The Residents
Encyclopedia
The Residents is an American art collective best known for avant-garde music
and multimedia
works. The first official release under the name of The Residents was in 1972, and the group has since released over sixty albums, numerous music videos and short films, three CD-ROM projects and ten DVDs. They have undertaken seven major world tours and scored
multiple films. Pioneers in exploring the potential of CD-ROM
and similar technologies, The Residents have won several awards for their multimedia projects. Ralph Records
, a record label
focusing on avant-garde music, was started by The Residents.
The group's albums are noted for surrealistic
lyrics and sound, and disregard for conventional music composition. Throughout its existence, the individual members have ostensibly attempted to operate under anonymity
, preferring instead to have attention focused on their art output. Much outside speculation and rumor has focused on this aspect of the group. In public, the group appears silent and costumed, often wearing eyeball helmets, top hats and tuxedos -a long-lasting costume now recognized as their signature iconography-.
, where they met in high school in the 1960's and in 1966, members headed west to San Francisco, California
. After their truck broke down in San Mateo
, they decided to remain there. Like all information pertaining to the early days of the band, this is provided by The Cryptic Corporation and may or may not be invented.
While attempting to make a living, they began to experiment with tape machines, photography, and anything remotely to do with art that they could get their hands on. Word of their experimentation spread and in 1969, a British guitarist and multi-instrumentalist named Phil Lithman
and the mysterious N. Senada
(whom Lithman had picked up in Bavaria
where the aged avant-gardist was recording birds singing) paid them a visit, and decided to remain.
The two Europeans would become great influences on the band. Lithman's guitar playing technique earned him the nickname Snakefinger
, after his frantic playing on the violin during the performance with the Residents at The Boarding House
in San Francisco 1971, where his fingers' speed made them look like snakes in the eyes of the less-musically proficient, but imaginative Residents.
The group purchased crude recording equipment and instruments and began to make tapes, refusing to let an almost complete lack of musical proficiency stand in the way.
in 1999. Cryptic says there are lots of tapes dating back decades, but they were all recorded before the group had officially become The Residents so the band does not consider them to be part of their discography.
The album The Ballad of Stuffed Trigger has never been released in any form. Uncle Willie, former Residents fan club president, wrote in his book Uncle Willie's Highly Opinionated Guide to The Residents that, while searching through the band's archives, he came across a suite named 'The Ballad Of Stuffed Trigger', but not a complete album.
In 1971 the group sent a reel-to-reel tape to Hal Halverstadt at Warner Brothers, since he had worked with Captain Beefheart
(one of the group's musical heroes). Halverstadt was not overly impressed with The Warner Bros. Album
(He describes it as "okay at best" in Uncle Willie's Cryptic Guide to the Residents), but awarded the tape an A for Ariginality. Because the band had not included any name in the return address, the rejection slip was simply addressed to The Residents. The members of the group then decided that this would be the name they would use, first becoming Residents Unincorporated, then shortening it to the current name.
The first performance of the band using the name The Residents was at The Boarding House
in San Francisco in 1971. That same year another tape was completed called Baby Sex. The original cover art for the tape box was a silk-screened copy of an old photo depicting a woman fellating a small child. (Considered artistically rude at that time, it would be viewed as child pornography today).
In 1972 they moved to San Francisco and formed Ralph Records
. By this time, The Cryptic Corporation was operating as a partnership and incorporated to take over the running of Ralph Records
.
single and while recording Meet the Residents, The Residents undertook one of their first major projects: the ambitious Vileness Fats
film project. Intended to be the first-ever long form music video, The Residents saw this project as the opportunity to create the ultimate cult film
. After four years of filming (from 1972 to 1976) the project was reluctantly canceled because of time, space and monetary constraints. Fifteen hours of footage were shot for the project yet only about three-quarters of an hour of that footage has ever been released.
Santa Dog
is considered by The Residents themselves and their fans to be the official start of the band's recorded output. This is so because it was the first to be released to the public. Shortly after this release, the band left San Mateo
and relocated to San Francisco. They sent copies of Santa Dog
to west coast radio stations with no response until Bill Reinhardt, program director of KBOO
·FM in Portland
, Oregon
received a copy. Santa
had the strange kind of sonic weirdness he was looking for and it was played heavily on his popular (Radio Lab) show. Bill met The Residents at their Sycamore St. studio in the summer of 1973 with the news of his broadcasts. They were overjoyed that they had finally got media acceptance and he was celebrated with the news that KBOO was the first station to play a Residents record on the air. Inviting him in and treating him like family, The Residents gave Reinhardt exclusive access to all their eclectic recordings, including copies of the original masters of Stuffed Trigger, Baby Sex and the Warner Bros. Album
. He promoted these along with Meet the Residents regularly on his radio program. There was considerable resistance to the commercial viability of Residents material. To aid in their promotion, Bill was given 50 of the first 1,000 copies of Meet the Residents. Some were sent to friends, listeners and critics and two dozen were left for sale on consignment at Music Millennium Records where they sat unsold for months. KBOO DJ, Barry Schwam (Schwump, who also recorded with The Residents) promoted them on his program as well. Eventually KBOO airplay attracted many loyal fans and Portland became the epicenter of a worldwide cult phenomenon.
The Residents, at this time, were at a rough point in their career. According to official Residents lore, there was internal turmoil which resulted in a large, "embarrassing" food fight
; they decided to resolve this tension in 1974 by recording what would later become Not Available
—representative of N. Senada
's Theory of Obscurity taken to its logical conclusion. The album was recorded and then placed in storage in order to be issued only when everyone had forgotten about it. However, contractual obligations related to the much-delayed release of Eskimo
forced its release in 1978 after the band had almost forgotten about it. The Residents were not bothered by this deviation from their plan since the 1978 decision to release the album would not affect the philosophical conditions under which it was originally recorded.
The Third Reich 'n' Roll came next, a pastiche on 1960s rock and roll
with an overarching Nazi theme, represented visually on the album cover, which featured Dick Clark in an SS uniform holding a carrot
, with a number of Hitlers
dancing on clouds behind him. On each side of the record was a single composition, approximately 17½ minutes long, using recordings of classic rock and roll songs that were spliced, overdubbed and edited with new vocals, instrumentation and tape noises.
The original songs were finally removed leaving entirely new and bizarre performances. The music video for this album was shot on the sets that were built for Vileness Fats
.
Following The Third Reich 'n' Roll came Fingerprince
, a particularly ambitious project not unlike the earlier Not Available
recordings. The band's original intention with Fingerprince
was to release it as the very first three-sided album – they had found a way to simulate a third side by arranging the grooves on one side of the vinyl album to play a completely different program of tracks depending on which series of grooves the needle was dropped on. However, this idea was dropped when the band discovered that the Monty Python
comedy troupe had executed the very same idea three years earlier with their Matching Tie and Handkerchief album. The third side was later released as an EP entitled Babyfingers
, and the Babyfingers tracks have since been re-integrated into the Fingerprince album on the CD reissues.
The Residents followed Fingerprince with their Duck Stab/Buster & Glen
album – their most easily comprehensible album up to that point. This album got the band some attention from the press (namely NME
, Sounds and Melody Maker
), and dropped most of their reliance upon the Theory of Obscurity.
Eskimo
(1979) contained music consisting of non-musical sounds, percussion, and wordless voices. Rather than being songs in the orthodox sense, the compositions sounded like "live-action stories" without dialogue. The Residents remixed the "songs" in disco
style, the results of which appeared on the EP Diskomo
. Eskimo was reissued in surround sound
on DVD
in 2003. Eskimo's cover presents the first instance of the group wearing their signature eyeball masks and tuxedos, which would be featured in many subsequent releases, films, live appearances, and promotional materials.
Commercial Album (1980) consisted of 40 songs, each consisting of a verse and a chorus and lasting one minute. The songs pastiched the advertising jingle although the songs were not endorsements of known products or services. The liner notes
state that songs should be repeated three times in a row to form a pop song. The Residents purchased 40 one-minute advertising slots on San Francisco's most popular Top-40 radio station at the time, KFRC
, such that the station played each track of their album over three days. This prompted an editorial in Billboard magazine
questioning whether the act was art or advertising.
When MTV
was in its infancy, The Residents' videos were in heavy rotation since they were among the few music videos available to broadcasters. The Residents' earliest videos are in the New York Museum of Modern Art
's permanent collection and were eventually released together in 2001 on the Icky Flix
DVD, which includes an optional audio track of remixes.
, was to be released. A tour ensued, and was narrated nightly by Penn Jillette
. The Mole Trilogy is made up of parts I, II and IV.
The performance featured The Residents performing behind a burlap screen, occasionally wearing disguises (such as their iconic eyeball masks), while dancers and actors appeared in front of painted backdrops used to help illustrate the story. Penn Jillette would come out between songs telling long intentionally pointless stories. The show was designed to appear to fall apart as it progressed: Penn pretended to grow angrier with the crowd, and lighting effects and music would become increasingly chaotic, all building up to the point where Penn was dragged off stage and returned, handcuffed to a wheelchair, to deliver his last monologue. During one performance, an audience member assaulted Penn while he was handcuffed to the wheelchair.
and Jerry Garcia
.
Backstage at the Hollywood Palace show on December 26, 1985, one member's eyeball mask (Mr. Red Eye) was stolen, so it was replaced with a giant skull mask. The eye was returned by a devoted fan who discovered where the thief lived and stole it back, although Homer Flynn said the person who returned the mask was most probably the thief. It was put into retirement because they said it was "unclean" and in a bad condition—a superfluous shell. After this, the lead Resident was known as Mr. Skull.
The last show of this tour was in January 1987 at The Warfield
in San Francisco, with a special appearance by Penn & Teller
.
They introduced the first part, which covered cowboy music, on German television as "Buckaroo Blues". It featured the singer and two dancers wearing giant cowboy hats around a glowing campfire. Part two was called "Black Barry" and focused on slave music and the blues. The act ended when a giant cube head rose from the back of the stage. Part three, "The Baby King," featured Elvis songs performed by an elderly Elvis impersonator for his grandchildren. The show ended with an inflated Elvis dying as a result of the British Invasion
.
