The founder and guitarist of Shockabilly, a demented C&W influenced outfit that had several albums released by England’s Rough Trade label, Eugene Chadbourne is one of America’s greatest natural resources, a one-eyed man among a nation of the blind. Eugene is a social and political satirist with the tact of a sledgehammer, his original songs showing reverence for no holy cows, calling a spade a spade, and hurling pointed barbs at targets as diverse as North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms (a politician once described as standing so far to the right that he makes Reagan look like a communist), President Reagan, Jerry Falwell, ‘Women Against Pornography’ and the Ku Klux Klan.
It's all done with a sense of absurdity in a musical style that can only be described as cacophonic and unpredictable, a strange blend of rock ‘n’ roll, county, and folk influences with a dose of metal-edged guitar and sheer noisy industrial instrumentation. Chadbourne’s The President, He Is Insane is a studio-quality presentation of some of Eugene’s best material. Side one features several of his…ah, shall we say…somewhat “structured” songs, including such fan favorites as “America Stands Tall,” “10 Most Wanted List,” and “Women Against Pornography.”
Eugene Chadbourne
Side two is strictly improvisational, mixing Eugene’s guitarwork with scrap vocals from late-night movies and early morning cartoons along with background instrumentation provided by Chadbourne’s infamous electric rake and, apparently, whatever noise he can drum up with various kitchen utensils and appliances. Not for everyone, to be sure, but nevertheless interesting and unique.
Eugene is, in the American tradition, somewhat of a capitalist, offering both his solo albums and older Shockabilly material for sale from his home. He also has a catalog of some 30+ original tapes, recorded at live shows and in his home, spotlighting and documenting a truly deranged genius, raw and totally uncommercial. (Iridescence Records, released 1984)
Review originally published by Nashville’s The Metro magazine...
Among the handful of elite underground artists toiling away on the fringes of rock ‘n’ roll, perhaps only the legendary R. Stevie Moore has proven to be more prolific than the master of the “electric rake,” multi-instrumental talent Dr. Eugene Chadbourne. How many records has Chadbourne released over a career that now spans five decades? “I stopped counting them a long time ago,” Eugene told me in a 2019 interview for the Rock and Roll Globe website, “one could probably throw out any number above 200 and basically be right.”
Chadbourne’s Solo Guitar, Volume 4-1/3 is another worthy addition to Chadbourne’s still-growing catalog, which offers music as entertaining, challenging, and eclectic as any artist in rock’s checkered 60+ year history. Released by the Massachusetts-based independent Feeding Tube Records, which specializes in reissues of subterranean music that refuses to fit into the mainstream pop culture straitjacket, this is the fourth and final volume in a series of live recordings made during the late ‘70s when Chadbourne was in exile in Canada as a conscientious objector to the Vietnam War. Each album has been released in a limited edition of 400 vinyl records, and all four albums in the series were “programmed” by the good Doctor himself and each promises a reckless joyride of musical experimentation.
After a few years in Canada spent playing and recording, Chadbourne returned to the states under President Carter’s amnesty program in 1976 and formed seminal 1980s underground rockers Shockabilly (with fellow sonic terrorists Mark Kramer and David Licht). The trio released a handful of now-legendary albums throughout the decade but once Shockabilly drifted apart, Eugene once again focused on his solo career. He would build a loyal cult following across the U.S. and Europe by constantly touring and releasing a metric shit-ton of records, many for dodgy “fly by night” indie labels. Chadbourne also operated his own basement-based mail order label, selling live recordings, all while developing a following among fellow musicians. He would later record with members of the Violent Femmes and Camper Van Beethoven as well as John Zorn, Evan Johns, and the Mothers of Invention’s Jimmy Carl Black (“the Indian in the group”).
Chadbourne’s Solo Guitar, Volume 4-1/3
Featuring but four (mostly lengthy) songs, Chadbourne’s Solo Guitar, Volume 4-1/3 is nevertheless the most ambitious of the four albums. Although each performance was primarily recorded on solo guitar, in reality you never know what sort of odd sonic gremlin that Chadbourne is going to yank out of the ether and slap into the grooves. The album-opening “Bow” is somewhat subdued, with Eugene making use of light and dark passages to create an aural ambiance, the quietude punctuated when the listener least expects it by flashes of nimble-fingered fretwork. Flurries of jagged notes fly by your ears like jet-powered ninja stars and, when it’s all over (almost eight minutes later), you’re really not sure what you just heard…so cue it up again!
The shortest tune on the LP, “The Bird” is a jazzy treatise that displays Chadbourne’s musical dexterity and knowledge of the form. Sounding like the mutant love child of Charlie Christian and Al Di Meola, Eugene’s lightning-quick fretboard runs are accompanied by a secondary stream of lower, bassy notes that create an unusual (and fascinating) depth to the performance. “Be,” which closes out the album’s first side, is a chaotic roller-coaster ride of unusual sounds, aggressive syncopated rhythms, tortured guitar strings, and scary sound affects akin to what a UFO abduction probably sounds like. After politely applauding the previous song, the audience is shocked into silence by the randomness of Chadbourne’s performance here, its creative cacophony, and the obvious enthusiasm the guitarist brings to his craft.
Side two of Chadbourne’s Solo Guitar, Volume 4-1/3 is comprised of one long performance with the inventive (and on-the-nose) title of “Meo Tse Tung Did Not Have To Deal With People Who Were Watching Seven Hours of Television Every Day.” Eugene introduces the song with its title, a gong-like percussion opening the door of perception to all sorts of howling, growling string-play and a menacing croaking noise that sounds like a bullfrog on LSD. A torn-off riff on the bass strings builds a blueprint for a generation of stoner-metal bands to follow. The song creaks and moans under the weight of its own staggering construction, a truly brilliant composition built like a funhouse mirror – you’re never quite sure what your reflection is going to look like when it’s staring back at you.
