Liquids Flow To The Sea:Jandek

Artist: Jandek

Album: Your Turn To Fall

Appears On (Mixes): Revme.Vox.Com

Song Notes: So, as I mentioned yesterday, tonight is the big Seattle Jandek concert! Which is really pretty wicked awesome, considering that the dude had been putting records out for, what, not quite 30 years and has only started playing live in the tail end of 2004? (Amusing co-inkydink: The date of Jandek's very first show was the same day that my friends and I had all seen Jandek On Corwood for the first time at the Film Forum.  So, how about that?)  So, yes! Here's a cut from Your Turn To Fall, one of the earlier records, put out in 1983. For more on Jandek, including the whole history and whatnot, pick up the DVD of Jandek On Corwood, and check out Seth Tisue's Guide To Jandek, which is really wicked awesome.

Also: If you are in New Jersey or the neighborhood, The Red Paintings are playing a show (I believe with the Dresden Dolls, who are wicked awesome) -- they're Oh-Kay, I Guess, but the main reason I'm mentioning this is because they had a film backdrop when I saw them a week or so ago, which I was really trying to figure out the source for, because I really wanna see the movie they were using.

Anyway, though, the stuff I remember from the film:

Nuclear bombs go off, as there're mushroom clouds and whatnot. A man with glasses appears to be in pain and nerviously, he rolls up his shirt sleeve and discovers that his skin is cracked and gross from the radiation. He also sees a hunk of metal pipe in there, and kind of goes "AHH!" at it, which I suppose would be the proper reaction. He finds a woman and kidnaps her or beats her up and kidnaps her or something and puts her bloodied body in a bathtub. The odd thing, though, is that she actually seems to be enjoying it sexually, even though she looks like she's beat up pretty bad. The guy ends up in more pain and I'm guessing through mutation, he starts to get all sorts of.... fluffy-dirt-mud-skin-something over him (I'm thinking it was supposed to be tumors), and it seems to be very painful and perhaps making him more into a monster.

It was Black & White, and LOTS of fast motion/jump cut kind of stuff. One of the other things I remember is another guy with an "X" on his jacket running around in some of the fast motion scenes (which were often basically a collage of stills going down a street with telephone poles and whatnot),

Ben & I both saw it, and said that it reminded us that we'd both rather be watching this or Eraserhead (Ben)/''Funeral Parade Of Roses'' (Me). Ben said it reminded him of Eraserhead because of some faces looked kind of like the Baby. It kind of reminded me a little of Funeral Parade just from the general feel.

Ben thought to note too that it may have just been sped up by the Band, but to me, it looked like it was like that in the real film. Ben also remembers the X guy riding around on a bike. I've also heard it suggested that it was a collage of different movies, but disjointed though it was, it really seemed to have the Same Feel, like it WAS all from one movie.

Also, there were a few shots of piles of rather dryish looking dirt, and also some spaghetti lookin' stuff, though those might have been wires. Also, the Mutated Guy looked like he might have been part robot or part wires and such like, too. (There was a shot of a rotating pile of un-sorted wires, that I actually noted reminded me a little bit of the way Cartoon Planet would, say, have a stop-motion spinning plate of beans or spaghetti. But that part isn't helpful, probably.)

(Also, it cut out about halfway through their set, and got replaced with footage of the eye-slitting scene of Un Chien Andalou (and NOTHING ELSE from UCA), then a movie which had the Creation Of The Universe, which lead to a bunch of weird religious imagery and also hole imagery, but the main thing I remember is an old guy in a hospital bed, a Televangelist Lookin' Dude with a white bible throwing the bible down in a really bright place, and then a cut back to the Hospital Dude, where you're going to expect the bible to hit him, but instead he's covered up with the Shroud Of Turin, which he pulls from his face angrily and throws in the corner. Soon after, it cuts to a multi-eye goat-headed man being crucified. I wouldn't mind finding out what that was too, but it didn't look nearly as compelling as the Weird Japanese Avant Film. It looked like the Televangelist/5-or-6-eyed-goat-jesus film would have been more of an Ironic Watchin', rather than the Japanese one which looked legitmately rad.)

I know that it sounds like it might be Tetsuo: The Iron Man, but the stills I've seen from that don't seem to match. (Also, I would have noticed if anyone had a drill-dildo-penis, too. That's not something you typically overlook.)  So, yeah, a) If anyone knows, that would be awesome, or b) If you get a chance to talk to the folks in the band, that would be awesome too. I've emailed the band via their website, but I haven't heard back, so, yes, I don't know! Hooray! I like pie! I'm gonna crosspost this to my LJ too, just because I think more people read that. Also the Music Wiki, just because I like to include all the notes there, even those that don't have anything to do with anything. Hooray! - Rev. Syung Myung Me