, a story about the exploitation of two Siamese twins with healing powers by a male dominant force and The King & Eye
, a surreal biography of Elvis Presley
and the birth of rock and roll.
released by the Voyager Company on March 1, 1995, shortly after Laurie Anderson
's first multimedia CD-ROM experiment, Puppet Motel. Freak Show was also a stage performance by a theater company at the Archa Theater in Prague that premiered on November 1, 1995, and a comic book. Several of the songs were also performed live during the 1997 25th anniversary concerts at the Fillmore in San Francisco. After the CD-ROM's success, the album was re-released as The Freak Show Soundtrack with a different cover. A limited edition, The Freak Show Special Edition, was released in 2002 to mark their 30th anniversary.
Other multimedia projects by The Residents included The Gingerbread Man and Bad Day on the Midway.
featured the Residents departing from pre-programmed music and again using a live band. The band wore ecclesiastical robes and performed in a brightly lit fluorescent cave. The male and female lead singers switched leads, depending on what characters they needed. Act one consisted of one-off stories about individual Bible characters. Act 2 focused on suites of songs about Bible figures such as Abraham
, Moses
, and King David. During a performance in Athens, Greece, Nolan Cook, their guitarist, had to leave the stage after taking a rock to the head from an audience member.
(also a tour and DVD in 2002) and Animal Lover
in 2005. Singer Molly Harvey began as a Ralph employee but by the mid-90s contributed to virtually all of The Residents' many projects. The Residents' increased reliance on Harvey—essentially handing her half of the vocal duties since at least Demons Dance Alone—parallels their artistic revitalization. Nolan Cook, Carla Fabrizio, Toby Dammit
, Eric Drew Feldman
, and many other artists continuously worked with the band over the last five years, recording and performing live. The new artists helped to counter what Allmusic derided as a "sonic palette [confined to] factory presets from their new Macintosh audio" of the CD-ROM era.
In February 2005, The Residents toured Australia as part of the "What is Music?" festival, performing a two hour retrospective set entitled the 33rd Anniversary Tour: The Way We Were. These shows saw a fairly minimal band; three eyeball-headed Residents (one on guitar and two laptop/sample operators), a "stage hand" performer, and a male and female vocalist in costumes reminiscent of the Wormwood tour. Video projections and unusual flexible screens were added to the stage set, creating an unsettling ambiance. The performances on the Way We Were tour were recorded and were released on CD and DVD in 2005.
video project on YouTube
. In 2007 they did the music for the documentary Strange Culture
and also released a double instrumental album, Night of the Hunters. On the Fourth of July, 2007, the planned October release of their latest project with Mute Records
, The Voice of Midnight
(a music theater adaptation of E.T.A. Hoffmann
's short story "Der Sandmann
"), was announced on their website.
On the May 21 they announced on their website that their first North America tour since Demons Dance Alone
for a project entitled The Bunny Boy
was set to begin on October 9 in New York – later an earlier date was added for Santa Cruz. Soon, it was announced that the tour would also include Europe, starting November 13. On June 3, the Residents.com website boasted the planned release of The Bunny Boy which was released on September 1. The website had posted information in which Foxboro claimed this would be a Farewell Tour; it was later revealed that this was nothing more than a mistake by Foxboro.
November 3, 2009 saw three new releases. The Ughs! is a mostly instrumental album made up of music composed earlier in their career, which had been completely reworked for the Voice of Midnight album. Ten Little Piggies is a "futurist compilation", ten songs from projects that may or may not be released in the future. Finally Is Anybody Out There is a DVD collecting all the Bunny Boy videos from the series posted on YouTube. The episodes are streamlined and not exactly the same as the originals.
festival curated by Matt Groening
in May 2010 in Minehead, England. The band released several albums related to the Talking Light concept, including the instrumental albums Dollar General and Chuck's Ghost Music, live album Bimbo's Talking Light, and studio album Lonely Teenager.
In October and November 2011, the Residents presented Sam's Enchanted Evening at The Marsh
performance center in Berkeley, with the lead signer appearing as "Randy Rose."
(born April 1945), Hardy W. Fox (born 1945), and John Kennedy in 1976, all of whom denied having been band members. (Clem and Kennedy left the Corporation in 1982, much to the chagrin of some fans.) The Residents themselves do not grant interviews, though Flynn and Fox have conducted interviews with the media.
Nolan Cook, a prominent collaborator with the group in both their live and studio work (as well as being a live member of I Am Spoonbender
), denied in an interview that Fox and Flynn are the Residents, saying that he has come across such rumors, and they are completely false. However, Cook himself is considered a member of the band by some, as he is known to wear the same head coverings as the rest of the group during live shows, even wearing the trademark eyeball mask during the Wormwood tour.
William Poundstone
, author of the Big Secrets
books, compared voiceprints of a Flynn lecture with those of spoken word segments from the Residents discography in his book Biggest Secrets. After noting similar patterns in both, he concluded "the similarities in the spectograms second the convincing subjective impression that the voices are identical." He posited that "It is possible that the creative core of the Residents is the duo of Flynn and Fox." A subset of that belief is that Flynn is the lyricist and that Fox writes the music. In addition BMI's online database of the performance rights organization (of which the Residents and their publishing company, Pale Pachyderm Publishing (Warner-Chappell), have been members for their entire careers), lists Flynn and Fox as the composers of all original Residents songs. This includes those songs written pre-1974 (the "Residents Unincorporated" years), the year Cryptic formed.
Simon Reynolds
wrote in his book Rip It Up and Start Again: Post Punk 1978-1984 that "The Residents and their 'representatives' were one and the same", elaborating on one of his blogs that "this was something that anybody who had any direct dealings with Ralph figured out sooner rather than later." Reynolds quotes Helios Creed
, who identifies The Residents as a keyboardist named "H", a singer named Homer, and "this other guy called John"; and Peter Principle of Tuxedomoon
, who claims that "we eventually figured out that the guy doing the graphics and the engineer in the studio were in fact the Residents."
Cryptic openly admits the group's artwork is done by Flynn (among others), under various names that, put together, become Pornographics, but the pseudonym is rarely spelled the same way twice (examples: Porno Graphics, Pore No Graphix, Pore-Know Graphics); and that Fox is the "sound engineer" — meaning that he is the main producer, engineer, master, and editor of all their recordings. (Since 1976, the Residents' recordings have all listed their producer as "The Cryptic Corporation," presumably meaning Fox in particular.) Many other rumors have come and gone over the years, one being that 60s experimental band Cromagnon
shared members with the band.
Avant-garde music
Avant-garde music is a term used to characterize music which is thought to be ahead of its time, i.e. containing innovative elements or fusing different genres....
and multimedia
Multimedia
Multimedia is media and content that uses a combination of different content forms. The term can be used as a noun or as an adjective describing a medium as having multiple content forms. The term is used in contrast to media which use only rudimentary computer display such as text-only, or...
works. The first official release under the name of The Residents was in 1972, and the group has since released over sixty albums, numerous music videos and short films, three CD-ROM projects and ten DVDs. They have undertaken seven major world tours and scored
Film score
A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film, forming part of the film's soundtrack, which also usually includes dialogue and sound effects...
multiple films. Pioneers in exploring the potential of CD-ROM
CD-ROM
A CD-ROM is a pre-pressed compact disc that contains data accessible to, but not writable by, a computer for data storage and music playback. The 1985 “Yellow Book” standard developed by Sony and Philips adapted the format to hold any form of binary data....
and similar technologies, The Residents have won several awards for their multimedia projects. Ralph Records
Ralph Records
Ralph Records was The Residents' original record label, the name coming from the somewhat colorful phrase "calling Ralph on the porcelain telephone."...
, a record label
Record label
In the music industry, a record label is a brand and a trademark associated with the marketing of music recordings and music videos. Most commonly, a record label is the company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the production, manufacture, distribution, marketing and promotion,...
focusing on avant-garde music, was started by The Residents.
The group's albums are noted for surrealistic
Surrealism
Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....
lyrics and sound, and disregard for conventional music composition. Throughout its existence, the individual members have ostensibly attempted to operate under anonymity
Anonymity
Anonymity is derived from the Greek word ἀνωνυμία, anonymia, meaning "without a name" or "namelessness". In colloquial use, anonymity typically refers to the state of an individual's personal identity, or personally identifiable information, being publicly unknown.There are many reasons why a...
, preferring instead to have attention focused on their art output. Much outside speculation and rumor has focused on this aspect of the group. In public, the group appears silent and costumed, often wearing eyeball helmets, top hats and tuxedos -a long-lasting costume now recognized as their signature iconography-.
Origins
The Residents supposedly hail from Shreveport, LouisianaLouisiana
Louisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...
, where they met in high school in the 1960's and in 1966, members headed west to San Francisco, California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
. After their truck broke down in San Mateo
San Mateo, California
San Mateo is a city in San Mateo County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area. With a population of approximately 100,000 , it is one of the larger suburbs on the San Francisco Peninsula, located between Burlingame to the north, Foster City to the east, Belmont to the south,...
, they decided to remain there. Like all information pertaining to the early days of the band, this is provided by The Cryptic Corporation and may or may not be invented.
While attempting to make a living, they began to experiment with tape machines, photography, and anything remotely to do with art that they could get their hands on. Word of their experimentation spread and in 1969, a British guitarist and multi-instrumentalist named Phil Lithman
Snakefinger
Philip Charles Lithman , who performed under the stage name Snakefinger, was an English musician, singer and songwriter. A multi-instrumentalist, he was best known for his guitar and violin work and his collaborations with The Residents.-History:Lithman was born in Tooting, South London, and came...
and the mysterious N. Senada
N. Senada
N. Senada was a Bavarian composer and music theorist who formulated the "Theory of Obscurity" and the "Theory of Phonetic Organization"...
(whom Lithman had picked up in Bavaria
Bavaria
Bavaria, formally the Free State of Bavaria is a state of Germany, located in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the largest state by area, forming almost 20% of the total land area of Germany...
where the aged avant-gardist was recording birds singing) paid them a visit, and decided to remain.
