Captain Beefheart, probably one of my most adored musicians, passed away today from multiple sclerosis. Though I haven’t posted a review of his many albums on here, rest assured that will be amended. Trout Mask Replica is of particular importance, I think once I heard that album I listened to it solid for an entire month.
Besides his music, there was his attitude. How he operated was not how others operated. Some might see his weirdness as a put-on, but I think it was genuine. Growing up in the middle of nowhere and moving around can create a difficultly in relating to other people. Using art as a form of escape isn’t unusual, but he grew relatively obsessed with it.
Rituals related to his sculpting continued strong as he created a band. Despite having no training playing a piano, he created songs on it to be translated into full-fledged songs. In case having multiple rhythms and intentionally loose playing wasn’t enough, there are the lyrics. The lyrics feel like the rants of a crazed lunatic on the street corner who used to be a Poet Laureate.
Getting the pieces ready took forever. People had a hard time liking him. His music was one thing, but then he spread random information in order to create a myth. Members of his band stated he tried (and succeeded) in brainwashing them. He bullied the bejesus out of them, tormenting them, physically hurting them at times. Living in a house with the windows blacked out, he created his masterpiece “Trout Mask Replica”.
Nothing he did ever seemed understandable. It was as if he wanted to make music that could have an infinite number of responses. Delta Blues (back when rock referenced blues instead of itself), free jazz, and bits of the avant-garde came together in the most incoherent mess ever to create a career. Most of what he did escaped categorization, there’s really no way to describe the utterly bizarre nature of what he did. I’m personally shocked that people listened to this, enough of them to actually give Donald an actual career.
After he ended his obsession with music, he went back to art. The music industry had nothing left to offer this iconoclast. Ending it in 82, he stated that he couldn’t take that world anymore. Plus, a lot of those ideas and sketches had been around in his head for some time, and he let them out. Nature and art were the only things left for him, and he quietly pursued them until his death.
I’m going to miss this guy. One of the few weirdos who existed outside all norms, he truly was an American original, unwilling or unable to conform to some late hippie or mystical stereotype. By hiding himself in the California desert he maintained control of what other people’s perception was of him, something he could do more easily by keeping quiet than speaking.