THE RESIDENTS’ announce the release of the definitive versions of their classic albums, "Duck Stab" and "Eskimo" on Mute May 27, 2008.

THE RESIDENTS’ announce the release of the definitive versions of their classic albums, "Duck Stab" and "Eskimo" on Mute May 27, 2008.

“For over 30 years The Residents have been a world unto themselves: madcap jesters, video innovators, rock’s very own devil’s advocates” – The Mirror


DUCK STAB

At some point in 1977, The Residents happened to stumble onto a review of their album, The Third Reich 'N' Roll, and the reviewer was joyously proclaiming, "Kids today don't want to listen to music like The Residents make. There is no fun in it. You certainly can't dance to it." That kind of pissed The Residents off, not because he said their music was no fun, but more because it implied that kids were complete idiots.

So The Residents set out to make an album of shorter, more fun tunes to prove to the world that it would be just as unpopular as their other recordings. The Residents recorded "Duck Stab."

However, when it came out in February of 1978, it was an instant smash. The kids ate it up, proving that The Residents were wrong yet again, and the pesky reviewer knew what he was talking about. The kids were idiots after all.

"Duck Stab" produced several instant classics. ‘Hello Skinny’, ‘Constantinople’, ‘Bach is Dead’, and ‘Blue Rosebuds’ became anthems of Residents mania. The very reviewer who didn't take to earlier Residents works proclaimed, "Duck Stab" lifts the country out of the slumber of the Seventies."

Even now, 30 long years later, "Duck Stab" is, to many people the ultimate Residents album. The kids obviously grew into adult idiots. The Residents gave up trying to prove that catchy music would be unpopular and announced that next they would record an album of wind noises and grunting. Which is exactly what they did….

ESKIMO

In 1979 "punk" music was all the rage. The Residents had gone though the punk stage three years earlier with the release of “Satisfaction” and were ready for anything that was not punk.

They decided it was a good time to make the jump into world music, since by their own calculations it would not become popular for several more years. They scanned the map for a proper culture to exploit and, not finding one, became discouraged until seeing a large Coke sign featuring Santa Claus. Immediately they realized they had overlooked the North Pole because it is made of ice and therefore didn't exist on their world map.

Immediately rushing out to a library, they gathered all the information they could find on Eskimos. What they found was a government issued book on Eskimo sanitation, a book of Eskimo legends, and one scratchy record of someone hitting a drum and chanting. Not exactly the rich cultural vein they had hoped to mine.

But it was enough, for it set the Eyeballs spinning off into their own imaginary world of six-month nights, marimbas made of frozen fish, and Eskimo sex lives. For almost four years the ideas tumbled around. Sometimes they would feel elated at some new breakthrough, but usually they moaned that the album would not only make dreary listening, but be pretentious beyond belief.

But when it was finally released "Eskimo" was a hit, both in sales and in reviews. Andy Gill of New Music Express said, “I’m not sure quite how to convey the magnitude of The Residents’ achievement with Eskimo. What I am sure of it that it’s without doubt one of the most important albums ever made, if not the most important, and that its implications are of such an unprecendentedly revolutionary nature that the weak-minded polemical posturing of purportedly “political” bands are positively bourgeois by comparison.“

He says this because the album tells the story, without relying upon words, of the assimilation of a ritualistic society into consumer culture. This story unfolds as Eskimo fables, a lived experience, set to the grinding of sound effects and music. It is a mind movie rich with detail. "Eskimo" is, quite literally, a unique experience.


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www.mute.com / www.myspace.com/theresidents / http://www.residents.com/


*** Also available on Mute from The Residents are the definitive editions of their classic albums Freak Show, The Commercial Album (25th anniversary special edition), Third Reich ‘N’ Roll and The Mole Trilogy plus 2005’s Animal Lover, 2006’s Tweedles and 2007’s The Voice Of Midnight, all available in deluxe limited edition hardback packages.