THE RESIDENTS – Mark Of The Mole (Ralph Records – RZ-8152 / LP-1981)

Label: Ralph Records – RZ-8152
Format: Vinyl, LP, Album / Country: US / Released: 1981

Style: Experimental

Recorded by Ralph Records/444 Grove Street/San Francisco, CA 94102

Manufactured By – Ralph Records

Copyright (c) – Cryptic Corporation

Published By – Pale Pachyderm Publishing

Mastered By – Leo Kulka / At – Sonic Arts

Pressed By – KM Records Inc. – KM-6911

Matrix / Runout (Runout A-side, etching): RZ 8152 A Re1

Matrix / Runout (Runout B-side, etching): RZ 8152 B Re1 KM-6911-B re1

A - Hole-Workers At The Mercies Of Nature ..................................................... 19:10

      1 - Voices Of The Air

    The Ultimate Disaster

      2 - Won't You Keep Us Working?

      3 - First Warning

      4 - Back To Normality?

      5 - The Sky Falls!

      6 - Why Are We Crying

      7 - The Tunnels Are Filling

      8 - It Never Stops

    Migration

      9 - March To The Sea

    10 - The Observer

    11 - Hole-Workers' New Hymn

B - Hole-Workers Vs Man And Machine ........................................................... 21:50

    Another Land

      1 - Rumors

      2 - Arrival

      3 - Deployment

      4 - Saturation

    The New Machine

      5 - Idea

      6 - Construction

      7 - Failure / Reconstruction

      8 - Success

    Final Confrontation

      9 - Driving The Moles Away

    10 - Don't Tread On Me

    11 - The Short War

    12 - Resolution?

Written-By, Performer – The Residents

This isn’t really an album you can just pick up and listen to a song at a time out of context without being really familiar with the album to begin with, but it is very interesting and worth listening to and paying attention.

For all my effluence about The Commercial Album, it was a bit of a flop. In response, The Residents decided they were going to do something “apocalyptic.” So, they created an album about an apocalypse, a disaster of biblical proportions. Inspired by tales of the Great Depression, they created the first album in what would become The Mole Trilogy: Mark of the Mole. A return to the storytelling, conceptual work of Not Available and Eskimo, Mark of the Mole tells the story of the Moles, a primitive people who toil in deep underground holes. One day, the sky falls and a massive storm floods their holes, forcing them to wander across a cruel, unforgiving land to the land of the lazy, decadent Chubs. There, the Moles are used as cheap labor until a Chub scientist comes up with a labor-saving machine. Out of work, the Chubs and the Moles end up breaking out in brutal, indecisive war.

Heady stuff. Deep stuff. We’re a long way from the twisted pop of Duck Stab! and Commercial Album. Mark of the Mole is a dark, oppressive album, of brutal, moody music. Unlike its antecedents Eskimo and “Six Things to a Cycle,” there’s not a whole lot of humor here. The cameo by Penn Jillette, of Penn & Teller fame, delivering a weather forecast at the start of the record might raise a chuckle just out of recognition. Instead, there’s a lot of lushly harsh synthesized tones that, much like Not Available provide as much to the story as the lyrics. There’s still some “strange voices,” but they’re restrained and applied to compelling—if anonymous—characters, and serve to drive the plot home. The music is hauntingly beautiful at time, such as the sad synthesized strings in the finale of “Another Land.”

Mark of the Mole is among the Residents' most successful, emotionally potent, gimmick-free offerings. By this time, the Residents had completely embraced keyboards/synthesizers as a key instrument, but instead of using them for goofy bloops and bleeps (as they did on the couple of albums prior to this), they use them to create a dark purple sky of doom and despair.

