Excerpt

I’d like to introduce myself: my name is Chris Burden and today, on this tape, I’m going to show you excerpts—visual excerpts—from 11 different pieces I’ve done starting in 1971 into 1974. Pieces have either been filmed on super 8, which is the most common, or 16… millimeter, or half-inch video and there’s one that’s actually a television ad that was taken off the air… as you watch this tape (and listen to my explanation for some of the pieces) I want you to remember that it doesn’t cover or encompass the whole body of my work, that you’re only seeing several very arbitrary selections. You’re not seeing the pieces that don’t lend themselves to being taped or filmed because of… purely technical reasons such as it’s too dark or it’s too far away or something like that… um… you’re not seeing the pieces that, that uh, don’t lend themselves to filming because… it’s not right—I didn’t want ‘em filmed… it didn’t make sense. Uh. There’s an exception to that, there’s uh, a bed piece which is, which you’re going to see in this tape, some excerpts from it: it’s a piece that involves staying in bed for 22 days without getting up. Um. We’ll see how successful that is, whether it can convey some of the energy and feelings that were going on during that piece and, uh… another reason is—that… I hadn’t attempted to film some of the pieces—is that, um, some of the pieces involve a one-to-one relationship where, with me and one other person are the audience and having a camera or, like, a person there would disturb the whole, whole setup and so it’s not possible. Um. Other than that, there are some piece that, that I’ve tried to film and haven’t, hadn’t been able to because there’s been a technical error—either on my part or somebody else’s—somebody forgot to push it, push the button…um, I couldn’t, I couldn’t concentrate, you know, give enough of my attention because I was very involved with the performance so you’re really seeing, what you’re going to see today, is a very arbitrary selection, um, so almost a, well, a haphazard selection of work, um, but, well, and another thing is that I’ve been, uh, hesitant to, to release these because of the, of the so arbitrary nature of how they come about, um, but, more than that, it’s because, um, film and tape are taken as reality while they’re being, while, while we, the viewer—or anybody—is watching them, uh, so, so, for the most part, I record most of my pieces with still photographs because they’re so, uh, old-fashioned that they’re very, they’re taken very abstractly, and they’re taken symbolically, um, but, uh, I guess at this time I, I feel that there’s maybe enough, enough, energy in the pieces—or in the films—that it’s important to show them and that some of it will filter through but, uh, I want you to try to—although I know a lot of you will forget it—to remain aware that you’re not seeing the actual experience…

Transcript of the Description of a Scene from a Movie I Have Never Watched

Ok. So…so one of the opening scenes, right? So, uh, this hit man who’s supposed to be one of the best in the world, he’s going to an office building—this very plush office building—to find some kind of clue and so…he lets himself into this elaborate office and just walks in and this secretary sees him, immediately knows who he is and she’s all (makes a face) and he says, “don’t worry; if I wanted you dead you’d be dead already” and so she looks visibly relieved and so he’s standing at the window kind of looking out and then he looks over at her and something happens and it’s like WHOOOOP and she’s dead right there and so he did what most of us would do, he ran as fast as he could down the hall to the end of the hall to the elevator and starts tapping at the… at the elevator door waiting for the elevator to come. So I think “ok he’s going to leave the building and try to figure out who did it”… so he gets in the elevator finally and he turns around, he launches into, uh, like a runners stance and the camera goes into a close-up to his heel and his heel is back up against the elevator and the back of the elevator goes like KKKPHHHKKK because he’s pressing so hard and he takes off down the hallway, all the papers from the various offices are swirling like the leaves of autumn—except they’re white—and he bursts through the doors and… he is, at this point, traveling so fast that he bursts through the glass, yeah the glass wall, and while he’s bursting through the glass wall he’s all (mimes the motion of reaching for guns in holsters) …I don’t know why he cross… reaches into the… and his legs are going like NYEAA (hands imitate leg motion) In the air right? … to get…the thing is he’s trying, you know, to get to the other…the thing is, to get to the other side of the building, I mean, to the other building… and as he’s going he sees about four hit men who are all (mimes rifle stance) and he’s BOOOJ BOOOJ BOOOJ BOOOJ and then he starts to fall and I think “wow… that was, like, his last desperate act.” He actually falls on a ledge on the other building and there’s one hit man left who’s standing there going (mimes taking a drag from a cigarette and exhaling) like this and all of a sudden he’s like (mimes a bullet going through the back of his head) like that…the hit man had gone up here and around up the stairs through and shoots him and he’s standing there. At this point his phone rings “hello?” he’s having this conversation with his…what must be his nemesis… this is all back-story that we don’t know. And he says “if you wanted to take me out why didn’t you just come here and do it yourself, man-to-man?” and the camera… and what you hear is “the hit men were just bait” and then he looks down at his feet and he’s standing on an X at which point a bullet comes out of nowhere and shoots him right in the head and the… it shows where the bullet came from and it’s going like this across town to another part of the city where a guy is standing at his window with an unbelievable telescope and the phone and then he repeats what he said “the hit men were just bait” squeezes the trigger… follows the bullet in slow motion all the way to that guy’s head. Cut scene.

Ongoing Project

May 2009……………………......……..…...……….. 1.875 lb.

Ongoing project

December 1999 (“Best of the 90’s”)…………..…….. 1.25 lb.

Summer 2002…………………………..…….……...……….. 1.5 lb.

January 2006…………………………………………….. 1.8125 lb.

