From Wesley Willis and Daniel Johnston to Jacques Brodier, Martha Grunenwaldt, Oscar Haus, and Dr. Konstantin Raudive, this compilation offers a variety of music by disparate artists on the fringes of society, whose only link is their idiosyncratic artistic vision. Lacking both a formal music education and pretentiousness, these artists' creations contain enough inventiveness and passion to make accepted conventions of musicality irrelevant.
A few blocks from my house, a huge framed drawing of the Chicago skyline by Wesley Willis hangs on the wall of a burger joint that otherwise is inexplicably saturated in Scooby Doo paraphernalia. Although the venue is an unlikely host for this work of art, that it’s there at all speaks to Willis’ appeal to a wider spectrum of the populace than might be expected. Even his music, despite its factory preset accompaniments and its repetitive lyrical content, shows his uncanny ability to engage audiences with entertaining stories, stories that are all the more riveting because they’re usually true.
Willis isn’t alone. The other artists in this collection each have his or her specialty, from Jacques Brodier’s sound-effects wizardry, to the dustbin percussion of André Robillard or the accordion virtuosity of Oscar Haus. That they have little chance of even moderate financial success is unimportant since their music erupts from a wellspring of creativity that they cannot silence, sometimes even sacrificing technical ability in the fever of expression. Rarely is there a prohibitive self-consciousness at play, and what issues forth is sincere and without guile. These artists are unabashedly themselves, and it’s this quality that lends these songs an undeniable authenticity that augments their charm. Nor are these artists directly imitative of others who have gone before them. Instead, they share glimpses of their highly personalized, unique worldviews, of which music is only an extension and not some compartmentalized product for mass consumption. The resulting music is the direct result of artists who follow their muse no matter where it takes them, a philosophy many other musicians would be wise to adopt.
As for the music itself, much of it is enjoyable for its idiosyncrasies outside of its context. There’s the pleasantly quiet guitar and vocals of Anton et Quentin, Marcella Dumeray’s acapella singing, the brief therapies of Reinhilde Tastenoe, and the eerie Electronic Voice Phenomena recorded by Dr. Raudive. One of the highlights is Daniel Johnston’s “Premarital Sex,” which displays his songwriting skill on a shoddy organ. While not all of the artists have equal appeal, what’s included here is still valuable for the insight not only into the artistic process, but also for what it reveals about the artists themselves. On that note, I do wish that the biographies included in the liner notes weren’t so short, and I would have liked the inclusion of more details about the actual recordings. Because this compilation for the most part emphasizes Western artists, particularly Europeans and a disproportionate number of them Belgian, the selection on this disc is not a complete overview of outsider music, but it’s certainly a fantastic place to start.
samples:
- Jacques Brode - Extrait du 'Filtre de Réalité
- Wesley Willis - Trama Hell Ride
- Oscar Haus - Sans Titre
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