The two Europeans would become great influences on the band. Lithman's guitar playing technique earned him the nickname Snakefinger
Snakefinger
Philip Charles Lithman , who performed under the stage name Snakefinger, was an English musician, singer and songwriter. A multi-instrumentalist, he was best known for his guitar and violin work and his collaborations with The Residents.-History:Lithman was born in Tooting, South London, and came...
, after his frantic playing on the violin during the performance with the Residents at The Boarding House
The Boarding House (nightclub)
The Boarding House was a nightclub located at 960 Bush Street in San Francisco, California. Steve Martin's first three albums, Let's Get Small, A Wild and Crazy Guy, and Comedy Is Not Pretty were recorded there, in whole or in part...
in San Francisco 1971, where his fingers' speed made them look like snakes in the eyes of the less-musically proficient, but imaginative Residents.
The group purchased crude recording equipment and instruments and began to make tapes, refusing to let an almost complete lack of musical proficiency stand in the way.
1969–1972: Residents Unincorporated
In 1969 the group began to make the first of their unreleased tapes. Rumors have surfaced of two (of perhaps hundreds) of unreleased reel-to-reel items titled Rusty Coathangers for the Doctor and The Ballad of Stuffed Trigger. The actual titles are in question (as is the notion that these were album-length recordings), but the first title has been confirmed by a former head of the now defunct Smelly Tongues fan club. Further evidence of pre-1970 recordings surfaced with the release of the song I Hear You Got Religion, supposedly recorded in 1969, and released originally as a downloadable track from Ralph AmericaRalph Records
Ralph Records was The Residents' original record label, the name coming from the somewhat colorful phrase "calling Ralph on the porcelain telephone."...
in 1999. Cryptic says there are lots of tapes dating back decades, but they were all recorded before the group had officially become The Residents so the band does not consider them to be part of their discography.
The album The Ballad of Stuffed Trigger has never been released in any form. Uncle Willie, former Residents fan club president, wrote in his book Uncle Willie's Highly Opinionated Guide to The Residents that, while searching through the band's archives, he came across a suite named 'The Ballad Of Stuffed Trigger', but not a complete album.
In 1971 the group sent a reel-to-reel tape to Hal Halverstadt at Warner Brothers, since he had worked with Captain Beefheart
Captain Beefheart
Don Van Vliet January 15, 1941 December 17, 2010) was an American musician, singer-songwriter and artist best known by the stage name Captain Beefheart. His musical work was conducted with a rotating ensemble of musicians called The Magic Band, active between 1965 and 1982, with whom he recorded 12...
(one of the group's musical heroes). Halverstadt was not overly impressed with The Warner Bros. Album
WB: RMX
WB:RMX is an album by The Residents, released in 2003. The album is a remake of a 1971 demo tape.The Residents originally got their name when the demo tape they recorded in 1971 was rejected and returned to "residents," since no name of the band had been provided...
(He describes it as "okay at best" in Uncle Willie's Cryptic Guide to the Residents), but awarded the tape an A for Ariginality. Because the band had not included any name in the return address, the rejection slip was simply addressed to The Residents. The members of the group then decided that this would be the name they would use, first becoming Residents Unincorporated, then shortening it to the current name.
The first performance of the band using the name The Residents was at The Boarding House
The Boarding House
"The Boarding House" is a short story by James Joyce published in his 1914 collection Dubliners.-The story:Mrs. Mooney, separated from her husband, a butcher who descended into alcoholism, runs a boarding house for working men. Her daughter Polly entertains the boarders by singing and flirting...
in San Francisco in 1971. That same year another tape was completed called Baby Sex. The original cover art for the tape box was a silk-screened copy of an old photo depicting a woman fellating a small child. (Considered artistically rude at that time, it would be viewed as child pornography today).
In 1972 they moved to San Francisco and formed Ralph Records
Ralph Records
Ralph Records was The Residents' original record label, the name coming from the somewhat colorful phrase "calling Ralph on the porcelain telephone."...
. By this time, The Cryptic Corporation was operating as a partnership and incorporated to take over the running of Ralph Records
Ralph Records
Ralph Records was The Residents' original record label, the name coming from the somewhat colorful phrase "calling Ralph on the porcelain telephone."...
.
1972–1980: Album era
Before the Santa DogSanta Dog
Santa Dog was the first official release from The Residents and Ralph Records. It was a double single released in December, 1972.The single was packaged to look like a Christmas card from an insurance agency and was mailed to various recipients, including Frank Zappa and Richard Nixon. The...
single and while recording Meet the Residents, The Residents undertook one of their first major projects: the ambitious Vileness Fats
Vileness Fats
Vileness Fats is an unfinished film project of avant-garde band The Residents, filmed primarily from 1972 to 1976. The Residents shot over fourteen hours of footage for the project, but were not even two-thirds of the way through their incomplete script before they cancelled the production...
film project. Intended to be the first-ever long form music video, The Residents saw this project as the opportunity to create the ultimate cult film
Cult film
A cult film, also commonly referred to as a cult classic, is a film that has acquired a highly devoted but specific group of fans. Often, cult movies have failed to achieve fame outside the small fanbases; however, there have been exceptions that have managed to gain fame among mainstream audiences...
. After four years of filming (from 1972 to 1976) the project was reluctantly canceled because of time, space and monetary constraints. Fifteen hours of footage were shot for the project yet only about three-quarters of an hour of that footage has ever been released.
Santa Dog
Santa Dog
Santa Dog was the first official release from The Residents and Ralph Records. It was a double single released in December, 1972.The single was packaged to look like a Christmas card from an insurance agency and was mailed to various recipients, including Frank Zappa and Richard Nixon. The...
is considered by The Residents themselves and their fans to be the official start of the band's recorded output. This is so because it was the first to be released to the public. Shortly after this release, the band left San Mateo
San Mateo
San Mateo, Spanish for Saint Matthew, is the name of several places:*San Mateo , Spain- Canary Islands :* Vega de San Mateo, Las Palmas, a municipality on the island of Gran Canaria in the province of Las Palmas- Costa Rica :...
and relocated to San Francisco. They sent copies of Santa Dog
Santa Dog
Santa Dog was the first official release from The Residents and Ralph Records. It was a double single released in December, 1972.The single was packaged to look like a Christmas card from an insurance agency and was mailed to various recipients, including Frank Zappa and Richard Nixon. The...
to west coast radio stations with no response until Bill Reinhardt, program director of KBOO
KBOO
KBOO is a non-profit organization, listener-funded FM Community radio station broadcasting from Portland, Oregon. The station's mission is to serve groups in its listening area who are underrepresented on other local radio stations and to provide access to the airwaves for people who have...
·FM in Portland
Portland, Oregon
Portland is a city located in the Pacific Northwest, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2010 Census, it had a population of 583,776, making it the 29th most populous city in the United States...
, Oregon
Oregon
Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...
received a copy. Santa
Santa Dog
Santa Dog was the first official release from The Residents and Ralph Records. It was a double single released in December, 1972.The single was packaged to look like a Christmas card from an insurance agency and was mailed to various recipients, including Frank Zappa and Richard Nixon. The...
had the strange kind of sonic weirdness he was looking for and it was played heavily on his popular (Radio Lab) show. Bill met The Residents at their Sycamore St. studio in the summer of 1973 with the news of his broadcasts. They were overjoyed that they had finally got media acceptance and he was celebrated with the news that KBOO was the first station to play a Residents record on the air. Inviting him in and treating him like family, The Residents gave Reinhardt exclusive access to all their eclectic recordings, including copies of the original masters of Stuffed Trigger, Baby Sex and the Warner Bros. Album
WB: RMX
WB:RMX is an album by The Residents, released in 2003. The album is a remake of a 1971 demo tape.The Residents originally got their name when the demo tape they recorded in 1971 was rejected and returned to "residents," since no name of the band had been provided...
. He promoted these along with Meet the Residents regularly on his radio program. There was considerable resistance to the commercial viability of Residents material. To aid in their promotion, Bill was given 50 of the first 1,000 copies of Meet the Residents. Some were sent to friends, listeners and critics and two dozen were left for sale on consignment at Music Millennium Records where they sat unsold for months. KBOO DJ, Barry Schwam (Schwump, who also recorded with The Residents) promoted them on his program as well. Eventually KBOO airplay attracted many loyal fans and Portland became the epicenter of a worldwide cult phenomenon.
The Residents, at this time, were at a rough point in their career. According to official Residents lore, there was internal turmoil which resulted in a large, "embarrassing" food fight
Food fight
A food fight is a form of chaotic collective behavior, in which food is thrown at others in the manner of projectiles. These projectiles are not made to harm or damage others, but to simply ignite a fight filled with spontaneous food throwing. Food fights may be impromptu examples of rebellion or...
; they decided to resolve this tension in 1974 by recording what would later become Not Available
Not Available
The Residents' album Not Available was originally recorded as a follow-up to 1974's Meet the Residents. However, following the Theory of Obscurity, it was immediately locked away in a bank vault with no plans to issue it until the members of the band had completely forgotten about its existence...
—representative of N. Senada
N. Senada
N. Senada was a Bavarian composer and music theorist who formulated the "Theory of Obscurity" and the "Theory of Phonetic Organization"...
's Theory of Obscurity taken to its logical conclusion. The album was recorded and then placed in storage in order to be issued only when everyone had forgotten about it. However, contractual obligations related to the much-delayed release of Eskimo
Eskimo (album)
Eskimo is an album by The Residents that was originally supposed to follow 1977's Fingerprince. However, due to many delays and arguments with management, it was not released until 1979...
forced its release in 1978 after the band had almost forgotten about it. The Residents were not bothered by this deviation from their plan since the 1978 decision to release the album would not affect the philosophical conditions under which it was originally recorded.
