Tuesday, October 19, 2004

A message this morning from Gary Gold suggested that Jandek had played the Instal Festival in Glasgow. I figured that if he did then one man would know. He did and here's a front line report from Mr David Keenan...

"Lindsay

Yeah, it's true, I didn't get to speak to him, no one did except my friend Barry who booked him and Richard Youngs and Alex Neilson who played with him. He never once said he was Jandek, just a rep of Corwood Industries. Said to Alex afterwards that the live show was the first time he had ever felt truly alive. Smiled on stage once. Looked very emaciated. Apparently in rehearsal, he told the group he had three types of songs and he would signal by the way he played guitar what type each one was, either Blues, Ballad or Brutal(!). He had been in Glasgow for a week, flew over on his own money so that he was under no obligation to play if he didn't feel like it. The venue was emptied while he practiced and no one was allowed to announce he was playing or he would pull the show. I knew he was thinking about doing it for a while and finally over the last few days realised it was happening but was unable to tell anyone. We have about 70 pics in all. The concert was filmed with Jandek having the option of releasing it as a DVD on Corwood(!). Everyone here is still in a daze, can't believe it happened, the concert was everything you could've hoped from a Jandek show, crazy heavy Velvets spiked blues guitar, Richard playing Holger-Czukay style bass throbs, Alex playing heavy and free and that fucking voice sounded like it was straight from the void, set of blasted blues, Haino said afterwards "Jandek *is* the blues." Jandek looked like he was realy enjoying it and pulled a few good shapes too, never said one thing though, took his time packing his guitar but no one approached him and he left the venue as abruptly as he had arrived. All the songs were of heartbreak and abandon, few funny lines too, like when he suddenly exploded "I made the decision to get real wild!" and everyone began screaming. Apparently he loved the screams, looks like he wants to do it again, maybe even announce it next time. Anyway, still trying to piece it all together. Who could've thunk it? Dx"


Now that's what you could call a world exclusive I believe.... thanks David...

1 comment:

Jeroen Vedder said...

Gotta fes up that this whole Jandek "thing" always passed me, even tho' I remember seeing his name mentioned in mags like Forced Exposure way back when. So after reading the above I did some digging and came across a piece called Jandek and me by Katy Vine, that served as fine crash course introduction that might suit your needs as well...