Showing posts with label 2023. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 2023. Show all posts

Friday, 16 February 2024

Jandek – "Nashville Friday" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0863) 2023


Another Live Jandek from the homeland of American music recorded in 2009 (again). Enough to make the Grand Ole Opry spontaneously combust.....so no bad thing.
On this outing we find one of spontaneous music's legends in Ladonna...er... Smith.....no relation I guess? Ladonna who played on all those batshit crazy Davey Williams records. And still scraps the viola in a complementarily warped fashion...as in both warped like a record,and warped like a mind.
One would love to see Jandek do a surprise appearance at the Grand Ole Opry one day,eh kids?
Here,we are treated to a singing Jandek avoiding tunes like obstacles in an obstacle race,skimming the jagged surface of every obstacle the sonic backing can conjure up.
Disc one seems to have a Horse theme running ,or should i say, cantering, asunder the rancid chunks of  dueling banjo's that accompany Jandek's dream of becoming a wild Mustang for the 8 long minutes this equine nightmare trots unsteadily along.
And we all like a nice Horse Theme don't we boys'n'girls?
And Yes, Sterling whips out the Fretless bass to further compound those heinous acts of violence against taste that occurred in the 1980's;but, Kajagoogoo this is most certainly NOT!

Tracklist:

1-1 Now That I Want You 10:37
1-2 Shadow Of The Horse 11:12
1-3 Tennessee Flower 9:20
1-4 The Mustang 8:04
1-5 Castigated To Be Free 11:02
2-1 Don't Be Seen 10:25
2-2 This Isolated Moment 7:08
2-3 It Don't Matter 9:17
2-4 Linden Row 7:21
2-5 When I Got You 15:30

Monday, 12 February 2024

Jandek – "Vision Of Jewels" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0864) 2023


While we is on the subject of Japan, I realised there is someone else who begins with 'J' that's been overlooked recently,and certainly never drives on the correct side of the road musically speaking.
Jandek innit?
He's got a new studio album out which sounds like a lot of his post - 2010 live output.but without the sparse applause. 
Its improvised,no vocals, no credits, no info,so i can't verify if it actually was recorded within the last 15 years. So no proof of the carrot topped bard's continued existence on this planet.
I presume that the cover art is a photograph of the Representative's home planet,whizzing around in one of the outer spiral arms of the Milky Way;.....either that, or Sterling R. Smith has just discovered image editing software?......Nah! That's Planet Jandek.
Its as good as anything The Scratch Orchestra did at least.Would have liked to have been around for that Derek Bailey Jandek collaboration that was never discussed.I suppose i could do a fantasy audio montage of this fictional event one day?
When i first encountered a Jandek record I thought it was Funny,but upon listening to subsequent releases I realised that he wasn't fucking Joking!? I thought it was just shite Self-released by a nutter with too much spare cash? Where he got that from I dunno,as i thought he used to work in a Machine Shop somewhere in Houston?
Nowadays I think its less Shite,and especially this stuff,which could pass for Free Improvisation in any number of pretentious enclaves dotted around the metropolitan Chumbawumba beer kellers of planet Jandek.

Tracklist:

1 White Quartz 16:16
2 Color Streaks 15:19
3 Star Specks 12:45
4 Viewing The Realm 23:59


Sunday, 8 October 2023

Jandek – "Brooklyn Sunday" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0859) 2023


Heeeeeeres Jonny!....on a crusade for truth justice and the unamerican way.....and a quest to make unpopularity popular again.
All that, played out to a soundtrack of atonal improvisation by the unpopularly popular JANDEK.....he knows she didn't do it,come and SIGN THE PETITION,before you read the facts,and wallow in the acidic bath of becoming ripe Troll bait.Satisfied in knowing you done good,perched on the right side of History.

There seems to be an actual theme to this recording,again from 2009,but featuring outsider Pedal Steel Guitar, Susan Alcorn.
It seems to be about a miscarriage of justice leading to execution,and eternal punishment.
Jandeks Harmonica and Alcorn's Steel Guitar seems to suggest the regular abuse of justice carried out in the old Wild West.
Of course this doesn't happen today does it?With all that technology ,foolproof scientific tests,and statistics? Nah!
That said I've got a bee in my bonnet about something......

