Going to see the Devil And Daniel Johnston tonight

[Tobias March]

So why am I posting this here. Well Johnston's an interesting guy. He's been championed by Yo La Tengo and Kurt Cobain. Many of his songs are romantic ballads to a girl named Laurie he met 40 years ago. And he's been in and out of mental health institutions for years.

Plus he thinks Metallica are the servants of Satan. No really.

Anyway I've never heard of the guy before, but I was wondering if anyone here had? I'll post on the flick once I've seen it.

[Tobias March]

I don't know if this flick has already been shown in the States, but it's well worth seeing. It's beautiful/sad and fascinating.

Johnston appears to have been obsessed from an early age with being 'seen', which translates into fame. So he has always performed for little films he made, sang songs on tape, drawn fantasy comics featuring himself as a superhero. The film does not attribute a direct cause for his fall into mania, but the multiplicity of roles he adopted eventually appear to spill over his own personality - to the point were the dividing line between performance and direct action became completely blurred.

Johnston's life is quite strange, all the stranger for much of it having been directly recorded by himself. He blagged his way onto MTV in the 80's singing his love songs to the girl he could never have, Laurie. He won awards for best folk singer in Austen Texas, though he couldn't actually play guitar. We witness his breakdown in New York and members of Sonic Youth hunting for him across the city (it's extraordinary that they were complicit in his myth by filming this themselves). Kurt Cobain took to wearing a t-shirt with his self-drawn tape album cover.

His conflict with his family, his frustration with his own longing for fame, his failing mental health - have all coalesced into what he appears to see as an ongoing conflict between Daniel Johnston and the Devil. In this way his life could almost have been a Philip K. Dick short story from the Valis years. It has all the requisit elements. Religious fundamentalism, drugs, a lost girl, popstars and damnation.

He's a strange cat and he's still out there. The question is is the attention he's receiving encouraging his madness, or allowing for whatever talents he has to come to the fore.

Great film, go see.

[Dadzarro]

It does sound fascinating. Enjoy the show!

[Ogdred]

I have a couple of his albums. He's often compared to Wesley Willis, but this is unfair, because Johnston actually has some musical talent and a definite pop sensibility.

[hellokittykat]

What a coincidence! I hope to see The Devil and His Little Sidekick in Dallas.

[Tobias March]

I have a couple of his albums. He's often compared to Wesley Willis, but this is unfair, because Johnston actually has some musical talent and a definite pop sensibility.

I believe they're releasing a best of album beginning of May.