The Trouble With Eyeballs & Top Hats

Though it’s just over a year since I last interviewed Homer Flynn- The Residents's key graphic designer, spokesman & manager. The project has been mighty busy- following up their 50th anniversary with a European & US tour Faceless Forever (subtitled 50th Anniversary Dog Stab Tour).  Two new Resident books have been released- Faceless Forever – A Residents Encyclopaedia- a three-hundred-page text encyclopaedia, and most recently The Residents: A Sight for Sore Eyes Vol 2- a chunky coffee page book- looking at the visual side of the band between 1983 and the late 1990’s. They released their first feature film Triple Trouble, as well as a DVD/Blu-Ray release of their stage adaptation of their 1988 album God In 3 Persons…busy bees indeed!. Below is my email interview with Homer, and we cover a fair bit of ground.

M[m]: First off congratulations on the recently completed fifty-anniversary tour, which saw the project playing in the UK, Europe, and the US. Were you and The Residents generally pleased with how it went- and do have any particularly fond memories of this tour?

Homer This tour, 45 shows in three months, was quite demanding but, in general, everyone was pleased with it. For me, the highlight was the New York show where my two daughters and my six-year-old granddaughter were all in attendance. It was satisfying to have them see The Residents perform such a great show.

 

M[m]: I was lucky enough to see The Residents play their London date at The Union Chapel. One of the key things that hit home about this tour was the singing Resident- who unlike Randy had no in-between song banter/ chatter. And to be honest, came across as decidedly unnerving- with his mouth & eyeball face scarf on. What made The Residents decide to go down this more silent & sinister route?

Homer After the three Randy, Chuck & Bob tours, the members of the group were ready for a change, consequently they decided to go back to more of a traditional “group” look. They felt like the eyeball suits were perfect costumes for this show but the “singer” needed a “mouth’ to complete the look. THEY certainly considered it more Residential than sinister.

 

M[m]: Just out on from Melodic Virtue is A Sight For Sore Eyes Vol 2- the second bulky tome looking at the visual side of the project. The book opens in late 1983 with The Resident’s collaboration with Renaldo And The Loaf. What are some of your personal memories of this collaboration, and why do you think this has remained the only joint-named collab The Residents have done?

Homer The most memorable thing about Title in Limbo is that it was primarily recorded in two sessions approximately a year apart. Curiously this was the same as the two primary sessions for the Third Reich'n Roll. The reasons for both being that this was when the principles - The Residents for 3rd RnR and Brian and Dave for Tille in Limbo - could get time off from work in order to focus on the recording. The Residents' are collaborators, when either working with each other or a long list of co-workers. The main reason why there hasn't been another "joint-named" collaboration is that THEY haven't formed that kind of relationship with any other group.

 

M[m]: In the first part of the book we come to 1985’s The Big Bubble- which is the fourth part of the Mole Trilogy. We get a selection of pictures of the Big Bubble four-piece. I believe these were actors employed for the shoot- are you able to give us any more details of how they were found/ selected? And have any of them resurfaced in later years?

Homer They weren't really actors, just people who responded to a classified ad. The guy in front is Kyle Newell; he did onstage lights for The Residents on the 13th Anniversary tour. The guy in back on the right showed up at a Residents' performance in Europe a few years ago. He's German and was just in SF for a short while; I think he came to the photo session with a friend and happened to get picked.

 

M[m]: Moving through the book into its fifth chapter entitled Soundtracks & Compilations 1985- 1997. We see a few pages of images relating to the recently passed Paul Reubens aka Pee Wee Herman. Tells us a little bit about how & when The Residents first got introduced to Paul, what was he like to work with, and do you personally have any fond memories of him?

Homer I think The Residents connected to Paul through a guy named Phil Culp. Phil was the president of The Residents' first fan club, W,E.I.R.D. I'm fairly certain Phil connected The Residents to both Pail Reubens and Gary Panter, Gary was the art director for Pee Wee's Playhouse and also a friend of Paul. I was told that Paul could be quite controlling with many aspects of the show but he wasn't like that with the music, an area in which he allowed a lot of freedom. I have very pleasant memories of Paul; the most striking things about him being how different he was as Paul as opposed to Pee Wee.

 

M[m]: Moving deeper into the book, and chapter eight. And it’s a celebration of things Freak Show- this stands as one of the most multi-faceted of all the projects release thus far- with the original album, the CDrom, comic book, stage show etc? Were there any Freak Show sidelines the Resident wanted to do, but were never fully realized?

Homer Freak Show probably represents the most fully realized Residents' project with God in 3 Persons still coming on strong. I supposed I'd have to say that a Freak Show movie would be welcomed but the biggest regret for that production is that THEY never got it in front of an English-speaking audience. The month-long run in Prague was great and while the majority of the audience spoke English, it was their second language and, even then, not the American vernacular used in the performance. Subtitles were projected but in some ways they almost seemed more distracting than helpful.