Here the Residents embark on their most ambitious project to date. A sprawling story about to races of people and the clash of cultures that happens when they are driven together through natural forces. The result is not only a near-perfect sonic depiction of the concept's subject matter (the plight of the Moles and their eventual migration to the land of the Chubs, where they are persecuted), but also a musically engaging affair that works on its own even without the concept. This album represents the beginnings of the Residents' experiments with electronics.      (Review by Richard J. Anderson)

Note:

Again, though, The Residents punctured the pretentiousness of the project on the Mole Show Tour, wherein Penn Jillette, as a narrator, explained the plot for what would likely be confused audiences (The Mole Show: Live in Holland). Said narration often consisted of joking commentary on the story and performance, but this was all part of the act. There’s enough audio/visual documentation of these shows to explain for the curious, but the album that it started the whole project, retains its power even in the context of The Residents later works in the vein, including the other album in the Mole Trilogy 'The Tunes Of Two Cities'…

See also:

http://www.gio80.com/mark-of-the-mole/

If you find it, buy this album!

THE RESIDENTS – The Tunes Of Two Cities (Ralph Rec. – RZ 8202 / LP-1982)

Label: Ralph Records – RZ 8202

Format: Vinyl, LP, Album, 1st Pressing / Country: US Released: 1982

Style: Abstract, Experimental, Ambient

Locations recordings: P. del Scrappio, Sound Genesis of San Francisco.

Manufactured By – Ralph Records

Phonographic Copyright (p) – Cryptic Corporation

Copyright (c) – Cryptic Corporation

Published By – Pale Pachyderm Publishing

Cover – Poorknow Graphics

Mastered By – LKIKS / At – Sonic Arts

Matrix / Runout (Etchings Side A): RZ 8202 A Re2 LKIKS ▭◯▭

Matrix / Runout (Etchings Side B): RZ 8202 B Re2 LKIKS ▭◯▭

A1 - Serenade For Missy ....................................................................................... 3:20

A2 - A Maze Of Jigsaws ........................................................................................ 2:51

A3 - Mousetrap ...................................................................................................... 3:25

A4 - God Of Darkness ........................................................................................... 3:10

A5 - Smack Your Lips (Clap Your Teeth) ............................................................... 3:52

A6 - Praise For The Curse .................................................................................... 2:50

B1 - The Secret Seed ............................................................................................ 2:48

B2 - Smokebeams ................................................................................................. 2:44

B3 - Mourning The Undead ................................................................................... 3:05

B4 - Song Of The Wild .......................................................................................... 3:22

B5 - The Evil Disposer ........................................................................................... 3:17

B6 - Happy Home (Excerpt From Act II Of "Innisfree") ......................................... 4:50

Written-By, Performer – The Residents

+

Snakefinger (Philip Charles Lithman) – guitar

Norman Salant – saxophone

Nessie Lessons – vocals (on track B6)

The 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. The music of the Chubs is light cocktail jazz, while that of the Moles tends toward industrial hymns. A major feature of this album is that it was one of the first to use the E-mu Emulator, one of the earliest commercial digital samplers.

The Chub track "Mousetrap" bears a noticeable resemblance to Stan Kenton's "Eager Beaver." In one interview, band spokesman Homer Flynn acknowledged that the band listened to jazz big band artists including Kenton, as well as Charles Mingus and Sun Ra.

I like what The Residents do with their music in that they turn convention on its head and break through barriers and nobody can argue that they are an acquired taste. I wonder though what was in their minds when releasing this saga about the two races, the Chubs and The Moles. To reiterate for the uninitiated, the Chubs are the swinging jazz lovers that have the high life above ground and do what they want and have a blast not giving a toss about the hapless Moles who are 'working down below' and are determined to find some solace in the high life above. In Part 1 the Moles were forced out of their flooded tunnels to the surface and an uprising occurred where a war broke out and devastation resulted; a war of racial intolerance.

On this next part in the saga 'The Tunes of Two Cities' we have the inimitable Snakefinger which for me was a breath of fresh air as I always loved his part in the band as guitarist and vocalist. The Tunes are from the two races; the Moles are dark, deep resonating tunes, and the Chubs are jazz fusion atonalities. A nice idea that works better than the other albums in the saga. The album opens with instrumentals 'Serenade for Missy', jazzy dissonance, and 'A Maze of Jigsaws' just plain weirdness from the Moles side. 'Mousetrap' is a piano and synth competition. It has the quirky whimsical jazzy humour that the Residents are only capable of. I began to realise that this was an instrumental album primarily with just a few moments of la la las and that suits me fine.

