Oh, the wonders of the Internet. Somehow this one is only now hitting my radar, but boy-oh-boy is it good. Kentucky’s Norma Lee ticks off every check box on my list of what makes an outsider artist truly great: creative use of the form, provocative content, and a complete and utter lack of self-awareness. Like the Shaggs or Wesley Willis before her, Norma Lee is trying her darndest, seemingly oblivious to her own lack of talent in a traditional sense—but all the while being incredibly entertaining.

I adore her Kentucky hills accent. She sounds a bit like a brain-damaged Loretta Lynn when she sings in “He’s Swapping His Boat” about her husband being “retard from a factory.” “He’s Swapping His Boat” is Norma’s big hit. It’s essentially about giving up on every bit of joy in one’s life—specifically her poor husband who had to sell his boat to buy a tractor to clear six acres of land. If you only hear one Norma Lee song in your life, IT MUST BE THIS ONE.

He’s a middle-aged man who needs a hand to help him work his land… he’s just a swappin’ all that fun on that boat, ‘cause he done sowed his oats… now it’s time to get down to earth and put his hands to work.

Forget emo or goth. You want monotone music extolling the bleak reality of absolute depression? Here it is.

Your dreams are dead, get to work:
 

 
After the jump, hear how Norma Lee feels about Paris Hilton, and more!

 
Upon hearing the very first word uttered on Maskull’s self-titled (only) album, it’s impossible to fathom the sheer duress that the singer/composer is under. It hits you with physical force, so much that it causes five out of six friends of mine to immediately ask for it to be taken off. In fact, one friend travelling with his band on tour made enemies in the van each time he put this release on, it may have even hastened said band’s demise. Not much is known about this project/person (except that it’s a Los Angeles-based artist named Troy Maskull), but this 1997 CD on Unicorn Records is comprised of some pretty traditional homemade-sounding dark, drum machine-ladensynthpop. Until that voice cracks open.

It’s a voice that makes Peter Murphy sound like Lemmy, Ian Curtis like Edgar Broughton. Words are sung delivered in a breathy drawl where Maskull is seemingly choking back the tears and/or vomit, upfront, untreated in the mix above the synthscapes sounding completely whispered in your ear. Words like “gypsayyyyyyy” and “how would you like it to be bottled for playyyyyhhhhh” are drawn out and inflected in a way akin to Lux Interior’s self-induced vibrato minus the rhythmic element, and full of misery bordering on a complete sobbing breakdown.
 

 
Where does one dwell to understand the level of what’s going on with Maskull? Despite most people I know instantly hating this music, it is extremely intriguing and after years of hearing this album I’m not even close to “getting” it. There’s a wispy element that is evocative of a long, lonely drive on a California highway at night, seeing lights and splendor pass by that one feels alien to, not belonging, always cocooned. Yet a lot of the music doesn’t synch up to cadence of the vocals; I think of Mark E. Smith using his own voice as instrument in a chaos collage of whatever is going on musically, a looming dark cloud of force and will, but instead of outward conquering of the listener, it’s inward recession into a swirling black vortex that only Maskull can understand. He is swirling around in his own vortex emitting whimpers from a blackened universe. Given a bigger budget and studio, one only can wonder if he might have beaten Scott Walker at his own late-era game.

“Might have” being past tense, because I’m uncertain whether Troy Maskull even still exists. Rumors bubble that he was suffering from AIDS at the time of this recording, others that he is entrenched somewhere in Burbank. Until then, we must look into the blackness with no reference. No photographs, no live performances, no snapshots, no missives from the void.

Just the music…
 

 
Legendary outsider musician Jan Terri is back! Almost twenty years after the recording of her classics “Get Down Goblin” and “Losing You” (regularly voted one of the worst videos of all time, but actually one hell of a catchy track), Jan is set to release a new album next year called Wild One. “Excuse My Christmas” is the first single from the album, and screw Billy Idol, Bob Dylan, Ozzy Osbourne & Jessica Simpson, the Beatles or any of that other shit - THIS is what Christmas should be about: 
 

 
After the jump, the video for Jan Terri’s 1994 Christmas track “Rock’n'Roll Santa”...

 
Here’s a blast from the past (well my past, not yours): some kind soul has put the outsider music piece I did for the Disinformation series years ago on YouTube. I haven’t seen this clip in years and it was weird to see myself nearly ten years younger. (It’s my birthday today, so I keep trying to tell myself “You haven’t changed much!”).

Featured in this clip is the wonderful Irwin Chusid, author of Songs in the Key of Z: The Curious Universe of Outsider Music, which is well worth your time. It may even launch a few new musical obsessions.