September 2006……………………….………..…………….. 3 lb.
October 2006…………………………………..…….….. 2.1875 lb.
November 2006……………………………………….... 2.4375 lb.
December 2006………………………………………….... 2.625 lb.
January 2007……………………………….…………………….. 2 lb.
February 2007……………………………….......………….. 2.25 lb.

April 2007……………………………………….…………….. 2.125 lb.
May 2007………………………………..……….……..……... 2.875 lb.
Summer 2007…………………………………….………….. 3.8125 lb.
September 2007……………………………..….…………… 3.6875 lb.

January 2008……………………………………..…..……….. 2.1875 lb.

March 2008…………………………………………...…………….. 2.75 lb.

May 2008…………………………………………..….………….. 2.8125 lb.
Summer 2008…………………………………………...…...….. 3.4375 lb.
September 2008…………………………..…………….……….. 3.1875 lb.
October 2008………………………………..……………......…….. 2.875 lb.
November 2008………………………………..………………...…….. 2.5 lb.

January 2009………………………………………………....…….. 1.6875 lb.
February 2009…………………………………….………….…….. 1.5625 lb.
March 2009………………...………..……………………………….. 1.9375 lb.
April 2009………………...………..……………………………..………... 1.5 lb.

Me I'm Mark (The Very Best of The Fall as Heard by John Peel)

I just recently rediscovered a CD-R I made of favorite songs The Fall played over the course of their 24 appearances on John Peel's legendary radio show (only Ivor Cutler guested more often). Though the mix is a little heavy on the band's mid-eighties to early-ninties output and is not arranged in chronological order, it's a fairly even survey of the band from their first appearance on the show in 1978 until their last in 2004 and I think it's the most flattering and comprehensive picture I could give someone of The Fall.

The Fall's appearances on John Peel's show are inconsistent (to say the least) which makes the 6-disc Complete Peel Sessions 1978-2004 infuriating even as it is a treasure trove of great, great performances. With this said, when The Fall were at their best on Peel's show, they were also at their overall best; the peaks documented on this mix show the band at their finest in every period of their ludicrously prolific career. It's another witness to the validity of John Peel's indefatigable quote about The Fall ("always the same, always different").

The first song, "What About Us", was played on the group's last appearance on the show and would have a studio release the next year on 2005's Fall Heads Roll, which was the first album of theirs I heard or owned. It remains a favorite.

Thing is: I hated the album the first time I heard it. I thought it was a joke. To this day, given the violence of my reaction against it, I have no idea why I played Fall Heads Roll a second, third or fourth time but, by that point, it had magically snapped into place and I played it repeatedly for the next month.

Only one of the songs I included is a cover (of The Sonics' "Strychnine") and it's worth the time spent to stop over at touched mix where a brilliant, brilliant blogger has compiled that and many other of the songs The Fall have covered (including their infamous one of The Kinks' "Victoria").

For the most part I skipped songs The Fall performed that veer dangerously close to being throwaway novelty songs and stuck to songs that can be found (in various versions) on studio recordings in the band's catalogue. An exception is 1994's "Glam Racket - Star" which baits the then-popular British group Suede, of whom I am also a large fan. Suede would 'return fire' with a cassette-only B-side called "Implement Yeah!" half a decade later (oh... snap?).

The Christmas songs also played on the session that included "Glam Racket - Star" ("Jingle Bell Rock" and "Hark the Herald Angels Sing") are the sort of songs I wouldn't put on a mix like this. The band Elastica, in their own Peel Sessions, would play a song called "I Wanna Be a King of Orient Aah," lightly mocking Fall vocalist Mark E. Smith's ridiculous vocal tics as applied to these Christmas season standards.

Unlike Suede, however, Elastica were no Fall-detractors: for a time, former Fall member David Bush played keyboards for Elastica and Smith (who is the only consistent member of The Fall) added vocals to one version of an Elastica song, "How He Wrote Elastica Man," itself a tribute to The Fall song "How I Wrote Elastic Man."

The mix ends with another song from The Fall's last appearance on Peel's show, "Job Search," which feel appropriate as I am currently in a state of employment aporia (aka "I don't think my job pays me enough to survive on"). I seem to remember being in the same state when I made the mix... always the same, I suppose.

It's annoying that I constantly preface the mixes I post with caveats, but here it seems neccessary in light of the relationship I have with the band:

I do not listen to The Fall for their musical excellence.

I'm... not exactly sure why I do.

The Fall is not a band.

The Fall is a way of life.

The Fall is like waking up, realizing that there is a large, possibly venomous tarantula sitting on your chest and not moving for fear of angering it while also starting to admire the complex beauty of the fine hairs all over its body.

And now, all hyperbole dispensed with and with no further adieu:

Me I'm Mark (The Very Best of The Fall as Heard by John Peel)

1What About Us

2Spoilt Victorian Child

3Gut of the Quantifier

4Squid Lord

5Hot Aftershave Bop

6Hey! Student

7What You Need

8Guest Informant

9Glam-Racket Star

10Ladybird (Green Grass)

11Futures and Pasts

12Numb at the Lodge

13Strychnine [The Sonics cover]

14Oleano

15Paranoia Man in Cheap Shit Room

16D.I.Y. Meat

17Groovin' with Mr. Bloe- Green-eyed Loco Man

18Job Search

(mp3, 74 min.)

Bonus:

Elastica- "How He Wrote Elastica Man" (unfortunately, not the version featuring Mark E. Smith)

Suede- "Implement Yeah!"

Pavement- "Mark E. Smith" (live)

(Pavement are also avowed enemies of The Fall, having been accused of 'ripping-off' The Fall by Mark E. Smith.)

(mp3s in a .zipped folder)

Ugo