The Third Reich 'n' Roll came next, a pastiche on 1960s rock and roll
Rock and roll
Rock and roll is a genre of popular music that originated and evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s, primarily from a combination of African American blues, country, jazz, and gospel music...
with an overarching Nazi theme, represented visually on the album cover, which featured Dick Clark in an SS uniform holding a carrot
Vegetarianism of Adolf Hitler
In addition to being a teetotaler and a non-smoker, Adolf Hitler has been regarded by some as a vegetarian. It has been theorized that Hitler's diet may have been based on Richard Wagner's historical theories which connected the future of Germany with vegetarianism...
, with a number of Hitlers
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
dancing on clouds behind him. On each side of the record was a single composition, approximately 17½ minutes long, using recordings of classic rock and roll songs that were spliced, overdubbed and edited with new vocals, instrumentation and tape noises.
The original songs were finally removed leaving entirely new and bizarre performances. The music video for this album was shot on the sets that were built for Vileness Fats
Vileness Fats
Vileness Fats is an unfinished film project of avant-garde band The Residents, filmed primarily from 1972 to 1976. The Residents shot over fourteen hours of footage for the project, but were not even two-thirds of the way through their incomplete script before they cancelled the production...
.
Following The Third Reich 'n' Roll came Fingerprince
Fingerprince
Fingerprince is an album by The Residents. The album was recorded between 1974–76 and released in 1977. It was intended to be a three-sided record named Tourniquet Of Roses. Due to expense, the project was abandoned and cut down to a regular two-sided album. The third side was originally released...
, a particularly ambitious project not unlike the earlier Not Available
Not Available
The Residents' album Not Available was originally recorded as a follow-up to 1974's Meet the Residents. However, following the Theory of Obscurity, it was immediately locked away in a bank vault with no plans to issue it until the members of the band had completely forgotten about its existence...
recordings. The band's original intention with Fingerprince
Fingerprince
Fingerprince is an album by The Residents. The album was recorded between 1974–76 and released in 1977. It was intended to be a three-sided record named Tourniquet Of Roses. Due to expense, the project was abandoned and cut down to a regular two-sided album. The third side was originally released...
was to release it as the very first three-sided album – they had found a way to simulate a third side by arranging the grooves on one side of the vinyl album to play a completely different program of tracks depending on which series of grooves the needle was dropped on. However, this idea was dropped when the band discovered that the Monty Python
Monty Python
Monty Python was a British surreal comedy group who created their influential Monty Python's Flying Circus, a British television comedy sketch show that first aired on the BBC on 5 October 1969. Forty-five episodes were made over four series...
comedy troupe had executed the very same idea three years earlier with their Matching Tie and Handkerchief album. The third side was later released as an EP entitled Babyfingers
Babyfingers
Babyfingers was a release by the avant garde/experimental rock band The Residents, containing music written for their 1977 album, Fingerprince...
, and the Babyfingers tracks have since been re-integrated into the Fingerprince album on the CD reissues.
The Residents followed Fingerprince with their Duck Stab/Buster & Glen
Duck Stab/Buster & Glen
Duck Stab redirects here. For the 1978 EP, see Duck Stab!Duck Stab/Buster & Glen is an album released in 1978 by The Residents. It is often called Duck Stab, after Duck Stab!, a seven-song EP released earlier in 1978 featuring shorter songs similar to the first side of Fingerprince...
album – their most easily comprehensible album up to that point. This album got the band some attention from the press (namely NME
NME
The New Musical Express is a popular music publication in the United Kingdom, published weekly since March 1952. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s, changing from newsprint in 1998. It was the first British paper to include a singles...
, Sounds and Melody Maker
Melody Maker
Melody Maker, published in the United Kingdom, was, according to its publisher IPC Media, the world's oldest weekly music newspaper. It was founded in 1926 as a magazine targeted at musicians; in 2000 it was merged into "long-standing rival" New Musical Express.-1950s–1960s:Originally the Melody...
), and dropped most of their reliance upon the Theory of Obscurity.
Eskimo
Eskimo (album)
Eskimo is an album by The Residents that was originally supposed to follow 1977's Fingerprince. However, due to many delays and arguments with management, it was not released until 1979...
(1979) contained music consisting of non-musical sounds, percussion, and wordless voices. Rather than being songs in the orthodox sense, the compositions sounded like "live-action stories" without dialogue. The Residents remixed the "songs" in disco
Disco
Disco is a genre of dance music. Disco acts charted high during the mid-1970s, and the genre's popularity peaked during the late 1970s. It had its roots in clubs that catered to African American, gay, psychedelic, and other communities in New York City and Philadelphia during the late 1960s and...
style, the results of which appeared on the EP Diskomo
Diskomo
"Diskomo" was a 12-inch single of elements from the 1979 album Eskimo by the Residents put to a disco beat, released on March 26, 1980. The b-side was a special suite of nursery rhymes put together as "Goosebump"....
. Eskimo was reissued in surround sound
Surround sound
Surround sound encompasses a range of techniques such as for enriching the sound reproduction quality of an audio source with audio channels reproduced via additional, discrete speakers. Surround sound is characterized by a listener location or sweet spot where the audio effects work best, and...
on DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
in 2003. Eskimo's cover presents the first instance of the group wearing their signature eyeball masks and tuxedos, which would be featured in many subsequent releases, films, live appearances, and promotional materials.
Commercial Album (1980) consisted of 40 songs, each consisting of a verse and a chorus and lasting one minute. The songs pastiched the advertising jingle although the songs were not endorsements of known products or services. The liner notes
Liner notes
Liner notes are the writings found in booklets which come inserted into the compact disc jewel case or the equivalent packaging for vinyl records and cassettes.-Origin:...
state that songs should be repeated three times in a row to form a pop song. The Residents purchased 40 one-minute advertising slots on San Francisco's most popular Top-40 radio station at the time, KFRC
KFRC
KFRC may refer to:* KFRC-FM, a radio station carrying a simulcast of KCBS and licensed to San Francisco, California, United States* KZDG, a radio station licensed to San Francisco, California, United States, which used the call sign KFRC from January 2009 to August 2011* KFRC , a radio station ...
, such that the station played each track of their album over three days. This prompted an editorial in Billboard magazine
Billboard (magazine)
Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...
questioning whether the act was art or advertising.
When MTV
MTV
MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....
was in its infancy, The Residents' videos were in heavy rotation since they were among the few music videos available to broadcasters. The Residents' earliest videos are in the New York Museum of Modern Art
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world...
's permanent collection and were eventually released together in 2001 on the Icky Flix
Icky Flix
Icky Flix is the title of a combined DVD and CD set released by the band The Residents as part of their 30th anniversary celebration in 2001...
DVD, which includes an optional audio track of remixes.
The Mole Trilogy and The Mole Show (1981-83)
In 1981, a trilogy of albums, starting with Mark of the MoleMark of the Mole
Mark of the Mole is an album by The Residents, released in 1981. It was meant to be the first album in a quadrilogy detailing the conflicts between the Moles and the Chubs .After the Moles are forced to abandon their tunnels due to flooding, they enter the land of the Chubs seeking...
, was to be released. A tour ensued, and was narrated nightly by Penn Jillette
Penn Jillette
Penn Fraser Jillette is an American magician, comedian, illusionist, juggler, bassist and a best-selling author known for his work with fellow illusionist Teller in the team Penn & Teller, and advocacy of atheism, libertarian philosophy, free-market economics, and scientific skepticism.-Early...
. The Mole Trilogy is made up of parts I, II and IV.
The performance featured The Residents performing behind a burlap screen, occasionally wearing disguises (such as their iconic eyeball masks), while dancers and actors appeared in front of painted backdrops used to help illustrate the story. Penn Jillette would come out between songs telling long intentionally pointless stories. The show was designed to appear to fall apart as it progressed: Penn pretended to grow angrier with the crowd, and lighting effects and music would become increasingly chaotic, all building up to the point where Penn was dragged off stage and returned, handcuffed to a wheelchair, to deliver his last monologue. During one performance, an audience member assaulted Penn while he was handcuffed to the wheelchair.
The 13th anniversary show (1985-86)
After their Japanese distributor approached them for a two-week run in Japan, The Residents created the 13th Anniversary tour. While the musical performance was more mainstream, the stage show was another over-the-top spectacle, featuring inflatable giraffes, dancers in eye ball masks illuminating the darkened stage with work lights, and a lead vocalist who seemed to change costumes throughout the show from wearing his eyeball mask to wearing a Richard Nixon mask, and at one point wearing only a wig and fake ears. After the two-week run in Japan, the Residents took the show through the US. During the US run of the tour, the band encountered a few problems, having the tour manager fan a members keyboard because of overheating, being booked in a pool hall, and having someone run on stage only to be thrown back into the audience, the tour was still successful however. For the New York run of shows, they ranked 3rd in ticket sales behind Eric ClaptonEric Clapton
Eric Patrick Clapton, CBE, is an English guitarist and singer-songwriter. Clapton is the only three-time inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: once as a solo artist, and separately as a member of The Yardbirds and Cream. Clapton has been referred to as one of the most important and...
and Jerry Garcia
Jerry Garcia
Jerome John "Jerry" Garcia was an American musician best known for his lead guitar work, singing and songwriting with the band the Grateful Dead...
.
Backstage at the Hollywood Palace show on December 26, 1985, one member's eyeball mask (Mr. Red Eye) was stolen, so it was replaced with a giant skull mask. The eye was returned by a devoted fan who discovered where the thief lived and stole it back, although Homer Flynn said the person who returned the mask was most probably the thief. It was put into retirement because they said it was "unclean" and in a bad condition—a superfluous shell. After this, the lead Resident was known as Mr. Skull.
The last show of this tour was in January 1987 at The Warfield
The Warfield
The Warfield, also known as The Warfield Theater, is a 2,300 seat music venue located at 982 Market Street, San Francisco, California. It was built as a vaudeville theater, and opened as the Loews Warfield on May 13, 1922.-History:...
in San Francisco, with a special appearance by Penn & Teller
Penn & Teller
Penn & Teller are Las Vegas headliners whose act is an amalgam of illusion and comedy. Penn Jillette is a raconteur; Teller generally uses mime while performing, although his voice can occasionally be heard during their performance...
.
