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Daniel Johnston

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Daniel Dale Johnston (born January 22, 1961) is an American singer, songwriter, musician, and artist. Johnston was the subject of the 2006 documentary The Devil and Daniel Johnston. He currently lives in a house adjacent to his parents' home in Waller, Texas.

Johnston has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder[1] [2][3]. One critic writes that Johnston's recordings range from "spotty to brilliant."[4]

Biography

Early life

Johnston was born in Sacramento, California, and grew up in the northern panhandle of West Virginia between Ohio and Pennsylvania near Chester, West Virginia.

Johnston began recording John Lennon—and Beatles-inspired music in the late 1970s on a $59 Sanyo monaural Boombox, singing and playing piano and chord organ.

After graduating from Oak Glen High School, Johnston spent his first year away from home at Abilene Christian University. He then left West Texas and attended the East Liverpool branch of Kent State University, which was closer to his hometown.

Music career

He performed at the 1985 Woodshock music festival in Austin, where he was featured in short documentary of the festival by Richard Linklater. The film, entitled "Woodshock," is included in the Criterion Collection release of Linklater's film Slacker.

In 1991, Johnston was able to air his music on a radio show while being hospitalized at Weston State Hospital. While hospitalized, Johnston sent requests to his manager to have Yoko Ono produce his music and to contact PepsiCo about the possibility of becoming spokesman for the soft drink Mountain Dew. Johnston had written a song praising Mountain Dew during this hospitalization, in which he claimed to have been locked up because he "loved the Mountain Dew so much".

In 1994, Johnston released Fun on Atlantic Records, his only major-label release. The record was produced by Paul Leary of Butthole Surfers.

In 1995, Johnston contributed two songs to the soundtrack for Larry Clark's controversial film Kids, produced by Folk Implosion and Sebadoh's frontman, Lou Barlow.

Johnston covered Schoolhouse Rock!'s "Unpack Your Adjectives" for a compilation of the popular education songs called Schoolhouse Rock! Rocks in 1996.

Johnston's songs have been covered by over 150 artists around the world including Tom Waits, Pearl Jam, Beck, The Dead Milkmen, The Twilight Sad, Sparklehorse, Wilco, Yo La Tengo, M. Ward, fIREHOSE, Justin Furstenfeld, Bright Eyes, Teenage Fanclub, Matthew Good, Mercury Rev, Built to Spill, Peter Kember (Sonic Boom from Spacemen 3), Spiritualized, The Swell Season, The Frames, The Flaming Lips[5] and TV on the Radio.

File:Hi,HowAreYou 21st&Guadalupe.jpg
The famous "Hi, How Are You?" mural in Austin, Texas

In 2005, Texas-based theater company Infernal Bridegroom Productions received a Multi-Arts Production/MAP Fund grant[6] to work with Johnston to create a rock opera based on his music, titled Speeding Motorcycle.

Art career

In 1993, Johnston painted a mural of the "Hi, How Are You?" frog, also known as Jeremiah the Innocent after the Three Dog Night song, on the side of Sound Exchange in Austin, Texas. In spring 2008, The "Jeremiah the Innocent" frog was released as a collectible figurine. The frogs were released in limited runs of green (250), yellow (250) and white (350)[7].

Johnston's drawings were featured in the 2006 Whitney Biennial. His artwork is shown in galleries around the world, including exhibits in London's Aquarium Gallery (April 28 - May 20, 2006) and New York's Clementine Gallery (March 16 - April 15, 2006).

Johnston is scheduled to exhibit during the 2008 Liverpool Biennial (October 18 – November 1, 2008) in England at Red Wire Gallery.

Recent news

In 2005, Dutch broadcasting organization VPRO recorded a documentary about Johnston for their TV series R.A.M. and was later re-aired on Dutch theme channel /Geschiedenis.

In December 2005 Johnston's song, "McDonald's on the Brain", was published in (translated) Hebrew in Maayan Magazine for poetry and art.