The Reverend's Bottom Line
Chadbourne, a true American underground icon, possesses an extensive knowledge of rock, blues, folk, and country music. But he is also an unusually-curious instrumentalist that has shown a willingness to push beyond any boundaries and into the unexpected in search of one or two shining cosmic notes. In this aspect, he’s a lot like fellow avant garde musical explorers like Sun Ra, James Blood Ulmer, and Captain Beefheart (without sounding like any of ‘em). Solo Guitar, Volume 4-1/3 is Muzak® for the hard of hearing, challenging and creative music with seemingly endless depths and boundless imagination. Deep into a storied career spent on the outer fringes of pop music, Eugene Chadbourne remains a visionary talent always looking for new ways to challenge himself and his audience. (Feeding Tube Records, released February 21, 2020)
Excitable Press and That Devil Music’s Rev. Gordon are happy to announce the publication of the fourth volume in the Rev’s ongoing collections of artists interviews. The Rock ‘n’ Roll Archives, Volume Four: Cult Rockers is a budget-priced collection of thirteen “cult rockers” who have made great music that failed to find a mainstream audience, talents like Billy Bragg, Eugene Chadbourne, Mojo Nixon, Kirsty MacColl, Band of Susans, Barrence Whitfield, and They Might Be Giants, among others. The book also includes album reviews for many of the featured artists.
The “Reverend of Rock ‘n’ Roll,” Rev. Keith A. Gordon has been writing about music for 45+ years. A former contributor to the All Music Guide books and website, and the former Blues Expert for About.com, Rev. Gordon has also written for Blurt magazine, Creem, High Times, and The Blues (U.K.), among many other publications, and has written eighteen previous music-related books, including Blues Deluxe: The Joe Bonamassa Buying Guide, The Other Side of Nashville, and Scorched Earth: A Jason & the Scorchers Scrapbook.
The Rock ‘n’ Roll Archives, Volume Four: Cult Rockers is a 74pp 5.5” x 8.5” paperback with B&W photos, priced at $7.99 for the print book and $2.99 for the eBook version with the same content. Get your copy through the handy Amazon.com links below:
CAMPER VAN CHADBOURNE Camper Van Chadbourne
(Fundamental Music)
Shades of insanity! What we have here, brothers and sisters, is a conspiracy, a contemptuous cover-up, a black-hearted attempt to conceal from you the truth that they wish you to be ignorant of! I’m talking about the shadowy, mysterious ‘them’ who want you to be stuck listening to re-tread rockers and processed cheese pop stars on their radio stations, buying their records, and playing them on the tinny transistor ray-didios and bass-heavy ster-oreos that they sell you!
Break free of these chains of mediocrity that they want you to be intellectually and aesthetically weighed down with and discover the music that will blow your mind, save your soul, and set you on the path of righteousness. I’m speaking, naturally, of the erstwhile Dr. Eugene Chadbourne and the one-and-only Camper Van Beethoven...
Ah, Dr. Chadbourne, I presume? Just when you thought it was safe to venture out of the house and into a new issue of The Metro, here we come slappin’ Chadbourne at you again. And well we should, ‘cause the rest of the free, cultured, civilized world is on the brink of declaring Eugene an artistic genius and showering him with the wealth, fleeting fame, and USA Today bar graphs that such esteem incurs. Nashville hasn’t even seen fit to honor the man with a gig in our city. Chadbourne talks about it, too, on his first Placebo Records release Kill Eugene.
In between the usual Chadbourne mix of original musical satire – such as his “Ollie’s Playhouse,” an ode to our favorite patriot [Ollie North]; the good-natured yet sociopathic “Women Against Pornography;” and the anti-sports tune “Big Boys With Little Balls” as well as inspired covers of the Byrds’ “Eight Miles High,” Pink Floyd’s “Lucifer Sam,” or “Ramblin’ Man,” a vintage Hank Williams number – rests a two-part telephone conversation between Eugene and Elliston Square’s Tommy Smith aptly titled “Getting A Gig In Nashville,” parts one and two. Yours truly is mentioned here, though not by name, ‘cause then they might hear it and realize that there are a few of us brave enough to recognize the talent and skill hidden beneath the looney-tune madness and tongue-in-cheek social commentary that is the art of Chadbourne.
Camper Van Chadbourne is a collaboration between the mighty Dr. Chadbourne and those revolutionary shock troops, Camper Van Beethoven. It’s a match made in heaven, friends, for both parties wander the same shadowy netherworld of broken pop tradition, radical musical composition, and distaste for the rules and regulations of the naked industry gentlefolk. Musical ancestry takes on a new meaning here as the Camper Van Chadbourne guys toss in the (un)usual mutant hybrid of covers, ranging from Joe South and Frank Zappa to Thelonious Monk and beyond, blending in a few typical Chadbourne creations among the trademark raga instrumentation and ‘80s psychedelia that had come to be known as Camper Van Beethoven.
The result is apocalypse dance muzak, nuclear new age classical for the post-holocaust crowd. Unless, of course, you defy them today by listening to the message hidden in these grooves beneath the hypnotic beat…a message that they, the all-too-evil, whore-mongering, erotica-spewing commercial conspiracy would like you to be ignorant of…the truth that music was meant to be energetic, dangerous, passionate, varied and, yes, even creative…and creativity is art. Will you listen?
Originally published by The Metro magazine, Nashville, 1988