Cube E (1989-1990)
"Cube E" was a three-act performance covering the history of American Music. It was a step up from previous shows, featuring more elaborate dance numbers and sets. It was also the first show composed exclusively of music written for the show. The show was almost entirely backlit, with blacklights highlighting fluorescent pieces of costumes and set.They introduced the first part, which covered cowboy music, on German television as "Buckaroo Blues". It featured the singer and two dancers wearing giant cowboy hats around a glowing campfire. Part two was called "Black Barry" and focused on slave music and the blues. The act ended when a giant cube head rose from the back of the stage. Part three, "The Baby King," featured Elvis songs performed by an elderly Elvis impersonator for his grandchildren. The show ended with an inflated Elvis dying as a result of the British Invasion
British Invasion
The British Invasion is a term used to describe the large number of rock and roll, beat, rock, and pop performers from the United Kingdom who became popular in the United States during the time period from 1964 through 1966.- Background :...
.
Other works
In the late 1980s, they created the epic recording God in Three PersonsGod in Three Persons
God in Three Persons is a rock opera/concept album by The Residents, released in 1988. It was about a man 'Mr. X' and two conjoined twins. The songs are all sung in a rhythmic spoken word fashion, similar to talking blues. A companion soundtrack album, featuring most of the instrumental backing...
, a story about the exploitation of two Siamese twins with healing powers by a male dominant force and The King & Eye
The King & Eye
The King & Eye is an album by the American avant-garde band The Residents, released in 1989. It consists of a series of Elvis Presley songs strung together with a narration exploring what motivated him throughout his career. Most of the album showed up in the Cube-E tour...
, a surreal biography of Elvis Presley
Elvis Presley
Elvis Aaron Presley was one of the most popular American singers of the 20th century. A cultural icon, he is widely known by the single name Elvis. He is often referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll" or simply "the King"....
and the birth of rock and roll.
1991-97: Multimedia projects
In the 1990s, they created Freak Show. This marked the beginning of The Residents' obsession with emerging computer technology in the 1990s. Much of the music was made with MIDI devices. Freak Show also served as the name for a CD-ROMCD-ROM
A CD-ROM is a pre-pressed compact disc that contains data accessible to, but not writable by, a computer for data storage and music playback. The 1985 “Yellow Book” standard developed by Sony and Philips adapted the format to hold any form of binary data....
released by the Voyager Company on March 1, 1995, shortly after Laurie Anderson
Laurie Anderson
Laura Phillips "Laurie" Anderson is an American experimental performance artist, composer and musician who plays violin and keyboards and sings in a variety of experimental music and art rock styles. Initially trained as a sculptor, Anderson did her first performance-art piece in the late 1960s...
's first multimedia CD-ROM experiment, Puppet Motel. Freak Show was also a stage performance by a theater company at the Archa Theater in Prague that premiered on November 1, 1995, and a comic book. Several of the songs were also performed live during the 1997 25th anniversary concerts at the Fillmore in San Francisco. After the CD-ROM's success, the album was re-released as The Freak Show Soundtrack with a different cover. A limited edition, The Freak Show Special Edition, was released in 2002 to mark their 30th anniversary.
Other multimedia projects by The Residents included The Gingerbread Man and Bad Day on the Midway.
Wormwood (1998-99)
Based on Bible stories, WormwoodWormwood
Wormwood may refer to:*Various plants of the genus Artemisia but commonly Artemisia absinthium, also called grande wormwood or absinthe wormwood...
featured the Residents departing from pre-programmed music and again using a live band. The band wore ecclesiastical robes and performed in a brightly lit fluorescent cave. The male and female lead singers switched leads, depending on what characters they needed. Act one consisted of one-off stories about individual Bible characters. Act 2 focused on suites of songs about Bible figures such as Abraham
Abraham
Abraham , whose birth name was Abram, is the eponym of the Abrahamic religions, among which are Judaism, Christianity and Islam...
, Moses
Moses
Moses was, according to the Hebrew Bible and Qur'an, a religious leader, lawgiver and prophet, to whom the authorship of the Torah is traditionally attributed...
, and King David. During a performance in Athens, Greece, Nolan Cook, their guitarist, had to leave the stage after taking a rock to the head from an audience member.
Demons Dance Alone and Animal Lover (2002-05)
The Residents recorded the dramatic album Demons Dance AloneDemons Dance Alone
Demons Dance Alone is a 2002 concept album by The Residents about the emotional effects of the September 11, 2001 attacks. The album is split into three main parts, "Loss", "Denial", and "The Three Metaphors", bookended by "Tongue" and "Demons Dance Alone", and broken up by various untitled...
(also a tour and DVD in 2002) and Animal Lover
Animal Lover
Animal Lover is an album, released in 2005 by The Residents.It portrays human life through the eyes of different animals. In the CD booklet, the lyrics to a song are preceded by a story from an animal's point of view. For example, "On the way " begins with a story, from the animal's viewpoint,...
in 2005. Singer Molly Harvey began as a Ralph employee but by the mid-90s contributed to virtually all of The Residents' many projects. The Residents' increased reliance on Harvey—essentially handing her half of the vocal duties since at least Demons Dance Alone—parallels their artistic revitalization. Nolan Cook, Carla Fabrizio, Toby Dammit
Toby Dammit
Toby Dammit , is an American musician, percussionist and composer. He has often been credited as Larry Mullins, his adopted name...
, Eric Drew Feldman
Eric Drew Feldman
Eric Drew Feldman is an American keyboard and bass guitar player. Feldman has worked with Captain Beefheart, Fear, Snakefinger, The Residents, Pere Ubu, Pixies, dEUS, Katell Keineg, Frank Black, The Polyphonic Spree, Tripping Daisy, Reid Paley, Charlotte Hatherley, Custard, and PJ Harvey.He was...
, and many other artists continuously worked with the band over the last five years, recording and performing live. The new artists helped to counter what Allmusic derided as a "sonic palette [confined to] factory presets from their new Macintosh audio" of the CD-ROM era.
In February 2005, The Residents toured Australia as part of the "What is Music?" festival, performing a two hour retrospective set entitled the 33rd Anniversary Tour: The Way We Were. These shows saw a fairly minimal band; three eyeball-headed Residents (one on guitar and two laptop/sample operators), a "stage hand" performer, and a male and female vocalist in costumes reminiscent of the Wormwood tour. Video projections and unusual flexible screens were added to the stage set, creating an unsettling ambiance. The performances on the Way We Were tour were recorded and were released on CD and DVD in 2005.
Storytelling projects (2006-09)
Summer of 2006 brought the internet download project, River of Crime (Episodes 1–5). River of Crime was their first project with Warner Music Group's Cordless label. Following the success of River of Crime, The Residents launched their weekly TimmyTimmy (The Residents)
Timmy is a fictional character by avant-garde group The Residents, first appearing in the 1995 CD-ROM project Bad Day on the Midway. The character was brought back on July 26, 2006 in a series of weekly short videos featuring Timmy telling anecdotes about his life and other strange stories...
video project on YouTube
YouTube
YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....
. In 2007 they did the music for the documentary Strange Culture
Strange Culture
Strange Culture is a 2007 documentary film directed by Lynn Hershman Leeson. It stars Tilda Swinton and Thomas Jay Ryan.It premiered January 19, 2007 at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival.-Synopsis:...
and also released a double instrumental album, Night of the Hunters. On the Fourth of July, 2007, the planned October release of their latest project with Mute Records
Mute Records
Mute is an independent record label based in the UK. It was founded in 1978 by Daniel Miller and featured several prominent musical acts on its roster such as Goldfrapp, Depeche Mode, Yazoo, Erasure and Fad Gadget.-Beginnings:...
, The Voice of Midnight
The Voice of Midnight
The Voice of Midnight is a concept album by The Residents, released in 2007. It was adapted from a short story, "Der Sandmann," by Prussian writer E. T. A. Hoffmann....
(a music theater adaptation of E.T.A. Hoffmann
E.T.A. Hoffmann
Ernst Theodor Wilhelm Hoffmann , better known by his pen name E.T.A. Hoffmann , was a German Romantic author of fantasy and horror, a jurist, composer, music critic, draftsman and caricaturist...
's short story "Der Sandmann
Der Sandmann
The Sandman is a short story written in German by E.T.A. Hoffmann. It was the first in an 1817 book of stories titled Die Nachtstücke .-Plot summary:...
"), was announced on their website.
On the May 21 they announced on their website that their first North America tour since Demons Dance Alone
Demons Dance Alone
Demons Dance Alone is a 2002 concept album by The Residents about the emotional effects of the September 11, 2001 attacks. The album is split into three main parts, "Loss", "Denial", and "The Three Metaphors", bookended by "Tongue" and "Demons Dance Alone", and broken up by various untitled...
for a project entitled The Bunny Boy
The Bunny Boy
The Bunny Boy is an album released on September 1, 2008, by avant-garde group The Residents. According to the group's blog, the album is similar to their previous albums Duck Stab, The Commercial Album and Demons Dance Alone and contains "19 fast paced songs" about "[o]bsession, insanity and the...
was set to begin on October 9 in New York – later an earlier date was added for Santa Cruz. Soon, it was announced that the tour would also include Europe, starting November 13. On June 3, the Residents.com website boasted the planned release of The Bunny Boy which was released on September 1. The website had posted information in which Foxboro claimed this would be a Farewell Tour; it was later revealed that this was nothing more than a mistake by Foxboro.
November 3, 2009 saw three new releases. The Ughs! is a mostly instrumental album made up of music composed earlier in their career, which had been completely reworked for the Voice of Midnight album. Ten Little Piggies is a "futurist compilation", ten songs from projects that may or may not be released in the future. Finally Is Anybody Out There is a DVD collecting all the Bunny Boy videos from the series posted on YouTube. The episodes are streamlined and not exactly the same as the originals.