Wasn't there a Nurse from the wild north west of England who was convicted purely on the strength of flawed statistics, and easily contested circumstantial evidence that her state funded defense team hardly bothered to contest? The stats said she was there every-time a very ill premature baby died,statisticians have shown it more to be a case of fitting the statistics to the person rather than,a person to the stats....They died of what, they never really established,despite The Coroner having already ruled the deaths as natural causes. There wasn't even a proven crime committed.But, oh no,like some people still refuse to recognise that Elvis could have died from natural causes, it seems that there are plenty more would don't believe a sick baby could die without being murdered.
Of course I am referring to the Lucy Letby case,who, along with other such cases involving health workers,has been stitched up like a kipper and thrown under the bus to save the NHS's blushes.
I mean,J.H. Christ, where do you want me to start!? The apparent ease in which the Police can change a cause of death from natural causes to Murder is deeply troubling,coupled with a trial that didn't seem to feel the need to present the science that explained why these very ill babies died,the Plumber the joke of a defense team called,tried his best;but he explained that the ward was rife with the permanent presence of pathogens and virus's,leaving the infants exposed to killer conditions like Sepsis.....in fact Lucy even complained on 17 occasions about the conditions....strange behavior for a murderer me thinks.
Lucy did overtime,so she must have murdered them because she was in love with a handsome Doctor. Such was the blatant misogyny in all areas of this case that this was put forward as the only desperate excuse for a motive ever heard in a British Court!? Yeah, that's right, she murdered babies to gain admiring glances from this dashing blade from the senior Doctors department.

The case against Lucy Letby has often been referred to by those of us who have looked closely at the evidence as a 'witch hunt', a crime that particularly impacted women,
When "Expert for Hire" Dr Dewi Evans was questioned about Lucy's possible motives, he gives Lucy's status as a "single woman"(?) in her late twenties and alleged 'infatuation' with Dr A as a grounds for suspicion, this after he mentions earlier in the interview that he remained single into the beginning of his career as a consultant. He considers himself career focused while she is suspicious.
I'm not sure how useful this comment is in terms of appeal, especially because flagrant sexism seems to be ignored or taken as a normal worldview especially in older members of the population, but in Dr Evans case I can't help wondering if evidence pointed to an unmarried, 'career- focused' doctor, his finding might have been a bit better informed?

But the Public are angry...yes the Fucking Public again,are foaming at the mouth like rabid Baboons,baying for blood,and revenge, like a 17th century Wytch trial.If you drown you're innocent, if you don't we'll hang you.

Jandek would have been burnt as a witch if he was around Salem back then.....maybe today he would just get away with a sound beating from a drunken Mob of Morons, or maybe not.Humans are dangerous.


Lucy Letby was convicted and sentenced to spend the rest of her life in jail for murdering seven babies and attempting to murder six others. She is facing retrial for one further attempted murder charge. On five other counts of attempted murder the jury could not reach a consensus. She has consistently maintained her innocence and some close friends and colleagues have supported her. No motives for the killings were ever put forward,except that she wanted to impress a Doctor she fancied. She was convicted almost entirely on circumstantial evidence from "expert" witnesses, who were often testifying on subjects outside their expertise. In particular, medical doctors were testifying about areas of medicine for which they were not specialists, or presenting their conclusions as "scientific", without applying correct scientific methods. As a result the evidence on which she was convicted was flawed and partial, and other likely explanations for the deaths, such as hospital infections, were not presented to the jury as part of the expert evidence. Flawed evidence was allowed to pass unchallenged in the court, or accepted as "uncontested fact" by the defense, who appear to have been out of their depth with the medical complexity of the case. Incredibly, given the nature of the evidence against her, no expert witnesses were called to testify on Lucy's behalf. This is a summary of some of the worst errors, identified by experts in their fields who able to be part of the proceedings. There are links to more detailed information available on the Science on Trial website. All this evidence was presented to the defense team during the trial, but,inexplicably, none of it was used or put before the jury?!


