1 post tagged “the devil and daniel johnston”
So, in the second part of our series on outsider artists, I'm going with another musician, mainly because of coincidence and because if you haven't heard Daniel Johnston or heard of him, then you should go out and watch the documentary The Devil and Daniel Johnston (you can buy it from his site). This will tell you all you need to know about Daniel. Of course, you should be forewarned, Daniel suffers from severe manic depression with psychotic features and a preoccupation with the religious, and has been in and out of hospitals his entire life. I know, rock documentaries tend to be horrible puff pieces to build the ego of the star(s), but this is told through home movies, recorded diaries, paintings, and interviews with Daniel and people that he's worked with and known. This makes the film even more intense than you're run of the mill Behind the Music BS. It also makes it crushingly heartbreaking to view at moments.
One of the main reasons that Daniel is included in this series is his use of his own personal mythology (partially created by him, partially by people talking about him). He takes his own life story--his true love Laurie, his hope to be a respected artist either visually (his paintings now go for a hefty sum*, so maybe he will some day) or through his music, his illness--and creates a world of song that is easy to interpret as your own life. One of our favorite songs by him (that we've been covering lately) is "True Love Will Find You in the End":
You'll find out just who was your friend
Don’t be sad, I know you will,
But don’t give up until
True love finds you in the end.
This is a promise with a catch
Only if you're looking will it find you
‘Cause true love is searching too
But how can it recognize you
Unless you step out into the light?
Don’t be sad, I know you will,
But don’t give up until
True love finds you in the end.
and as the wounded romantics we both are, we kind of feel this really says it all.
But the coincidence is that this post at Rhapsody Radish calls for people to listen to Daniel in Rhapsody (we don't use it) to up his standing in the most played artist category. Daniel lives with his elderly parents and they provide him with everything, so he needs money. If he's a top artist, he'll make money, so if you use Rhapsody, please, please do it. And why stop there? If you use LastFM, set an album on repeat when you go to bed. ITunes? Do the same thing. See what kind of publicity we can get for Daniel.
"Drove those demons out of my head with an organ and a pencil full of lead. And when I'm dead, like to have it said, he drove those demons out of his head. I'm a loner. I'm a sorry entertainer." --Daniel Johnston, "Sorry Entertainer"
Here's a couple of wonderful songs by Daniel. "True Love" was recorded by Kramer and is on his album 1990. "Story of an Artist" was recorded in his parents' basement (or his sister's garage) on a tape recorder and is a touching summary of his art. It originally appears on his album Don't Be Scared.