2010-present: Talking Light and beyond
In January 2010 the Residents began a series of tours entitled Talking Light, touring North America and Europe. During the tours, which lasted until April 2011, The Residents appeared as a trio and adapted new identities and costumes. The singer, "Randy", wore an old man mask, and the other two, keyboardist "Chuck" and guitarist "Bob", wore dread lock wigs and some kind of illuminated optical gear over their faces. The songs were stories about various characters' obsessions with ghosts, imaginary people and supernatural phenomena. One of these performances was featured as part of the edition of the All Tomorrow's PartiesAll Tomorrow's Parties (music festival)
All Tomorrow's Parties is a music festival which takes place at Camber Sands holiday camp in East Sussex and Butlin's holiday camp in Minehead, Somerset, England....
festival curated by Matt Groening
Matt Groening
Matthew Abram "Matt" Groening is an American cartoonist, screenwriter, and producer. He is the creator of the comic strip Life in Hell as well as two successful television series, The Simpsons and Futurama....
in May 2010 in Minehead, England. The band released several albums related to the Talking Light concept, including the instrumental albums Dollar General and Chuck's Ghost Music, live album Bimbo's Talking Light, and studio album Lonely Teenager.
In October and November 2011, the Residents presented Sam's Enchanted Evening at The Marsh
The Marsh
The Marsh is an American theater company that specializes in developing new performance. It is located in the Mission District of San Francisco, California.-History:...
performance center in Berkeley, with the lead signer appearing as "Randy Rose."
Identity
Much of the speculation about the members' true identities swirls around their management team, known as "The Cryptic Corporation." Cryptic was formed as a corporation in California by Jay Clem (born 1947), Homer FlynnHomer Flynn
Homer Flynn is a spokesman for the avant garde music and visual arts group The Residents, and their management group the Cryptic Corporation. Cryptic was formed by Flynn along with Hardy Fox, John Kennedy, and Jay Clem in the early 1970s...
(born April 1945), Hardy W. Fox (born 1945), and John Kennedy in 1976, all of whom denied having been band members. (Clem and Kennedy left the Corporation in 1982, much to the chagrin of some fans.) The Residents themselves do not grant interviews, though Flynn and Fox have conducted interviews with the media.
Nolan Cook, a prominent collaborator with the group in both their live and studio work (as well as being a live member of I Am Spoonbender
I Am Spoonbender
I Am Spoonbender is an American/Canadian multimedia group formed in San Francisco in early 1997 by composer/multi-instrumentalist/producer Dustin Donaldson, with Brian Jackson and cub guitarist Robynn Iwata I Am Spoonbender is an American/Canadian multimedia group formed in San Francisco in early...
), denied in an interview that Fox and Flynn are the Residents, saying that he has come across such rumors, and they are completely false. However, Cook himself is considered a member of the band by some, as he is known to wear the same head coverings as the rest of the group during live shows, even wearing the trademark eyeball mask during the Wormwood tour.
William Poundstone
William Poundstone
William Poundstone is an American author, columnist, and skeptic. He has written a number of books including the Big Secrets series and a biography of Carl Sagan...
, author of the Big Secrets
Big Secrets
Big Secrets is a series of books written by William Poundstone, and also the title of the series' first book.-History:In each book, Poundstone seeks to explore a number of mysteries, and reveal "the uncensored truth about all sorts of stuff you are never supposed to know" .Some of the mysteries...
books, compared voiceprints of a Flynn lecture with those of spoken word segments from the Residents discography in his book Biggest Secrets. After noting similar patterns in both, he concluded "the similarities in the spectograms second the convincing subjective impression that the voices are identical." He posited that "It is possible that the creative core of the Residents is the duo of Flynn and Fox." A subset of that belief is that Flynn is the lyricist and that Fox writes the music. In addition BMI's online database of the performance rights organization (of which the Residents and their publishing company, Pale Pachyderm Publishing (Warner-Chappell), have been members for their entire careers), lists Flynn and Fox as the composers of all original Residents songs. This includes those songs written pre-1974 (the "Residents Unincorporated" years), the year Cryptic formed.
Simon Reynolds
Simon Reynolds
Simon Reynolds is an English music critic who is well-known for his writings on electronic dance music and for coining the term "post-rock". Besides electronic dance music, Reynolds has written about a wide range of artists and musical genres, and has written books on post-punk and rock...
wrote in his book Rip It Up and Start Again: Post Punk 1978-1984 that "The Residents and their 'representatives' were one and the same", elaborating on one of his blogs that "this was something that anybody who had any direct dealings with Ralph figured out sooner rather than later." Reynolds quotes Helios Creed
Helios Creed
Helios Creed is an American guitarist, singer and bandleader. He first came to prominence in the mid 1970s with the San Francisco band Chrome. They are credited with being the godfathers of what later became known as Industrial Rock music...
, who identifies The Residents as a keyboardist named "H", a singer named Homer, and "this other guy called John"; and Peter Principle of Tuxedomoon
Tuxedomoon
Tuxedomoon is an experimental post-punk/New Wave group formed in San Francisco, California, consisting of core members Blaine L. Reininger, Steven Brown and Peter Principle....
, who claims that "we eventually figured out that the guy doing the graphics and the engineer in the studio were in fact the Residents."
Cryptic openly admits the group's artwork is done by Flynn (among others), under various names that, put together, become Pornographics, but the pseudonym is rarely spelled the same way twice (examples: Porno Graphics, Pore No Graphix, Pore-Know Graphics); and that Fox is the "sound engineer" — meaning that he is the main producer, engineer, master, and editor of all their recordings. (Since 1976, the Residents' recordings have all listed their producer as "The Cryptic Corporation," presumably meaning Fox in particular.) Many other rumors have come and gone over the years, one being that 60s experimental band Cromagnon
Cromagnon (band)
Cromagnon was an American experimental band that was active during the late-1960s. Led by multi-instrumentalist singer-songwriters Austin Grasmere and Brian Elliot, the band released Orgasm in 1969 which was later reissued as Cave Rock. They are said to have foreshadowed the rise of noise rock, no...
shared members with the band.
Albums
- Meet the Residents – 1974
- The Third Reich 'n Roll – 1976
- FingerprinceFingerprinceFingerprince is an album by The Residents. The album was recorded between 1974–76 and released in 1977. It was intended to be a three-sided record named Tourniquet Of Roses. Due to expense, the project was abandoned and cut down to a regular two-sided album. The third side was originally released...
– 1977 - Duck Stab/Buster & GlenDuck Stab/Buster & GlenDuck Stab redirects here. For the 1978 EP, see Duck Stab!Duck Stab/Buster & Glen is an album released in 1978 by The Residents. It is often called Duck Stab, after Duck Stab!, a seven-song EP released earlier in 1978 featuring shorter songs similar to the first side of Fingerprince...
– 1978 - Not AvailableNot AvailableThe Residents' album Not Available was originally recorded as a follow-up to 1974's Meet the Residents. However, following the Theory of Obscurity, it was immediately locked away in a bank vault with no plans to issue it until the members of the band had completely forgotten about its existence...
– 1978 - EskimoEskimo (album)Eskimo is an album by The Residents that was originally supposed to follow 1977's Fingerprince. However, due to many delays and arguments with management, it was not released until 1979...
– 1979 - Commercial Album – 1980
- Mark of the MoleMark of the MoleMark of the Mole is an album by The Residents, released in 1981. It was meant to be the first album in a quadrilogy detailing the conflicts between the Moles and the Chubs .After the Moles are forced to abandon their tunnels due to flooding, they enter the land of the Chubs seeking...
– 1981 - The Tunes of Two CitiesThe Tunes of Two CitiesThe Tunes of Two Cities is an album by The Residents, released in 1982. It is part two of the Mole Trilogy. Rather than forwarding the story of the battle between the Mole People and the Chubs, the record's concept is to display the differences between the two cultures through their music...
– 1982 - Title in LimboTitle in LimboTitle in Limbo is an album by The Residents in collaboration with Renaldo and the Loaf, released in 1983 on Ralph Records. Guest performers include Snakefinger , and vocalist Nessie Lessons....
with Renaldo and the LoafRenaldo and the LoafRenaldo and the Loaf was an English musical duo active in the late seventies and most of the eighties, consisting of a pathologist and an architect ....
– 1983 - George & JamesGeorge & JamesGeorge and James is an album by The Residents, released in 1984. It was subtitled American Composer Series - Volume 1. The American Composer Series was originally supposed to be an ongoing project lasting from 1984 until 2000 that profiled a number of different artists...
– 1984 - Whatever Happened to Vileness Fats?Whatever Happened to Vileness Fats?The Residents had begun a movie in 1972 called Vileness Fats. The concept of the movie was to shoot it on a new media form and tell most of the story through music. The story itself was about a village under siege by bandits stealing the meat supply, forcing the population to exist on vegetables...
– 1984 - The Big Bubble: Part Four of the Mole TrilogyThe Big Bubble: Part Four of the Mole TrilogyThe Big Bubble is an album by The Residents. It was released in 1985, and fleshed out the backstory of the band's "Mole Trilogy", which had been introduced in Mark of the Mole and The Tunes of Two Cities . The official third part of the Mole Trilogy was never actually released, and neither were...
– 1985 - Census TakerCensus TakerThe Census Taker is the soundtrack to the 1984 movie of the same name , released in 1985. The soundtrack was composed entirely by The Residents, which includes some new tracks, such as "Hellno" and "Where Is She", as well as some reworked older songs...
– 1985 - Stars & Hank Forever: The American Composers SeriesStars & Hank Forever: The American Composers SeriesStars and Hank Forever was the second release in the American Composers Series by the avant garde band The Residents. The album was released in 1986. This particular release featured a side of Hank Williams songs and a medley of John Philip Sousa marches...
– 1986 - God in Three PersonsGod in Three PersonsGod in Three Persons is a rock opera/concept album by The Residents, released in 1988. It was about a man 'Mr. X' and two conjoined twins. The songs are all sung in a rhythmic spoken word fashion, similar to talking blues. A companion soundtrack album, featuring most of the instrumental backing...
– 1988 - God in Three PersonsGod in Three PersonsGod in Three Persons is a rock opera/concept album by The Residents, released in 1988. It was about a man 'Mr. X' and two conjoined twins. The songs are all sung in a rhythmic spoken word fashion, similar to talking blues. A companion soundtrack album, featuring most of the instrumental backing...
