{The Devil and Daniel Johnston}
This documentary recently opened in select theaters...
About the film:
Director Jeff Feuerzeig depicts a perfect example of brilliance and madness going hand in hand with manic-depressive singer/songwriter/artist Daniel Johnston. As an artist suffering from manic depression with delusions of grandeur, Daniel Johnston's wild fluctuations, numerous downward spirals, and periodic respites are exposed in this moving documentary.
"The Devil and Daniel Johnston" melds current footage, vintage performances, home movies, and dozens of recorded audiotapes from Daniel's life. Testimony from friends and family add a rich layer to his personal history, but it is Daniel's poetic songs interwoven throughout the film, that tell their own story. Now in his mid 40s, Daniel Johnston has recorded over ten full-length albums, and his supporters have included: Kurt Cobain, Matt Groening, The Butthole Suffers, Wilco, Sonic Youth, Mike Watt, Yo La Tengo, David Bowie, Tom Waits, Beck, The Flaming Lips, and an ever-growing international cult audience.
About Daniel Johnston:
As a teenager, Johnston began recording homemade cassettes. Unemployed and attending art classes sporadically, Johnston began to spend most of his time in his family's cellar, writing and recording songs. The cassettes he made there included 'Songs of Pain' and 'More Songs of Pain', both of which centered around his unrequited love for a woman named Laurie who ended up marrying an undertaker.
The aspiring cartoonist - whose playful sketches have graced the covers of his releases - moved to Texas in 1983. At this time, the onset of manic depression had begun. It was around this time that Johnston recorded the seminal cassettes 'Yip/Jump Music' and 'Hi, How Are You?'. The latter was recorded in the midst of a nervous breakdown. Both were recorded on a $59.00 Sanyo mono boom-box and are quintessential of Johnston's desperate bid to get his creations out of his head and onto the record of human experience. Although lo-fi and amateurish in approach, these recordings are unflinchingly honest yet painfully beautiful.
For a short spell, Johnston joined a traveling carnival, selling corndogs. His five-month stint with the carnival left him in Austin, where he decided to stay. In the midst of that city's mid-eighties music scene, Johnston became a local legend. While he continued to hand out his cassettes for free, Austin record stores started selling them; in fact, they became best-selling local releases. Johnston's biggest break came when a camera crew from MTV's seminal 'Cutting Edge' show decided to feature Johnston. His appearance on the show made him a minor celebrity, and the music press in the US and abroad began to take note. the independent label, Homestead, re-issued some of the cassettes on CD to a wider audience in the early nineties. His songs were used in Generation X film soundtracks such as 'Kids' and 'My So Called Life'.
Here's a couple of fantastic early Daniel Johnston recordings:
Purchase Songs of Pain here.
