Our Tired, Our Poor, Our Huddled Masses
 
I’ve been collecting Residents ephemera since I was in short pants, and I have an unfortunate tendency to start talking like The Simpsons’ Comic Book Guy if some poor soul mentions the band. But I’ve never seen this footage before.

Promoting their appearance at the 1983 New Music America festival in Washington, D.C.—their final performance of the Mole Show, a concert that’s come to be known as the “Uncle Sam Mole Show”—the Residents held a press conference on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, and it’s captured on this camcorder tape.
 

The Residents at Mount Rushmore, 1981
 
Given the camera’s proximity to the limo the Residents emerge from at the beginning, the video seems likely to have been shot by someone inside the band’s organization. The members of the group, or four people wearing their eyeball masks and tuxedos with miniature American flags sticking out of the breast pockets, file onto the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in silence, fiddling with their costumes, taking snapshots, and posing for photographers.

At 3:50, a spokeswoman I do not recognize introduces the band to the press. She fields questions while the Residents’ four eyes stare impassively at the handful of reporters who’ve shown up. As in some of the stories the Residents tell, nothing much happens. But it does make this old heart swell with (sniff) national pride.

God bless this mess!
 

 
Below at 1:13, hear the special version of “The Star-Spangled Banner” the Residents worked up for the Uncle Sam Mole Show (from the fan-club release Liver Music):