Soundtrack – 1988 - The King & EyeThe King & EyeThe King & Eye is an album by the American avant-garde band The Residents, released in 1989. It consists of a series of Elvis Presley songs strung together with a narration exploring what motivated him throughout his career. Most of the album showed up in the Cube-E tour...
– 1989 - Freak ShowFreak Show/Freak Show SoundtrackFreak Show marked the beginning of The Residents' obsession with emerging computer technology in the 1990s. Much of the music was made with various MIDI devices. "Freak Show" also served as the name for a CD-ROM that was released in 1994, a stage performance by a theater company at the Archa...
– 1990 - Our Finest FlowersOur Finest FlowersOur Finest Flowers is an album by The Residents, released in 1992. For their 20th anniversary, instead of releasing a greatest hits album, they instead decided to release an album of new songs made out of their greatest hits...
– 1992 - Gingerbread Man – 1994
- HuntersHunters (album)Hunters was an album by The Residents, released in 1995. It was a soundtrack commissioned for the Discovery Channel series Hunters: The World of Predators and Prey...
– 1995 - Have a Bad DayHave a Bad DayHave a Bad Day is an album by The Residents, released in 1996. This CD features some of the soundtrack music from the CD-ROM Bad Day on the Midway, also by The Residents.-CD track listing:# "Bad Day on the Midway"# "Dagmar, the Dog Woman"...
– 1996 - Wormwood: Curious Stories from the BibleWormwood: Curious Stories from the BibleWormwood: Curious Stories from the Bible is a concept album released in 1998 by avant-garde musicians The Residents. The album's purpose is to retell some of the more "curious" stories in the Bible, not to condemn the stories, but to give a greater understanding to them.-Track listing:#"In the...
– 1998 - Roosevelt 2.0 – 2000
- Roadworms: The Berlin SessionsRoadworms: The Berlin SessionsRoadworms: The Berlin Sessions is an album by The Residents, released in 2000. During the tour supporting the Wormwood album, many of the songs changed quite a bit. Roadworms is an attempt to capture, live in the studio, the way the music was being played in concert...
– 2000 - Icky FlixIcky FlixIcky Flix is the title of a combined DVD and CD set released by the band The Residents as part of their 30th anniversary celebration in 2001...
– 2001 - Demons Dance AloneDemons Dance AloneDemons Dance Alone is a 2002 concept album by The Residents about the emotional effects of the September 11, 2001 attacks. The album is split into three main parts, "Loss", "Denial", and "The Three Metaphors", bookended by "Tongue" and "Demons Dance Alone", and broken up by various untitled...
– 2002 - WB: RMXWB: RMXWB:RMX is an album by The Residents, released in 2003. The album is a remake of a 1971 demo tape.The Residents originally got their name when the demo tape they recorded in 1971 was rejected and returned to "residents," since no name of the band had been provided...
– 2003 - 12 Days of Brumalia12 Days of BrumaliaThe 12 Days of Brumalia was an internet event presented by The Residents and Residents.com that resulted in an album of the same name. For 12 days, starting on December 25th, a new song was posted on Residents.com web site along with an illustration and a quote...
– 2004 - I Murdered MommyI Murdered MommyI Murdered Mommy is a 2001 album by avant rock band The Residents. The album was to be the soundtrack to a proposed but abandoned CD-ROM multimedia project of the same title....
– 2004 - Animal LoverAnimal LoverAnimal Lover is an album, released in 2005 by The Residents.It portrays human life through the eyes of different animals. In the CD booklet, the lyrics to a song are preceded by a story from an animal's point of view. For example, "On the way " begins with a story, from the animal's viewpoint,...
– 2005 - River of Crime (Episodes 1–5) – 2006
- TweedlesTweedlesTweedles is a concept album by The Residents released on October 31, 2006.The CD is accompanied by a two-part book: the first half consists of the album's spoken lines, and the second half contains the lyrics to the songs....
– 2006 - Night of the Hunters – 2007
- The Voice of MidnightThe Voice of MidnightThe Voice of Midnight is a concept album by The Residents, released in 2007. It was adapted from a short story, "Der Sandmann," by Prussian writer E. T. A. Hoffmann....
– 2007 - Smell My Picture – 2008
- The Bunny BoyThe Bunny BoyThe Bunny Boy is an album released on September 1, 2008, by avant-garde group The Residents. According to the group's blog, the album is similar to their previous albums Duck Stab, The Commercial Album and Demons Dance Alone and contains "19 fast paced songs" about "[o]bsession, insanity and the...
– 2008 - Postcards From Patmos – 2008
- Hades – 2009
- The Ughs! – 2009
- Arkansas – 2009
- Ozan – 2010
- Strange Culture/Haeckel's Tale – 2010
- Dollar General – 2010
- Dolor Generar - 2011
- Chuck's Ghost Music – 2011
- Lonely Teenager - 2011
- Coochie Brake - 2011
Compilation albums
- The Residents Radio SpecialThe Residents Radio SpecialThe Residents Radio Special is an album released by The Residents in 1979. This cassette was a promotional item issued to radio stations shortly before the release of Eskimo. It was soon offered through the mail-order service in limited quantities on cassette. The cassette was re-released in 1980...
– 1979 - Please Do Not Steal It! – 1979
- Nibbles – 1979
- Residue of the ResidentsResidue of the ResidentsResidue of the Residents is a compilation of The Residents' outtakes, ranging from about 1971-1983. The compilation was released in 1984. "Walter Westinghouse" is an edited version of the song from the Babyfingers E.P. while another early song, "Whoopy Snorp", was from a hard-to-find benefit album...
– 1984 - Ralph Before '84: Volume 1, The Residents – 1984
- Assorted SecretsAssorted SecretsAssorted Secrets was originally released as a cassette-only extra by The Residents that featured some live-in-the-studio recordings as well as a live rehearsal of the Mole Show...
– 1984 - Memorial Hits – 1985
- The Pal TV LP – 1985
- Heaven? – 1986
- Hell! – 1986
- Stranger Than Supper – 1990
- Liver MusicLiver MusicLiver Music is a collection of songs by the Residents put together by their now-defunct fan club UWEB. The tracks are from an assortment of live songs from 1972-1990.-Track listing:# Diskomo# Numb Erone/Satisfaction/Kick a Cat# This Is a Man's World...
– 1990 - Daydream B-Liver – 1991
- Poor Kaw-Liga's Pain – 1994
- Louisiana's Lick – 1995
- Our Tired, Our Poor, Our Huddled Masses – 1997
- Residue Deux – 1998
- 25 Years of Eyeball Excellence – 1998
- Land of Mystery – 1999
- RefusedRefused (Album)Refused, also known as Santa Dog '99, was released by the Residents towards the end of 1999 to celebrate the end of the millennium...
– 1999 - Dot ComDot Com (Album)Dot.Com is an album released by Avant rock musicians, The Residents, in 2000. It was released in a limited edition of 1200 copies.In 2000, Ralph America collected all of the MP3s they had released on the Buy Or Die website on a CD entitled dot.com...
– 2000 - Diskomo 2000Eskimo (album)Eskimo is an album by The Residents that was originally supposed to follow 1977's Fingerprince. However, due to many delays and arguments with management, it was not released until 1979...
– 2000 - Petting Zoo – 2002
- Eat Exuding Oinks – 2002
- Best Left Unspoken...Vol. 1 – 2006
- Best Left Unspoken...Vol. 2 – 2006
- Best Left Unspoken...Vol. 3 – 2007
- Ten Little Piggies – 2009
- Chicken Scratching With The Residents – 2010
- Ozark – 2011
Live albums
- The Mole Show Live at the RoxyThe Mole Show Live at the RoxyThe Mole Show Live at the Roxy is a live recording by The Residents. The show was originally bootlegged, and The Cryptic Corporation bought the master tapes, releasing it officially on Ralph Records in 1983. 1800 copies were pressed on black vinyl, and a picture disc edition of 1500 copies was...
– 1983 - The 13th Anniversary Show Live in the U.S.A.The 13th Anniversary Show Live in the U.S.A.The 13th Anniversary Show Live in the U.S.A. is a live album by The Residents. It was originally released in 1986 as a double cassette and re-released on CD in 1992 by the Residents fan club UWEB. Both versions of the release are difficult to find, as they were both limited to 500 copies each...
– 1986 - 13th Anniversary Show: Live in Japan – 1986
- The Thirteenth Anniversary ShowThe Thirteenth Anniversary ShowThe Thirteenth Anniversary tour was a triumph both financially and critically for the Residents. It was also the last time Snakefinger would work with them, as he died of a heart attack in 1987. The official album release of The Thirteenth Anniversary Show in 1987 was a recording of the show in...
– 1987 - The Mole Show Live in HollandThe Mole Show Live in HollandThe Mole Show Live in Holland is a live album by the band The Residents, released in 1989. This is the most easily accessible version of the Mole Show and it was presented live, complete with narration by Penn Jillette. There are others but, for sound quality and a good idea of how the...
– 1989 - Cube E: Live in HollandCube E: Live in HollandCube E: Live in Holland is an album by The Residents released on November 8, 1994 by Restless Records as an audio CD.Although not videotaped in its entirety, the project called The History of American Music in 3 E-Z Pieces was recorded almost in entirety and released as Cube-E: Live in Holland...
– 1990 - Live at the FillmoreLive at the Fillmore (The Residents)Live at the Fillmore is a limited release double CD recording of a live show by the Residents. To celebrate their 25th anniversary, the Residents performed a series of concerts during the last week of October 1997...
– 1998 - Wormwood LiveWormwood LiveWormwood Live is a live album by the Residents. Recorded in Germany, it features the full live performance of songs from their album, Wormwood: Curious Stories from the Bible. Studio versions of the live performances were later released as Roadworms: The Berlin Sessions...