 

M[m]: The book finishes off with the Disfigured Night snows in the late 1990s. For these shows, The Residents gave birth to the character of Billy- The Mute Clown. The show mainly consisted of older Residents' tunes- were there any plans ever afoot to develop this character further, and possibly base an album of new material about him?

Homer Silly Billy was a 30-minute piece created for the German PopKomm festival in Koln and was shot for the television music channel, VIVA. It was directed for TV by John Payson, a former MTV producer who was friends with The Residents, Shortly after the broadcast, the group was booked at San Francisco's Fillmore Auditorium for the first time. In addition to Disfigured Night, the band played selections from their Freak Show, Gingerbread Man and Bad Day on the Midway CD-Roms.

 

M[m]: The Book is finished off with a one-sided seven-inch featuring the track "That'll Be The Day (Baby Baby)". Which is from Sons Of The South: Buddy and Sonny- the unfinished & unreleased part of the American composer series- when does this date from & can you tell us any more about this session? And how far did work go on this album?

Homer As I understand it, Sons of the South was scheduled to be the next American Composers release. THEY had recorded a good amount of Sun Ra material and had just started on Buddy Holly when they bailed on it - I never knew exactly why - but that was around the time that THEY started God in 3 Persons and, since that album was more personal, maybe it became a more compelling project.

 

M[m]: On the subject of the American Composers series, and the parts that were released- Geroge & James( 1984) & Stars And Hank Forever(1986). When can we expect the Preserved Series release of these, will they be released as a box or separately? And can you hint at what might appear on the set(s)?

Homer I know that Cherry Red has been working on an American Composers series box set and I think it's close to release but I don't know if a date has been set yet or not.

 

M[m]: Are there plans afoot for A Sight For Sore Eyes 3- following from 1997 when Vol 2 finished?

Homer Aaron Tanner, the Sight for Sore Eyes publisher, told me that he's planning on four volumes, so it looks like there will definitely be a Vol. 3.

 

 

M[m]: Recently The Residents have released their first fully completed feature film Triple Trouble. Please could you discuss the timeline of this project?, and why did its title shift from Double Trouble to Triple Trouble?

Homer It’s a fairly long and complicated story which starts with Vileness Fats, The Residents unfinished masterpiece which they hoped would become the ultimate underground movie of all time. They worked on it from 1972-76, shooting about 50-60% of the script before abandoning the project. While its highly unique and visually arresting world eventually garnered a cult following, the project languished for almost forty years until the filmmaker Don Hardy, in the process of collecting Residents’ film and video for his documentary, The Theory of Obscurity, became charmed by the existing remnants of Vileness Fats. While the group had abandoned the idea of competing the film log ago, Hardy’s interest inspired them to write a new screenplay, Double Trouble, in which the protagonist, Randy Rose, Jr (son of the group’s lead singer at that time), became obsessed with the original Vileness Fats material only to discover that his own life, spiraling out of control, was echoing that of Lonesome Jack, the hero of Vileness Fats. But, after shooting about 20-25 min of that screenplay for a fundraising trailer and securing a small percentage of the budget, Covid shut everything down and work on the film came to a screeching halt. At the same time, Covid cancelled several Residents’ tours providing the group with unexpected free time. Given this unexpected opportunity, the group decided to write a new script, one that could be produced with the money that had already been raised.

The result was Triple Trouble.

 

M[m]: The film is directed by both yourself & The Residents. How did this work out when making the film, and did you deal with certain elements of the filmmaking & The Residents other?

Homer I am, by inclination, a collaborator, as are The Residents. Most of the ideas in the film are THEIRS but I was THEIR chief facilitator which means I took THEIR ideas and put them into a form that could be realized in the so-called “real world.”

 

M[m]: The film is a decidedly heady blend of lop-sided drama, glum psychedelia, bizarre noir-touched mystery, and low-key/off-kilter comedy. It’s mostly filmed in black & white too, which really enhances the noir tropes of the film- what made you decide to film in black & white?

Homer To move the project forward, the decision was made to use the Double Trouble trailer footage as flashbacks for Junior, the film’s protagonist. But there needed to be a way for the audience to easily distinguish between the flashbacks and what was happening in current time. Using color and B&W is a fairly common device for this type of filmmaking but since Junior was seeing his world as a distorted version of B&W, a monotone picture seemed like a good way of depicting Junior’s point of view. Also, The Residents, as well as myself, are huge fans of film noir.

 

M[m]: Talking about the films noir elements- I take it both yourself and The Residents are a fan of this moody genre of film?. What do you see as some of your personal favourite films within this genre?

Homer Sunset Blvd, Nightmare Alley, Night of the Hunter, Touch of Evil, The Sweet Smell of Success, The Third Man, Shadow of a Doubt, Ace in the Hole, Citizen Cane (perhaps not film noir but brilliant B&W cinematography); those are, of course, just a few.

