The
Residents
LaLuna 215 SE 9th
Ave., 241-5862
9 pm Saturday, April 17
$18 advance 21 and over
I stared in mute amazement at the ACME telegram communicating
my latest mission. I blinked and thought, "This can't be serious."
But there it was, printed in solemn Teletype:
Latest Carmen Sandiego case dropped STOP Find rock
band the Residents and reveal true identities STOP Expense
not an issue STOP You have two weeks STOP The Chief END
The telegram's return address read Tijuana, and I knew
it probably meant the Chief was chugging tequila by the
quart and chuckling at my plight that very moment. But that
wasn't the big problem. The problem was the Residents themselves.
By some accounts, the Residents don't exist. They may displace
air when they walk, and they seem to have a corporeal form,
but nobody knows who they are. In a career spanning more
than a quarter-century, they have never been identified,
and they have never been photographed without disguises
of some sort--usually they wear tuxedos, their famed giant
eyeball masks resting where a head should be.
For all anyone knows, the band members are actors. Or space
aliens. Perhaps they're a collective LSD-induced delusion
or an ambitious in joke staged by the Zappa family. Who's
to say whether the band's four personnel are the same every
time or if this year's model features Elvis Costello, Elliott
Smith, Wesley Willis and Jewel?
Certainly not I. But I had to find out, pronto. Clearly,
this would be harder than nabbing that jet-setting villainess
Carmen Sandiego. I had two weeks to do what no one had done
in 25 years: Out the Residents from their closet of anonymity.
I began my quest to track down these Thomas Pynchons of
the music world with the obvious legacy: their albums. Starting
with the grotesque 1974 Beatles parody Meet the Residents,
the musicians have deconstructed pop culture by focusing
their eyeballs upon it with a magnifying glass so large
everything melted under the intense lens. They tore apart
'60s hits to expose them as a representations of fascism
(Third Reich and Roll). They tore down the iconography
of Elvis (The King and Eye). And they tore out the
hearts of starched-collar James Brown and George Gershwin
fans with a bizarrely heartfelt tribute album (George
& James).
It was obvious why the Chief wanted 'em: Like Sandiego
and her gang, the Residents disturb the accepted order by
stealing historical artifacts for their own twisted means.
Over the decades, their music has evolved from rough, Captain
Beefheart-like art-jams to mock-operatic rock and freakish
circus pop. Yet while certain stylistic traits mark their
work--the use of synthesizers, for example--the Residents'
style explains not what they are but rather what they aren't.
Whatever the Residents do, you know it won't be (a) normal,
(b) popular or (c) fully comprehensible to anyone but themselves.
So I eliminated my first hunch that the Residents were well-known
musicians in disguise. They're simply too weird.
A week of library and Internet research proved fruitless,
so I hit the road. First stop: San Francisco. Lurking in
the shadows outside Residents HQ with a thermos of joe and
a jelly doughnut, I Polaroided anyone who entered the building.
Lessee...that's Hardy Fox of the Residents' private PR force,
the Cryptic Corporation...now he's leaving...returning again...wait,
who's that dude? Ah, crud, just a janitor. But he gave me
an idea: Rifle the garbage like a cheap PI.
Two days of paper cuts and rotting food later, I was still
nowhere. No signatures, no private memos, nothing. I decided
to catch the Resident's next gig and outfitted myself with
military-grade equipment for proper surveillance.
Unfortunately, the bouncer at the club didn't understand
my assignment.
"Oi, what's this?"
"Um...doctor's orders?" I said as he extracted night-vision
goggles with telescopic lenses from inside my jacket.
"Looks like drug paraphernalia to me," he grunted. "Leave
it at the ticket window. And that Medic Alert bracelet's
gotta go, too--could be a weapon."
Inside, the show had already started. The Residents, bathed
under a glowing black light, eyeballs phosphorescent, were
playing from their new album, Wormwood: Curious Stories
from the Bible. The lead Resident wore a skull mask
and sang about bad parts of the Good Book such as brutality,
betrayal and murder. To confuse me further, a woman--also
masked, of course--joined the fray. I got right up front,
practically clambering onto the stage before I was rebuffed
by a burly stagehand. The show continued unhindered, with
the band breaking out more stage sets and props to illustrate
its tales.
I was desperate. My two weeks were nearly up, the Residents
were still an enigma and their strange, croaking, progressive
pop was messing with my head.
"Who are you? Who are you?!?" I bellowed, but nobody
answered because they were cavorting to a loud, mutated
cover of "That Old Time Religion." And I suddenly realized
that it didn't matter. Who the Residents are isn't
as important as what they are--a crew of oddballs
that like to turn the fabric of society inside-out, processing
our most cherished beliefs into a negative-image picture
that highlights the dark elements.
So, in the end, I didn't accomplish my mission. The Chief
was pissed, but I felt wiser for my journey. And from then
on, whenever Kevin the Squadron Leader said, "Kick it, Rockapella!"
I smiled quietly because I understood the silliness of the
singers' game-show harmonizing. The Residents had shown
me the truth.
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Willamette Week | originally
published April 14,
1999
|
