Jandek

The Outsider Musician known as Jandek has self produced 52 albums to date. The albums, which are a mix of country,jazz and folk have all been successfully released with minimal interviews and no biological information released about the musician or collaborators.

Jandek releases his albums through his own record label Corwood Industries. Fans can write to Corwood to obtain a typewritten catalog of his works or to purchase these works at very minimal cost. Though many of his albums depict various images of a solitary man, it was not until his first live appearance that it was confirmed the images were of Jandek himself. A review of his album Ready for the House in OP Magazine refers to him as Sterling Smith. Smith is also who endorses checks written for merchandise, and also holds the copyright to Jandek's albums at the Library of Congress. In spite of all this evidence, Corwood has never used this name in connection with Jandek. Corwood also shares the same phone number as the "Sterling Smith Corporation", which seems to be a securities and stock brokerage.

Jandek's first album Ready for the House, though obviously a solo performance was credited to a band called "The Units". It had to be re-released though after "The Units" was found to be copyrighted to another band. Although he likes to appear to be a solo act, only around 2/3 of his music is truly solo. Some have included female vocalists, other male vocalists and a variety of other musicians. Though no credit is ever given to other performers there does seem to be a hint to the identification through songs titled "Nancy Sings" or "John Plays Drums". Some of the allure of Jandek can most assuredly be tied into some of his fans. Sonic Youth, Bill Callahan and Ben Gibbard of the band Death Cab For Cutie are all fans of Jandek.

A documentary was made on Jandek by Unicorn Stencil Productions. The documentary, directed by Chad Freidrichs, and produced by Freidrichs and Paul Fehler is titled Jandek on Corwood and was made in 2004. It includes the complete unedited Spin Magazine interview. In October of that year, Jandek made what was probably his first live appearance on stage as a performer. Since then, there have been many live performances and numerous album releases, including 5 in 2005.

Fast Facts:

1. Birth Name: Sterling Richard Smith
2. Birth Date: October 2, 1945
3. Origin: Houston, Texas
4. Years Active: 1978-Present
5. First performed live in Glasgow Scotland in 2004
6. Named one of the Most Important Artists of the 1980's by Spin Magazine
7. Rarely announces upcoming appearances
8. Wrote 7 books but burned them all when they were rejected by a New York publisher
9. Record Label: Corwood Industries
10. Discography

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