The Devil and Daniel Johnston, released in 2006, is a documentary by Jeff Feuerzeig about Johnston's life and music, and won the Director's Award at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival. It is now available on DVD from Sony Pictures Home Entertainment. As shown on the DVD's extra features, at a screening of the film, Johnston reunited with Laurie for the first time in decades and proposed.

In 2006, Johnston collaborated with Osaka Popstar, supplying backing vocals on their upcoming album. They also covered his song "Wicked World."

In April 2006, Filter Magazine reported that the Johnston family's Eternal Yip Eye Music label would soon release Johnston's first greatest hits compilation, Welcome to My World.[8]

In 2006 Johnston appeared as the musical guest on The Henry Rollins Show and performed "Mask" and "Care Less" (the latter was exclusive to the internet). Both can be viewed in the video section of the IFC page for the show.[9]

Daniel Johnston played the All Tomorrow's Parties festival in Minehead, Somerset England in May 2007. His performance was warmly received and he played two extra sets and reprised 'Speeding Motorcycle' with Yo La Tengo.

In December 2006, animator, cinematographer and 3-D photographer M. Henry Jones of SnakeMonkey Studio in NYC visited Daniel Johnston in his Galveston, Texas home and shot several hours of video for a music video collaboration involving one of Daniel's Christian songs.

On February 22, 2008 at the Trocadero Theater in Philadelphia, Johnston performed the Beatles' "I'm So Tired" as well as John Lennon's "Isolation" for the first time with The Capitol Years performing as his backing band.

The Internet Movie Database currently has Johnston listed in the cast of the upcoming film, City Rats. He is slated to play a character named "Ronnie".[10]

On September 27, 2008 Dick Johnston, Daniel's brother and manager, revealed that "a movie deal based on the artist's life and music had been finalized with a tentative 2011 release."[11] He also said that a deal had been struck with the Converse company for a "signature series" Daniel Johnston shoe.[11]

Legacy

2004 saw the release of The Late Great Daniel Johnston: Discovered Covered, a two disc compilation. The first disc featured musicians like Jad Fair, the Eels, Bright Eyes, Calvin Johnson, Beck, Death Cab for Cutie, Sparklehorse, The Flaming Lips and Tom Waits covering songs written by Johnston. The second disc featured Johnston's original recordings of all the songs covered on the first.

Discography

Full length

  • Songs of Pain (Stress Records cassette, 1981)
  • Don't Be Scared (Stress Records cassette, 1982)
  • The What of Whom (Stress Records cassette, 1982)
  • More Songs of Pain (Stress Records cassette, 1983)
  • Yip/Jump Music (Stress Records cassette, 1983; CD issued on Homestead, 1989)
  • Hi, How Are You (Stress Records cassette, 1983; issued with Continued Story on Homestead, 1989)
  • Retired Boxer (Stress Records cassette, 1984)
  • Respect (Stress Records cassette, 1985; 10" on Spain's Munster label)
  • Continued Story with Texas Instruments (Stress Records cassette, 1985; reissued with Hi, How Are You on Homestead, 1989)
  • A Texas Trip (Caroline Records, 2 Songs, 1987)
  • Merry Christmas (Stress Records cassette, 1988)
  • Live at South by Southwest (Stress Records cassette, 1990)
  • 1990 (Shimmy Disc, 1990)
  • Artistic Vice (Shimmy Disc, 1991)
  • Frankenstein Love recorded live in 1992 (Stress Records cassette, 2000)
  • Fun (Atlantic, 1994)
  • Why Me? recorded live at the Volksbühne in Berlin, June 6, 1999 (Trikont, 2000)
  • Rejected Unknown (Gammon Records/Pickled Egg Records, 2001)
  • Fear Yourself with Mark Linkous (Gammon Records, 2003)
  • Lost and Found (Sketchbook Records, UK, 2006)
  • Fear Yourself with Mark Linkous (Coppertree Records UK, Ltd Ed 180g vinyl, 2008)

