YMMV / Jandek

• Archive Panic: As the Jandek On Corwood documentary summed it up, Jandek is "one of the most prolific artists in contemporary music. Almost no one has noticed." It helps that he runs his own record label. He released his 120th album, The Wizards Hour, in 2023. Even the live albums, and concerts in general, consist of brand new material. Trying to get ahold of the entire catalog and all unreleased live presentations is a real chore for those daring enough to try, but there are, in fact, some fans out there who do just that.
• Audience-Alienating Era: Jandek is an acquired taste whose typical sound is already pretty dissonant as it is, so how can it be possible to alienate even his audience? Simple — go acapella. Around the turn of the millennium, Jandek put out three albums (Put My Dream On This Planet, This Narrow Road, Worthless Recluse) that were simply his own vocals, recorded in stream-of-consciousness fashion, into a portable cassette recorder. These albums were very difficult listening, even for the seasoned Jandek fanatic.
• Awesome Music: His whole discography, at least for some people. For the general audience, the rock/blues albums released in the late 80s/early 90s, since these are the most "accessible" ones.
• Ending Fatigue: Increasingly so as the project continues, Jandek will indulge in a particularly extended jam, such as "The Electric End" from 1992's Lost Cause, a brutal noise-fest that goes on for nearly 20 minutes. Some of the acapella recordings from the turn of the millennium could surpass even that. There's a nine-hour album that was released in 2013 titled The Song Of Morgan, which is entirely instrumental and made up of solo piano, and this was shortly followed by a six-hour album released in 2014 entitled Ghost Passing, which is entirely solo piano plus theremin (and occasional vocal).
• Epic Riff: "Niagra Blues", "European Jewel", "I'll Sit Alone And Think a lot About You", "Take Me Away With You", "License to Kill", "Upon the Grandeur"...
• Epileptic Trees:
  • A common theory, which was mentioned on the Jandek on Corwood documentary, is that the man probably suffers from some sort of mental illness.
  • Before concerts started being held, one of the odder rumors was that all of his albums were posthumous - that is, he was someone who died young but left behind hours and hours of personal recordings that were never meant to be released, and then a loved one got a hold of his tapes and decided they should be shared with the public one "album" at a time.
  • The live performances also established once and for all that the principal performer of the music is the same man depicted in the album cover photos. One theory that had been in circulation was that the person in the photos was a friend or relative or even lover of Jandek.
  • In general, fans have gone to great lengths to construct some sort of biography for Sterling Smith based on clues from Jandek lyrics, right down to geographical references (the theory that he spent his youth in Rhode Island and/or Ohio is quite common).
• Fan Nickname: As a nod to the man's secrecy, that figure playing all the live Jandek shows nowadays is simply referred to as The Representative (as in, the representative of Corwood Industries, the only way he'll identify himself publicly). Some shorten it to simply "The Rep."
• First Installment Wins: Given the relative obscurity of the Jandek project, this is a loose definition of 'wins,' but Ready For The House, the debut album, is the Jandek album that gets the most visibility, more or less because it's an easy starting point for the curious.
• Funny Moments: On April 5, 2009, The Representative performed in the project's hometown of Houston for the first time at a bar called Rudyard's. Every Jandek live show is different, so what did he do for the home town audience? Get absolutely funky. (The full show was released on DVD in 2020, simply titled Rudyard's, much to the delight of fans.)

  Representative: "I'M SO HAPPY!"

  Crowd: "WEEEEE!"

  Representative: "I'M SO SAD!"

  Crowd: "NOOOOO!"

• Shocking Moments: The unannounced appearance from The Representative, for the debut Jandek live performance, at Glasgow, Scotland's Instal Festival, on October 17, 2004. Making your first concert appearance a quarter-century into your recording career is unprecedented, especially for such a notoriously reclusive figure.
• Spiritual Successor: In some ways, to The Shaggs. Both artists take a, shall we say, freewheeling approach to melody, rhythm, and song structure. The Shaggs are much friendlier, though.
• Vindicated by History: Ready for the House only sold two copies in its first two years of release, but has gone on to be a Cult Classic of outsider music. Jandek as a whole became vindicated by proxy.

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