Lucy Letby was found guilty of killing six babies by injecting them with air. Again this was not from evidence gathered at the time. The post mortems recorded natural causes of death. Instead the prosecution relied on expert evidence from a retired pediatrician Dr Evans) through an investigation carried out several years later. The correct procedure for establishing death through air embolism should be a particular postmortem technique. But this was not done. The next best would have been a CT scan. But again this was never done. Instead the cause of death was inferred from X-rays taken before the babies died along with analysis taken from a study carried out in 1989 during the early days of ventilating preterm babies. The study used is entirely inapplicable as it examined babies with lungs damaged from high pressure oxygen, which is very different from injecting air. The expert witness in the case was not a pathologist or forensic scientist, and did not follow the correct methods for determining the cause of death, which could only have been done to any degree of certainty, through a comprehensive post mortem.


There were two babies Lucy was convicted of attempting to murder by injecting insulin. These cases were presented as "the smoking gun" which showed there was a spate of murders in the unit, rather than the more logical explanation of an uncontrolled series of infections. In the notes of these two babies investigators found (a couple of years after the event) entries of very high levels of insulin and very low levels of C-Peptide. An expert witness from the lab where the tests were done at Liverpool University NHS trust, said this pattern could only come about through injecting insulin. To the jury this was presented as proof of insulin poisoning - while Lucy Letby was the one on duty.  However the lab that did the tests specifically says in its online information that the lab test used was not designed to determine cases of insulin over-dose, and that if exogenous insulin were suspected then a different test at a different lab would be necessary. Lab experts say the type of assay tests carried out by the lab are prone to error and that the extremely high figures in the notes, which was many times the level required to send an adult into a coma, was much more likely a false result. While the result is recorded in the notes, no further tests were ordered, nor was a more accurate test by photo spectrometry carried out. Instead two hours later one of the babies (both of which survived) recorded normal glucose levels, strongly suggesting the insulin test recorded was indeed a false result. Unfortunately Lucy's defence, who seem to have been out of their depth, made an agreement early on with the prosecution where they conceded that insulin poisoning through injection of insulin into fluid bags was "established fact", based testimony of one professional expert witness:Dr Dewi Evans.


These and many other aspects of the case are covered in a more comprehensive critique of the evidence which you can read at your leisure HERE!. It was put together during the trial and sent to the defence lawyers who said they read it, but then failed to follow up or use it?????


Then we have to mention the "I AM EVIL" post-it note.On which the prosecution seemed blind to anything else except the "I AM EVIL I DID THIS" line at the end,taking it totally out of grammatical context.

The "They" she refers to is obviously The Police and her accusers.

"THEY went I DID THIS,I Killed Them on purpose because I'm not good enough to care for them,I am Evil I did This."

She is writing about her finger pointing accusers.A simple case of self-flagellation, Absolutely nowhere near a Confession.

The note is dissected expertly HERE!  




Much was made of the fact that Lucy Letby was the only one present during the deaths or sudden collapses of all 19 babies in the case against her. This was presented as too much to be co-incidence. However it also very misleading. She was not only present at all the deaths and collapses presented in the case. There were many other deaths in the unit where she was not present, and the unit suffered a higher than normal death rate over a five year period. There was no statistical analysis as to whether the proportion of deaths she was present at could have been  the result of chance or not. Neither was there a statistical comparison with other spikes in deaths in other NHS units, known to have other causes than a series of deliberate murders, to see if what happened in Chester was comparable.  It is this omission to investigate other possible causes which is most worrying.  This increase in deaths over the five years followed a similar pattern of sudden collapses, whether Lucy Letby was present or not. The most likely culprit for any spike in unexpected deaths in a hospital is an outbreak of infection. Yet this was not investigated. Nor was there any evidence from an epidemiologist or infectious diseases expert during the trial, to rule out this possibility. Yet all the babies in the case had "suspected sepsis" written in the notes. Some had confirmed viral and bacterial infections. All but one were preterm. They covered a wide range from the smallest three babies who were less than 28 weeks and below a kilo, to others who were more mildly premature. There were several multiple births. As such they were a group who were extremely vulnerable to infection. In addition most of the babies in the case were on ventilation. Everything suggests that these were a very sick cohort of babies. The high mortality in the unit led to outside investigations, one of them by the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) which was critical of the senior leadership of the unit. 

