To be completely honest, I’m not the best person to review a JANDEK concert. Yes I’d heard about his legendary reclusiveness over the years and was just as surprised as anyone else when he decided to come out of isolation a few years back to play some live shows. Furthermore, I’ve also seen the excellent documentary Jandek on Corwood, which made me that much more curious about his music. However, as of today, I still own no Jandek records or CDs as my curiosity still hadn’t fully taken hold. Nevertheless, when I found out about this show, my curiosity got the best of me. I still felt the need to rectify my relatively Jandek-free existence by seeing one of his now more frequent but still relatively rare live shows. I’m fairly certain that this was his first visit to Philadelphia during his at this point thirty-year career.
As such, I wish that I could say that I was blown away and that I plan to get all of his albums and blow as much money on his catalog as I have on artists ranging from ELVIS COSTELLO to THE FALL to THE BEACH BOYS. If I said that, I wouldn’t be truthful, however. First off, though, it must be said that the venue is absolutely gorgeous. If I’m not mistaken, the building dates back to the 18th century (!) and as such, it was perfect for the type of show that Jandek delivered. Accompanied by musicians on bassoon, harp and clarinet, it felt more like a classical recital than a stereotypical rock concert, especially due not only to the nature of the music but also because of the utter silence (per Jandek’s request, though with this rapturous crowd, he most likely would’ve gotten it anyway) present for the two hours or thereabouts that he played.
This, however, leads to one of my problems with the show. It was just too long. Much like the music of NICO (or a modern day chanteuse like FURSAXA), this is music with a distinctive 3 AM, late night, alone in your room kind of vibe. Jandek came out dressed in all black and extremely slender. The effect was almost ghost-like and the music, a combination of Jandek’s confessional talking/singing style and instrumentation that reminded me of later TALK TALK as well as the aforementioned artists and maybe even CLAUDE DEBUSSY or something in that vein. His piano playing wasn’t virtuoso-like, but it did the job and he’s a better player than his outsider-musician reputation would have you believe. Still, as much as I like, say, Nico, I don’t think I’d be able to listen to her for two hours straight and this is what it felt like. It also didn’t help that despite the wonderful ambiance of the hall, the room he played in was very stuffy. Again, I’m sure I wouldn’t have these relatively minor complaint if I was more familiar with the records these songs were taken from, but going in relatively cold, it was tough. It’s hard to accuse an artist of overstaying his welcome, especially when he has a cult of rabid fans who have been waiting nearly three decades (in some cases) to see him perform live. Perhaps it was I who should have been better prepared then?
The picture above was taken by SETH TISUE and is used with permission. He must have been sitting relatively close to me and my fiancee since I’m visible in the bottom right-hand corner of the picture. Anyway, you can view his flickr account here.