EPs and singles

  • Casper The Friendly Ghost (1988)
  • The River Of No Return (1991)
  • Big Big World recorded 1986 (Seminal Twang, UK, 1991)
  • Laurie (Seminal Twang, UK, 1992)
  • Happy Time (1994)
  • Dream Scream (Pickled Egg Records, 1998)
  • Impossible Love (2001)
  • Sinning Is Easy (Pickled Egg Records, 2002)
  • Mountain Top (Rough Trade, 2003)
  • Fish (Sketchbook Records, UK, 2003)

Side projects and collaborations

  • with Jad Fair: It's spooky (50 Skidillion Watts, 1989; reissued on Jagjaguwar, 2001)
  • with Yo La Tengo: Speeding Motorcycle single (1990)
  • Danny and the Nightmares (Eternal Yip Eye Music, 1999)
  • with Ron English and Jack Medicine: Hyperjinx Tricycle (Important Records, 2000)
  • with Chris Bultman and Jad Fair as The Lucky Sperms: Somewhat Humorous (Jagjaguwar, 2001)
  • Danny and the Nightmares: Natzi single (2001)
  • with Hyperjinx Tricycle: Long Lost Love single (2002)
  • with Okkervil River: Happy Hearts off the album Don't Fall in Love with Everyone You See(Jagjaguwar, 2002)
  • with Hyperjinx Tricycle: Alien Mind Control 3" CD (Important Records, 2003)
  • Danny and the Nightmares: The End Is Near Again (Cool Beans, 2003)
  • with Rule of Thirds: "Rin Tin Soldier" (Eternal Yip Eye Music, 2003)
  • Danny and the Nightmares: Freak Brain (Sympathy Records, 2005)
  • with Jack Medicine: The Electric Ghosts (Important Records, 2006)
  • Danny and the Nightmares: The Death of Satan (Munster Records, 2007)
  • with Kraig Mc Govern on a live track recorded in Dublin July 2008
  • with B. Fleischmann: Phones, Machines and King Kong (Angst Is Not a Weltanschauung!; Morr Music, November 2008)

Compilations and tribute albums

  • The Lost Recordings (Stress Records, 1983) cassette
  • The Lost Recordings II (Stress Records, 1983) cassette
  • Please Don't Feed The Ego (Eternal Yip Eye Music, 1994)
  • Dead Dog's Eyeball by Kathy McCarty (1994)
  • My So-Called Life - contributed "Come See Me Tonight" (1995)
  • Schoolhouse Rock! Rocks - contributed "Unpack Your Adjectives" (1996)
  • The Early Recordings of Daniel Johnston Volume 1 (Dualtone, 2003) - Reissue of Songs of Pain and More Songs of Pain
  • The Late Great Daniel Johnston: Discovered Covered (Gammon Records, 2004) - Tribute album along with disc of original versions plus one new song
  • White Magic: From The Cassette Archives 1979-1989 (Eternal Yip Eye Music, 2004)
  • I Killed the Monster: 21 Artists Performing the Songs of Daniel Johnston (2006) - Tribute album featuring contributions from Sufjan Stevens, Mike Watt, Jad Fair and Kimya Dawson.
  • Welcome To My World (Eternal Yip Eye Music, 2006)

References

  1. ^ Zacharek, Stephanie (2006-03-31). ""The Devil and Daniel Johnston"". Salon.com. Retrieved 2007-02-02. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  2. ^ Burr, Ty (2006-04-07). ""His life is troubling, his fame disturbing"". The Boston Globe. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  3. ^ Seitz, Matt. ""The Devil Goes Down to Texas"". New York Press. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  4. ^ Kristin Sage Rockermann (2002-01-01). "Interview: Daniel Johnston". Pitchfork Media. Retrieved 2007-02-02. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  5. ^ The Devil and Daniel Johnston
  6. ^ MAP Fund | Infernal Bridegroom Productions
  7. ^ Daniel Johnston Frog Becomes Collectable Figurine
  8. ^ Filter-Mag.com
  9. ^ IFC.com: Official site of the Independent Film Channel
  10. ^ IMDB entry for Daniel Johnston.
  11. ^ a b The Austin Chronicle article: "Off the Record: Music News".

Official

Other


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