Exactly the same thing happened to another Lucy in the Netherlands, Lucia de Berk, at the appeal trial of which Statistical expert Richard Gil, exposed the glaring inaccuracies, leading to a total exoneration of Ms de Berk.......Check the de Berk case out HERE!

And Richard Gil on the  Lucy Letby case HERE!

These and many other aspects of the case are covered in a more comprehensive critique of the evidence which you can read at your leisure HERE!. It was put together during the trial and sent to the defence lawyers who said they read it, but then failed to follow up or use it?????

Oh Yeah....if you've made it this far(?)...The Jandek record is great,and relevant only in the fact that he is an Outsider,as is anyone who supports justice in Lucy Letby's case.Which just might be the greatest miscarriage of justice in British legal history.
BASTARDS!


Tracklisting:.

1-1 Sacramento 16:39
1-2 The Trial 9:48
1-3 The Sentence 3:47 
1-4 The Chamber 11:01 
2-1 Deep Thought 10:22
2-2 Resurrection 14:06
2-3 Eternity 18:52

and

Friday, 6 October 2023

Jandek – "Vienna Wednesday" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0862) 2023


As Hitler roamed the streets of pre-war Vienna searching for his raison d'etre,destiny would dictate that a professional nobody called Sterling Richard Smith would plough a similar furrow so often gouged by the talentless. 
Adolf Schiklegruber would go on to adopt a single word as his nom de plume, just as Richard Smith would do a hundred years later, as a tradename for the clueless artwork they offered a disbelieving world.The Hitler one, was not gifted in the art department,even though he could paint an entire apartment in one afternoon.....TWO COATS! I think he sold even less paintings than Van Gogh....meaning ZERO.
But....Hitler committed the cardinal sin of the arts,...he gave up!? Then took out his frustrations as a narcissist down on his luck out on humanity......and we let him do it!
One thing Jandek certainly did NOT do, is give up. His art is...let's face it, total kaka, unless viewed in the whole, as a Gilbert and George style living concept. He is the Art,whereas Hitler was too stupid to realise this concept within himself.
How conscious The Corwood Representative is of this is debatable,but it can all be an acquired taste that becomes almost.....I said 'Almost'.....an addiction.He IS the Gilbert and George of Outsider Music.
And here he is,one hundred years on from the Bier Keller Putsch, almost to the day, and The Ginger Bard of Outsider-dom Jams with the Viennese locals,putting together another two CD's worth of tuneless noise,augmented by Jandek's painful moan. Again recorded in 2009,along with nearly 100% of his most recent output,fueling more rumours of his secret demise. He's dead, and whoever he entrusted his estate to has a dumpster full of Jandekian free Improvisation  ready to release on the public,stretching into the next century.
The question is often asked as to would the Holocaust have happened if Hitler had been accepted as an Artist?.....well knowing quite a few artists,the answer is a deeply harrowing 'Yes'. Of course it would,this planet is covered with Human's,and they can't help but do stuff like this, Artist or Not?
Another Question has to be asked concerning the Ginger One,as to whether he would have become a mass shooter if idiots like us didn't read too much into his music,which he undoubtedly would have. So,in conclusion, nerds like us save lives.Start by telling your kids that their awful paintings are works of genius,and you may just have saved the lives of dozens of college students. Or better still make them get a job, or don't live in the USA........No Guns, no shootings.....a slogan of pure logic that yer average American Republican is totally blind to!?