– 1999 - Kettles of Fish on the Outskirts of Town – 2002
- The Way We Were (live CD/DVD) – 2005
- Cube E Box Set – 2006
- Talking Light Rehearsal – 2010
- Talking Light – 2010-11 (recordings of most shows from the Talking Light tours, available as downloads)
Singles and EPs
- Santa DogSanta DogSanta Dog was the first official release from The Residents and Ralph Records. It was a double single released in December, 1972.The single was packaged to look like a Christmas card from an insurance agency and was mailed to various recipients, including Frank Zappa and Richard Nixon. The...
– 1972 - Satisfaction – 1976
- The Beatles Play the Residents and the Residents Play the BeatlesThe Beatles play The Residents and The Residents play The BeatlesThe Beatles Play the Residents and the Residents Play the Beatles is a 1977 single by the Residents. The A-side, "Beyond the Valley of a Day in the Life", is an audio collage of recordings by The Beatles and John Lennon, with a looped clip from The Beatles Third Christmas Record, in which Paul...
– 1977 - Santa Dog '78Santa Dog '78"Santa Dog '78" was a reworking of the song "Fire" from the original "Santa Dog" double single by the Residents. It was released in December 1978, packaged in a special picture sleeve and sold through mail-order only. The total run was 2700 copies....
– 1978 - BabyfingersBabyfingersBabyfingers was a release by the avant garde/experimental rock band The Residents, containing music written for their 1977 album, Fingerprince...
– 1979 - DiskomoDiskomo"Diskomo" was a 12-inch single of elements from the 1979 album Eskimo by the Residents put to a disco beat, released on March 26, 1980. The b-side was a special suite of nursery rhymes put together as "Goosebump"....
– 1980 - The Commercial SingleThe Commercial Single"The Commercial Single" was released to promote The Commercial Album by the Residents. It was released in the United Kingdom and France and, despite being called a single, included eight songs: six songs from the album and two bonus tracks, all clocking in at one minute.Despite its title and...
– 1980 - Intermission: Extraneous Music from the Residents' Mole ShowIntermission: Extraneous Music from the Residents' Mole ShowIntermission: Extraneous Music from the Residents' Mole Show is an EP by The Residents, released in 1982. It featured music from the opening, closing and intermission portions of the Mole Show. It was the first in a line of albums that would bear the warning that it was not part three of the Mole...
– 1983 - Safety is the Cootie Wootie – 1984
- It's a Man's Man's Man's WorldIt's a Man's Man's Man's World"It's a Man's Man's Man's World" is a song by James Brown and Betty Jean Newsome. Brown recorded it on February 16, 1966 in a New York studio and released it as a single later that year. It reached #1 on the Billboard Top R&B Singles charts and #8 in the Billboard Hot 100...
– 1984 - Kaw-Liga – 1986
- Earth vs. the Flying Saucers – 1986
- It's a Man's Man's Man's WorldIt's a Man's Man's Man's World"It's a Man's Man's Man's World" is a song by James Brown and Betty Jean Newsome. Brown recorded it on February 16, 1966 in a New York studio and released it as a single later that year. It reached #1 on the Billboard Top R&B Singles charts and #8 in the Billboard Hot 100...
(Australia) – 1986 - Hit the Road Jack – 1987
- For ElsieFor Elsie"For Elsie" was a reworking of Beethoven's Fur Elise by The Residents. It had a very limited release on colored vinyl, while a compact disc version was handed out at a one-off show....
– 1987 - Snakey WakeSnakey WakeThe Snakey Wake was a fan-club only release of music played by The Residents at the wake of their longtime friend, Snakefinger....
– 1987 - Buckaroo BluesBuckaroo BluesBuckaroo Blues is an early recordings of songs by The Residents that would later be included in their Cube-E tour. The songs are interpretations of Western folk songs and cowboy poems...
– 1988 - Santa Dog 88Santa Dog 88Santa Dog 88 was the first release by The Residents fan club called Uncle Willie's Eyeball Buddies, or UWEB for short. It included four versions of the song "Fire" , originally released on the 1972 double single "Santa Dog". Copies of the CD were given out free and signed by Uncle Willie.-Track...
– 1988 - Double ShotDouble Shot"Double Shot" is a single by The Residents. Although the back track listing has the words "God in Three Persons" between them, it tells us that 'The Thing About Them' is adapted from it and 'Double Shot' served as inspiration for it. The main part of the song is a cover of "Double Shot ", a minor...
– 1988 - Holy Kiss of Flesh – 1988
- From the Plains to Mexico – 1989
- Don't Be Cruel – 1989
- Blowoff – 1992
- Santa Dog '92 – 1992
- Prelude to "The Teds" – 1993
- Pollex ChristiPollex ChristiPollex Christi was the first of Ralph America's limited edition CDs by the Residents. The piece was purportedly composed by the friend and collaborator from their early years, N. Senada, and in some ways plays on classical themes the same way their 1975 album, Third Reich and Roll, did with '60s...
– 1997 - I Hate HeavenI Hate Heaven"I Hate Heaven" was a promotional CD single by the Residents released on EuroRalph in 1998, featuring three songs taken from their Wormwood: Curious Stories from the Bible album of the same year....
– 1998 - In Between Screams – 1999
- High Horses – 2001
- The Sandman Waits – 2007
- Anganok – 2009
- GBM(i) - 2011
- RZ VF - 2011
Multimedia projects
- Vileness FatsVileness FatsVileness Fats is an unfinished film project of avant-garde band The Residents, filmed primarily from 1972 to 1976. The Residents shot over fourteen hours of footage for the project, but were not even two-thirds of the way through their incomplete script before they cancelled the production...
(unfinished film project) – 1972–1976 - The Mole Show/Whatever Happened to Vileness Fats? (VHSVHSThe Video Home System is a consumer-level analog recording videocassette standard developed by Victor Company of Japan ....
) –1984 - Freak ShowFreak Show/Freak Show SoundtrackFreak Show marked the beginning of The Residents' obsession with emerging computer technology in the 1990s. Much of the music was made with various MIDI devices. "Freak Show" also served as the name for a CD-ROM that was released in 1994, a stage performance by a theater company at the Archa...
(CD-ROMCD-ROMA CD-ROM is a pre-pressed compact disc that contains data accessible to, but not writable by, a computer for data storage and music playback. The 1985 “Yellow Book” standard developed by Sony and Philips adapted the format to hold any form of binary data....
) – 1991 - The Eyes Scream: A History of the Residents (VHS) (with host Penn JillettePenn JillettePenn Fraser Jillette is an American magician, comedian, illusionist, juggler, bassist and a best-selling author known for his work with fellow illusionist Teller in the team Penn & Teller, and advocacy of atheism, libertarian philosophy, free-market economics, and scientific skepticism.-Early...
) – 1991 - Twenty Twisted Questions (LaserdiscLaserdiscLaserDisc was a home video format and the first commercial optical disc storage medium. Initially licensed, sold, and marketed as MCA DiscoVision in North America in 1978, the technology was previously referred to interally as Optical Videodisc System, Reflective Optical Videodisc, Laser Optical...
) – 1992 - Gingerbread ManGingerbread ManGingerbread Man is an album by The Residents, released in 1994. It was their first foray into computer graphics. Original versions of the CD were "enhanced" with animations that followed the music when played on a computer. The animations served as a basis for the costumes of the characters when a...
(CD-ROM) – 1994 - Bad Day on the MidwayBad Day on the MidwayBad Day on the Midway is a CD-ROM game designed and scored by The Residents and a number of other graphic artists, including Jim Ludtke. The game won the 1995 'Macrovision International User Conference Award' in two categories - Best Entertainment Title and Most Innovative Use of Multimedia.The ...
(CD-ROM) – 1995 - Icky FlixIcky FlixIcky Flix is the title of a combined DVD and CD set released by the band The Residents as part of their 30th anniversary celebration in 2001...
(DVDDVDA DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
) – 2001 - EskimoEskimo (album)Eskimo is an album by The Residents that was originally supposed to follow 1977's Fingerprince. However, due to many delays and arguments with management, it was not released until 1979...
(DVD) – 2002 - Disfigured Night DVD (DVD) – 2002
- Live! On The Outskirts (DVD) – 2002
- Demons Dance Alone (DVD) – 2003
- The Commercial DVD (DVD) – 2004
- Wormwood: Curious Stories from the BibleWormwood: Curious Stories from the BibleWormwood: Curious Stories from the Bible is a concept album released in 1998 by avant-garde musicians The Residents. The album's purpose is to retell some of the more "curious" stories in the Bible, not to condemn the stories, but to give a greater understanding to them.-Track listing:#"In the...
(DVD) – 2005 - The Way We Were (CD/DVD) – 2005
- Cube E Box (CD/DVD) – 2006
- The River of CrimeRiver of Crime (Episodes 1-5)The River of Crime is a release by The Residents, originally released online as a five-episode podcast through both iTunes and Cordless Recordings' website. The Residents also sold a two-disc package of blank CD-Rs to burn the episodes and bonus material for those who wanted a standard audio disc...
(podcastPodcastA podcast is a series of digital media files that are released episodically and often downloaded through web syndication...
) – 2006 - TimmyTimmy (The Residents)Timmy is a fictional character by avant-garde group The Residents, first appearing in the 1995 CD-ROM project Bad Day on the Midway. The character was brought back on July 26, 2006 in a series of weekly short videos featuring Timmy telling anecdotes about his life and other strange stories...
(InternetInternetThe Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...
video series) – 2006 - The Bunny BoyThe Bunny BoyThe Bunny Boy is an album released on September 1, 2008, by avant-garde group The Residents. According to the group's blog, the album is similar to their previous albums Duck Stab, The Commercial Album and Demons Dance Alone and contains "19 fast paced songs" about "[o]bsession, insanity and the...
(Internet video series) – 2008 - Icky Flix Live (DVD) – 2009
- The Mole Show (Kabuki) (CD/DVD) – 2009
- Is Anybody Out There? (DVD) – 2009
- Randy's Ghost Stories (DVD) – 2010
Further reading
- Meet the Residents – America's most eccentric band!, Ian Shirley, SAF Publishing, Wembley, UK, 1998 ISBN 0 946719 12 8