On with the album, and we have 'God of Darkness' which is more tribal native music from the intrepid Moles clan. It is similar to a lot of what we hear on the first part of the trilogy, complete with chants and odd repeated noises. The saving grace of jazz atonality follows with 'Smack Your Lips (Clap Your Teeth)', from the Chubs race, that have more musical sense for my tastes. Snakefinger's guitar is a highlight as always, just a weird phased sound and there's some cool little synth lines and horns to add to the soundscape. The pieces representing The Moles are certainly as droll as those off of 'Mark of the Mole'. 'Praise for the Curse' is dark and dreary synth burblings with a drum beat, 'The Secret Seed' is chimes that twinkle and clank over a bass drum rhythm and is too long and monotonus. The swinging jazz of the Chubs is wonderful such as 'Smokebeams' with its cool jazz flavour, lots of horns, trumpets and jazz time sigs.

'Mourning the Undead' is a clattering machine noise that drones on like being in a factory reminding me of 'New Machine' from the first album in the trilogy. This is highly strange but compelling as one out of the box among these tracks. It would make a great song to play in a factory; Residents capture the monotonous atmosphere perfectly. 'Song of the Wild' is a sad little tune with some interesting effects on the synths. The sounds are high pitched and unsettling. 'The Evil Disposer' returns to the native sounds of Moles with a lot of percussion and doomy factory like synths. Home [Excerpt from Act II of Innisfree]' is a bass drum and improvised music on horn synths, and repeated noises... Very original and intriguing album.

Review by AtomicCrimsonRush

See also:

http://www.gio80.com/the-tunes-of-two-cities/

If you find it, buy this album!

THE RESIDENTS – Not Available (LP-1978 / Ralph Records)

Label: Ralph Records – RR1174

Format: Vinyl, LP, Album / Country: US / Released: Oct 1978

Style: Experimental

This record was recorded in 1974, released 1978 of Ralph Records and 
The Cryptic Corp.

Artwork [Cover Art, Based On A Drawing By A Resident] – Pore-Know Graphics

Composed By, Arranged By, Recorded By, Producer – The Residents

Copyright (c) – Cryptic Corporation

Published By – Pale Pachyderm Publishing

First pressing with purple labels (5000 copies)

A1 - Part One: Edweena ................................................................ 9:29

A2 - Part Two: The Making Of A Soul ............................................ 9:59

B1 - Part Three: Ship's A' Going Down .......................................... 6:32

B2 - Part Four: Never Known Questions ........................................ 7:00

B3 - Epilogue .................................................................................. 2:20

This record is issued at the discretion of Ralph Records and The Cryptic Corp. The characters and events portrayed are fictional and do not represent either The Residents or other persons, living or dead.

This is one of the strangest and most interesting recordings in rock history, which speaks volumes coming from one of the strangest and more interesting bands in rock history.  While the Residents have experimented within the confines of rock throughout their entire careers, with the exceptions of Eskimo, The Commercial Album, and God in Three Persons, this album achieves like no other. A surreal rock opera resulting in an incredibly weird circus of sound, it is one that simply must be heard to be believed.

_1          In 1978, the “official” word was that The Residents had stated NOT AVAILABLE could never be released. The group claimed that they had recorded their musical film noir masterpiece in secrecy as a way of exercising their “theory of obscurity” to its fullest, and, In strict accordance with the theory, the work could never be released until its creators no longer recalled its existence.

But those steeped in the lore of The Residents’ milieu have long known that the recording of the album was in reality an exercise in group therapy. The real reason that the band wished to deny its existence was the fact that they felt that the work was too personally revealing.

What is not generally known, though, is that, as part of their therapeutic process, The Residents actually considered the idea of creating an operetta based on NOT AVAILABLE. Casting the primary roles with the actual inhabitants of the group’s internal drama, they then began a series of loosely structured “rehearsals” with those players enacting the principal roles of Edweena, The Porcupine, The Catbird, Uncle Remus and Enigmatic Foe.