M[m]: The film's lead character is Junior/ Randal Rose- a bearded, and long-haired tied-back ex-Catholic vicar who used to ride a skateboard, but now works as a plumber. He’s played wonderfully by Dustin York, who really manages to sell the more unbalanced side of the character well. How did he come to the project, and was he your first choice?

Homer When Don Hardy was raising money for Theory of Obscurity, one of the ideas he came up with was selling appearances of fans in Randyland, Randy Roses’s internet series. Dustin York was one of the people who paid for a Randyland cameo. The Residents were so impressed by Dustin’s performance, they asked him to play the part of a butcher who had a near-death experience in one of the short films they played during one of the Randy, Chuck and Bob tours. They were blown away by Dustin again and wrote first, the Double Trouble, then the Triple Trouble, screenplays with him in mind.

 

M[m]: Randal’s main companion is a drone with a female talking digital sprite attached to it. Who voiced over this character, and did it fully form/ or did it develop over time?

Homer Cherry was voiced by my daughter, Isabelle Barbier, who also plays the part of the young woman confessing to Junior at the start of the film. The idea of the drone was first suggested by Jason Long; Jason is a screenplay teacher who acted as a consultant on the film. He suggested the drone in a more simplistic form; I mentioned it to The Residents and they loved the idea, so we took off and ran with it. It’s Isabelle’s voice and the animation by Nathan Moody that makes the character work.

 

M[m]: Weaved into the plot are elements of The Resident’s first/ unfinished film Vileness Fats- do you think this could ever be finished with new elements/ additions? Or is there not enough of surviving footage to do this?

Homer The Residents decided some time ago that Vileness Fats will never be completed. The idea was entertained several times over the years but THEY eventually realized that a lot of its charm is due to naïveté and that’s a quality that’s impossible to recreate years after the fact. In actuality Double Trouble and then Triple Trouble were the group’s way of completing Vileness Fats.

 

M[m]: At the moment the film only has a stateside Blu-ray & DVD release on Eternal Flame. Will it be getting a euro/ UK release?.

Homer I feel confident that it will eventually happen, but so much has been going on during the last year (touring, God in 3 Persons performances, the completion of Triple Trouble, work on a new album, etc), not much time has been put into Triple Trouble’s distribution, buy It’s currently being worked on.

 

M[m]: The film's soundtrack appeared late last year, and it has a rather unusual layout- taking seven shifting soundscapes. What made The Residents settle on this format?

Homer THEY thought this format made for a more interesting album than simply listing or scoring the individual soundtrack pieces which are fairly fragmented.

 

M[m]: Did the soundtrack develop organically with the film- or did The Residents come to the project with some already composed music?

Homer The soundtrack was composed after the film was completed. There are a few pieces from Whatever Happened to Vileness Fats, but otherwise, it was all written for the film.

 

M[m]: The other recent Blu-Ray release is the live performance of God In Three Persons- which takes in a recording from May 2022 when The Residents played two nights at Presidio Theatre Performing Arts Centre, San Francisco, California. I believe this show got its first playing in 2019 in France- could you discuss how the presentation of the show changed/ developed from when it was first played?

Homer The performance in France was part of a workshop and installation of Residents' art at an art center in Bourges, France. The performance was done with a group of students and was mostly an excuse to start working up the material, as opposed to an actual theatrical performance like the ones at the MoMA in 2020 and at the Presidio Theater. There was another similar event as part of a museum installation in Rotterdam in 2018.

M[m]:For the show on the release The Residents are joined by Sivan Lioncub- Volin & chorus, and Greg Stephens- Trombone- which gives a different edge to the material. How did these two become involved in the project? And where they allowed to add their own elements/ additions to the playings of the tracks?

 

Homer The arrangements for God in 3 Persons were done by bandleader Johua Raoul Brody and were based on the original album. Richard Mariott was the trombone player on the album and to the best of my knowledge, Greg Stephens's parts were based on that. All parts were written out so I don't think either Sivan or Greg improvised much, if any, of their parts.

 

M[m]: Are there any other albums you’ve considered converting to a live setting?- I know Eskimo was on the cards at one point. And if so how far along did these get in planning?

Homer To me almost any Residents' album could be reworked in a theatrical setting but Wormwood, Tweedles and Voice of Midnight are ones that stand out in that way. Eskimo has been talked about forever and is still under discussion with a performance under consideration for Barcelona in two years - more or less.

 

M[m]: Can you give us of any other projects The Residents are presently working on? And any news/hints of a new album?

Homer The Residents are working on a new album, tentatively titled Dr Dark. They're also working on another film documentary with a well-respected French filmmaker. This one will be more of an art doc, and very different from Theory of Obscurity.

 

Thanks again to Homer for his time and efforts with the interview. Drop by here for all things Residents, you can pick up a copy of The Residents: A Sight for Sore Eyes Vol 2 here, and stateside both Triple Trouble & God In 3 Persons are available via MDV here.

Photo credits-  The first in-picture interview is from the London Union Chapel gig taken by R Batty, the other pictures are copyrighted Poor? No! graphics, and are used with  permission