19 febbraio 2024

 

A contenere almeno in parte la delusione per la cancellazione di tutti gli appuntamenti europei dei Residents con la versione scenica/scenografica di God In Three Persons - cui forse non è estranea la turbolenta dipartita di Nolan Cook - giunge notizia della pubblicazione tra poche settimane di un volume ispirato al loro amatissimo Commercial Album: ne è autore Andrew Hook, già responsabile della biografia del misterioso (per definizione) N Senada, che a ogni singolo brano di quell'album - quaranta in tutto, e tutti rigorosamente della durata di un minuto - ha dedicato un testo di mille parole ciascuno. Si intitola, com'è giusto, Commercial Book.

A few years ago, award-nominated writer Andrew Hook wrote O For Obscurity, Or, The Story Of N, the definitive biography of The Mysterious N Senada, the Bavarian musician who influenced the early music of The Residents, drawn from material discovered in the band's archives long after Senada's death. Now - with the full approval of the band - Hook's eleventh published short story collection, Commercial Book, will shortly be available from Psychofon Records. As most people reading this will be fully aware, in 1980 The Residents released Commercial Album, a collection of 40 songs each of exactly one minute in duration. Using these songs as the springboard for fiction, Andrew Hook's Commercial Book presents 40 stories each of exactly 1000 words in length, therefore emulating the restriction which The Residents placed on their songwriting. With each story taking its title from each song and inspired by the music and lyrics, Commercial Book is a weird, alter-trip into the depths of the original record, a collaboration wholly in the spirit of The Residents and fully endorsed by them.