By enacting this pseudo drama within a psycho drama, the internal conflict, still not completely understood by all of the participants, became much more clear, as the player/characters instinctively acted out their roles. The love triangle between Edweena, Porcupine and Catbird became obvious (“Can two be more than three?”) as well as Remus’s role as the distant and objective commentator (“The aching and the breaking are the making of a soul.”). The purpose of the Enigmatic Foe was of course still unclea ´r when the rehearsals began, but once the Porcupine’s breakdown was known (“He thought the end was overdue, but day broke him instead...”), the role of the noble Foe, as Porcupine’s stand-in for the operetta’s climatic duel scene, became clear.

As the faux piece reached its peak, the trio - two holding pistols while the third hid in a bush - came to the realization that the lovely young Edweena had eloped with the independently wealthy and no longer uninvolved Uncle Remus. At this point, the tension, previously thicker than frozen mayonnaise, was shattered by the Porcupine, emerging from the shrubbery to paraphrase Shakespeare (“To show or to be shown...”).

With illusions of love shattered, the three were then able to forgive, embrace and even welcome the traitorous Remus back to the fold, once he had returned from his unexpected honeymoon.

_2          This, the second album recorded by the Residents, is perhaps the most hauntingly beautiful of all their albums. Its was bounded by the “Theory of Obscurity” and “could only be released when the creators themselves had completely forgotten about its existence.”

For whatever reasons, the album was eventually released four years later. Some have complained that this release was blasphemous and that the theory should have been respected. Let me assure you that no crime was committed. The lyrics are heavily veiled in an acoustic and linguistic gauze. Sometimes there is rhyme, and sometimes there is reason. There are times at which we catch glimpses of these lyrics through the veil, however their meaning tends to speak more directly to the soul, and for the most part are not available to the analytical mind. When listening to this album, one realizes that its obscurity remains fully intact.

The music is full of many rich and varied themes. Its juxtaposition of the sad, the beautiful, and the unusual, creates deep emotional currents that with proper navigation will lead you to interesting places. There is an innocence about this album that lays aside all pretense and bears open their soul.

We hear a hypnotic mesh of percussion, strings, horns, and voices. We find ourselves carried upon waves of unfamiliarity which lead us to seductive places where female voices and pianos sweetly wonder about the blooming of posies. There are also places of loneliness as felt in these words:

The sentence existing inside of a rhyme, is only just a token left spoken in time.

In “The Making of a Soul” there exists a most beautiful and delicately played piano passage. It sounds as though they were playing on their grandmother’s seldom used piano in the basement while she was away. Later, lamenting strings join in with the piano, and a peculiar person shows up with some questions that are guaranteed to shake you up.

We make our way through the turbulent “Ship’s A’Going Down”, spiraling ever downward, descending into the whimpering depths from which there appears to be no return, until at last we find ourselves with “Never Known Questions”. A lush resting place.

When you look into the emotions contained in the music on this album, they speak clearly, and there is no question of obscurity. This album is simultaneously sad, happy, and beautiful. Particularly as found in its climactic conclusion. Grandma’s sad and innocent piano reappears and after a valiant attempt at trying to communicate the passage of calling cards and winking bards and falling guards, there is a certain feeling of resignation as we find ourselves, along with The Residents, throwing up our hands and saying “OK”.

An angelic farewell march fades in and takes over while the singing continues in time with the new music. “OK, OK”. There is a sense of finality and acceptance. As the march continues to play, another refrain emerges.

To exist to show, or to be shown? Is a question never, never known.

As the music slowly fades out, so do the lyrics. They leave us, receding faintly, with the words “to exist ... to exist”. The music is sad because it is time to say farewell, as we all must do someday. It is happy, for having had the chance to exist. And it is beautiful, because it is.

The Residents' Art Director Homer Flynn

Note:

The eventual publication of Not Available came about as the result of a problem with the band. In 1978, The Residents were working on Eskimo, a much-touted major release. However, after a disagreement with The Cryptic Corporation, the band disappeared to England with the Eskimo master tapes. Needing something to release, the Cryptics pulled "some old tapes" off the shelves and released them as Not Available, complete with ads in the UK music press announcing "Now It Can Be Sold." The Residents weren't bothered much by this deviation from their plan, however, since the 1978 decision by someone else to release the album couldn't affect the philosophical conditions under which it was recorded in 1974.

The Residents:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Residents

If you find it, buy this album!