Tracklist:

1-1 Sidewalk 11:44
1-2 I Go To You 12:43
1-3 Cloud 8:46
1-4 Intensity Of Love 12:52

2-1 Galaxy 8:34
2-2 I Never Dreamed 12:16
2-3 Everywhere 7:22
2-4 Still With You 15:55


Sunday, 2 April 2023

Jandek – "Northern Ireland July" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0857) 2023


More recordings from 2009?...was that the year he died?.....don't worry Jandek Saddoes,I'm only speculating. I'm sure he's real......and by all accounts rather good at this spontaneous music malarky.
Northern Ireland is too important a hotspot to only get individual concerts released on corwood.This is a whole Tour in a box!?
This ain't Outsider music, but it is made by an outsider,that being the  ginger post-reclusive Richard Smith.
He does indeed look like a member of the Real IRA, but is too pale to be in the continuity IRA, and too Ginger for the INLA. Most of these IRA splinter groups consisted of no more than minus one to one nationalist idiot as a rule, rather like all the so-called 'Groups' on Bandcamp. Its like the USA labelling the UnaBomber a terrorist group.
Maybe Bandcamp should be labelled a terrorist group too?
But,Nothing gets on British peoples Tits more than some senile American getting involved in things they don't,can't,won't understand....like Joe 'I'm Irish Me' Biden. 
Hopefully Jandek's lack of interest in this crass stupidity will help cancel out Irish Americans once and for all.
Good stuff this maybe,but the drummer sounds like he was recruited from an Orange Order marching band......yeah,its gonna happen.....on Drugs....Hahahahahaha.
I'm so funny.
Americans can't really get involved,mainly because most of them think Northern Ireland is somewhere in the Bronx,and native Americans are restricted to outdoor concentration camps called Reservations for their own good.Then they start slagging off China for doing what they were doing.
Its seems wrong to label Jandek an American,but there is no other place on the planet that he could have possibly come from.

Tracklist:

1. Larne Sunday 1:15:50
2. Bangor Monday 1:07:09
3. Belfast Tuesday (Afternoon) 23:13
4. Belfast Tuesday (Evening) 1:15:48
5. Londonderry Wednesday 1:13:55

Thursday, 30 March 2023

Jandek – "The Wizards Hour" (Corwood Industries – CORWOOD 0858) 2023


Is it me or is Jandek's output lessening? Only two albums in the first three months of the year so far....so I guess the answer is an emphatic NO! However, most of his recent releases seem to be recorded in  2009...a seemingly very prolific year for the Bard of Corwood.....I wonder if Corwood (Jandek) ever thought about issuing someone other than The Representative himself. If they(he) did,how would we know it wasn't Jandek pretending to be a group or something similar? He has form in that area......The Units,as credited on the debut Jandek,before it was credited to Sterling's alter-ego, after he got threatened by the similarly monikered synth-punk bands the Units.He changed names pronto as soon as legal action was mentioned....lightweight!
The Wizards Hour,dunno if he was refering to himself,benefits from being a recording made for WNYU 89.1 FM and having a strict time limit,so no 6 cd's worth of stuff here.......thank fuck.
A shimmering but scraping yet juddering note-less meander through the ox-bow lakes of The Bardo Pond outtakes bin.
The Rep and uncredited chums make ,what normal people would call a Psych-Drone journey into Outsider Space. That's all well and good,but with tunes like this our favourite Outsider is rapidly becoming an Insider. If you took away his entire pre-2000 lexicon of Outsider-dom,he would be now be filed alongside The aforementioned Bardo Pond, Loop, SkullFlower, and Ascension.Largely due to his unnamed guests I would suggest.It was about the time they appeared that things started to go downhill Outsider-wise. Musically, No-longer an Outside,but maybe, personality-wise,he still retains that threat to Bigots and Fools everywhere...in other worlds not us!?.Sometimes the Emperor needs to look into the mirror,and realise he's wearing new clothes that are no longer invisible. I blame the Internet and that cunt who wrote that book ....you know, the one that inexplicably puts Syd Barratt and Don Van Vliet in the same category as.....coff...Jandek?.......maybe he's right about Syd, but Don?...an Outsider he most certainly was NOT!

Tracklist:

1. The Wizard Awakens 20:44
2. The Wizards' Afternoon 24:51
3. The Wizards' Dream 16:34