was the 19th album for Jandek who recorded this in 1990, and doesn't deviate from the path set by its predecessor "The Living End" in polishing his avant-folk/blues songs into a small subset of relatively tasteful recordings. Yet, this album is not without its eccentricities and creepy mysteries. While there are a couple of acoustic guitar numbers, Jandek mostly plays electric guitar with a signature laziness, allowing all of the twinkling notes to swim in the spring reverb from his amp. The woman previous referrenced as "Nancy" makes another round of appearances, occasionally singing duets with Jandek including the stunning a capella track of sustained vocalizations "Om." Yet more interestingly is the arrangement of "Come Through With A Smile" which is also sung by "Nancy" and is eerily similar to "Your Other Man" from "The Blue Corpse." That earlier song, perhaps my favorite individual Jandek song, is a psychologically bleak portrait of a jilted lover resigning himself to post-breakup isolation. The arrangement for "Your Other Man" is about as straight-forward as Jandek ever gets, with an anxiously strummed repetition through a declining chord progression. If it is true that "Nancy" was his former girlfriend and "The Blue Corpse" was an autobiographical tale about their breakup, then the similarities in the arrangement of the two songs is particularly unnerving as it implies a brooding animosity towards "Nancy" that was once sublimated within Jandek's hermetic shell yet now has surfaced with a sly wit referencing one of his previous albums. Yet this curious piece of history in the Jandekian mythos doesn't overwhelm any of the music, which remains cool, distant, and restrained. "Somebody In The Snow" would be a great place to start for those discovering Jandek for the first time; but at the same time, this album is certainly a highlight from one of the most unique artists from the past three decades.

RealAudio clip: Om
RealAudio clip: Come Through With A Smile

The cover of Jandek's sixth album, 1982's "Staring At The Cellophane", is nearly identical to "Living In The Moon So Blue" (the underexposed photo on on that cover features a guitar centered in the composition, as opposed to the guitar positioned on the left of the photograph). Furthermore, the open chord guitar pick & strum barely structuring the vocal wisp and waver from Jandek is nearly indistinguishable on these two albums. It may be a bold question to ask, but is the content from Jandek's faded photographs to be seen as indicative of what can be found inside? Perhaps, another small clue into the enigma of Jandek.

The 12th album for the hermetic Jandek is "Telegraph Melts," released originally back in 1986 on vinyl. While firmly entrenched in the 'classic' Jandek sound of open-chord guitar pluckery and vocals that teeter on the brink of losing what little grip of sanity was there, this album stands out for a surprisingly consistent rhythmic attack on the first six tracks. Jandek hammers at his abused drumkit with locomotive rigor and intensity rarely heard in any of the previous recordings; of course, he inevitably loses control of the rhythm and sends it tumbling down the stairs. The rest of the tracks are far more loose in the rhythmic structure. Again, the woman who may be known as Nancy sings on a couple of tracks: one of which finds her sounding more like Jandek with a strained, atonal vibrato. Towards the end of the album, there are a couple of tracks in which a third male voice appears. It's considerably different from Jandek's normal whispy hover. It's been postulated that this voice is the "drummer" who was featured on "John Plays Drums" (a track from the 1983 album "The Rock Crumbles") yet it could simply be Jandek himself affecting a different voice. Similarly, it's entirely possible that Jandek became a 'band' during this period with Sterling Smith (the suspected individual behind all of these recordings) and the enigmatic individuals Nancy and John. As far as the truth about such matters, Corwood Industries remains as silent as ever.

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