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#Post#: 473--------------------------------------------------
13TH ANNIVERSARY SHOW (Project of the Week for the 25th of Septe
mber)
By: moleshow Date: September 25, 2017, 7:15 pm
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this one slides us further into the realm of all that is spooky
and strange in the world of Rz, without explicitly plopping us
down in, like... ghost and death and murder and Voice of
Midnight-y kinds of things.
go forth! if you feel so inclined.
#Post#: 474--------------------------------------------------
Re: PROJECT OF THE WEEK (25th of September): 13TH ANNIVERSARY SH
OW
By: moleshow Date: September 29, 2017, 12:16 pm
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this show is such an absolute mystery to me. i don't have a
solid sense of what the setlist was at any of the shows- i think
that it's cut down for some releases or reorganized for others.
i don't know what costumes were used for what tracks. i don't
know much of anything for sure about it, but i do know that i
really like it!
it's an eerie, minimalist affair. the way the shows seemed to
allow the Rz to appear as if they were ghostly apparitions in
the darkness, haunting a space, coming forth out of a stagnant
darkness with life and energy! they assume costumes and
identities for sections of tracks that do not necessarily have
characters with distinct appearances. they use the people
onstage as their decorations which allows the show to feel
exceptionally alive compared to any of their other shows. (they
would soon use both living and static decorations in Cube-E to
make for something REALLY fascinating.)
it sets a precedent for shows like Way We Were, Shadowland,
Talking Light, Fillmore '98, and Wonder of Weird (and seemingly
the upcoming In Between Dreams)- setlists not based off of
singular albums to visualize them, but assorted tracks organized
by eras, ideas, themes. this makes one thing i've seen pretty
funny: this tendency for Cliffords to trash the RCB trilogy
while praising the 13th Anniversary shows. like- hey, dude!
those shows are, structurally, similar. while the RCB shows have
narration, characters, those sorts of things- they don't take up
much of the show. but i am not of that mindset, and am almost
definitely missing the point. anyways, 13th Anniversary show
very good, perhaps a little spooky.
i may have more to say at a later date.
#Post#: 478--------------------------------------------------
Re: PROJECT OF THE WEEK (25th of September): 13TH ANNIVERSARY SH
OW
By: Meisekimiu Date: October 2, 2017, 6:46 pm
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Like moleshow said, the 13th Anniversary show is quite a mystery
(maybe because it has all kinds of assorted secrets or
something). It's an important part of Residents history as well.
It laid a foundation for future shows but it's also unique in
its own way. The famous red eyeball theft happened during this
tour. And lots of other crazy stuff! Grandpa Gio described this
show as "relaxed" compared to the Mole Show, and while the Mole
Show is a very tense show... I still think the 13th Anniversary
show isn't one you'd call relaxed. Something about the whole
quality of the music still has this "high tension" feel to it
which I can't really describe. I think that the footage of them
performing Cry for the Fire is some of the most powerful live
footage I've seen from them. I mean, Cry for the Fire is a tense
song to begin with, but something about the footage and the way
it's performed is just... I don't know. It's insane to me. Also:
Snakefinger performing with The Residents is always great.
Anywho, back to the actual history of this show. Besides the
things I listed, I'm pretty sure most people are aware of the
history of this show. It wasn't supposed to happen until they
were invited to perform in Japan by WAVE records... who would
also cover all the costs of the performance. And so the 13th
Anniversary Tour began in Japan (...much like the current In
Between Dreams tour!). Since I am sort of known for dumping all
this "Residents in Japan" stuff onto the forum, I guess I should
talk about that now. Get ready for a special Project of the Week
edition of... THE RESIDENTS IN JAPAN!
The Residents performed the 13th Anniversary Show (or the
"Eyeball Show" as it was called) in two venues: One unspecified
venue in Kyoto and in the Parco Space Part 3 theater in Shibuya,
Tokyo, Japan. I'm really curious about this Kyoto show since
there is no information on it at all. But the other venue is
much easier to find information on. The building they performed
at in Shibuya was actually part of a Department Store... Parco
Part 3 was one of a series of Parco Department Store buildings
in Shibuya (which is currently being completely renovated). On
the eigth floor was a theater named Parco Space / Parco Theater
and originally named "Seibu Theater". Seibu Theater was named
after Parco's parent company, Seibu Department Stores, Ltd.
What's really interesting is that Seibu/Parco also owned another
subsidiary... a music distributor called "WAVE".
But who was WAVE? Well, WAVE was managed by Masanori Akashi, who
appears under the credits for one of the 13th Anniversary Show
CDs put out. There are other folks in there too, but I can't
really find any information on them. Anyway, WAVE specialized in
New Wave (of course) and Jazz music and mostly focused on
foreign artists for a more "global" sound. They put out John
Zorn, Tuxedomoon, and even some Thelonious Monk! WAVE even put
out a Japan exclusive Residents compilation album, Memorial
Hits, to increase hype for their live shows. This compilation
album also includes a transcribed lyrics sheet written by WAVE
employees, much like their release of The Big Bubble. I would
love to get my hands on a copy of this album... or at least a
scan of those lyrics sheets!
[center]
HTML https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CxgSz8HVIAAKwc7.jpg
A promotional ad for WAVE's first store in Roppongi[/center]
While we're talking about WAVE, I found an interview with The
Residents and Homer Flynn by WAVE out on Youtube. I haven't
watched it all since it's pretty long, but here's the first
part: LINK!
HTML https://tinyurl.com/y88sgera
It's pretty charming. I can't read
all the Japanese because it's very fuzzy, but the little name
cards say "レジデンツ" (Residents)
for the members of The Residents and
"スポークスマン"
("Spokesman") for Homer Flynn. I find the moment at 01:36 quite
funny, where Homer describes the Theory of Obscurity and the
interviewer basically goes "WTF did he say? You're translating
that!" to the translator. The translator himself seems to go
"mmhm" a lot which seems kind of annoying, but in Japanese
culture this kind of "listening indicator" is pretty common.
...Though it is more annoying with the Americanized "mmhm"
rather than a typical "hai" or "sou desu" responses. They also
use the term "Strategy of Obscurity" in english a bit which is
the direct translation of their translation of "Theory of
Obscurity": 秘密の戦略 ("Himitsu
no Senryaku"). I find that particularly fascinating since the
localized version of the Theory of Obscurity movie was named
"めだまろん" which is much
catchier but loses some of the connection to the original title
(めだまろん translates to
something like "Theory of Eyeballs" which is still pretty good).
Anyway, I think that's pretty much all the weird rambling about
Japanese stuff related to the 13th Anniversary Shows I can find.
According to one of the Blue Note staff, the show was written
about in a Japanese magazine after it had happened. A big part
of why the 13th Anniversary Tour is a mystery to me is because
of this link to Japan, where a lot of specifics can just get
mixed up and lost. I mean, the most likely reason why we don't
know what venue they performed at in Kyoto is because The
Residents can't read Japanese... they don't know what venue they
performed at! That mystery just ties in further to my
appreciation of this show and its tour. Also because Snakefinger
singing in a southern accent is very cute.
(By the way, the idea of The Residents and Snakefinger and their
managers and everyone eating sushi or something together in
Japan is an idea that fills me with joy.)
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