RED KRAYOLA C/D

Coconut Hotel (Drag City, DC62) LP - the lost 1960s-era album (Mayo, Rick Barthelme, Cunningham lineup). Kinda like a rock band trying to play Morton Feldman.

The Parable of Arable Land - Probably my fave LP by them. Contains two bona-fide classic songs ("Hurricane Fighter Plane" and "Transparent Radiation"), a whole slew of good songs ("War Sucks," most memorably) and a bunch of "Freeform Freak-Outs" where they basically brought their Texas hippie friends into the studio to make noise. Essential.

God Bless the Red Krayola and All Who Sail With It (Radarscope, RAD 16) LP - The second studio album by the classic lineup, this one is much more structured than the first, and kinda takes a Coconut Hotel approach, but with actual songs. Mayo's wordplay really comes to the fore here.

Live 1967 (Drag City, DC92CD) 2CD - Actually, I need to listen to this again, so I can't comment.

Art & Language and The Red Krayola, Corrected Slogans (no label) LP - Mayo's first foray into resurrecting the Red Krayola after the orig. lineup imploded and his solo album (Corky's Debt to His Father) was basically buried. I think this is the first of the "exile-in-England" records. Notable for lyrics/contributions by the Art & Language collective, but probably not the easiest listen.

The Red Krayola with Art & Language, Black Snakes (Rec Rec, Rec Rec 002) LP - the first Rough Trade-y sounding record. Really good, kinda stilted punk/funk.

The Red Crayola with Art & Language, Kangaroo? (Rough Trade, Rough US 12) LP - Probably the classic of the England period.

Soldier-Talk (Radarscope, RAD 18) EP - Here the band is basically Pere Ubu, so...

The Red Krayola, s/t (Drag City, DC52CD) CD - New, 1990s version featuring (at the time) Chicago Illuminati Grubbs, O'Rourke, McEntire (I think he's on it, anyway). Some songs are recycled from older lyrics Mayo wrote in the 80s, but it's a solid rec.

Amor and Language 95 (Drag City, DC53) EP - Probably my favorite thing by the "new" RK lineup.

Hazel (Drag City, DC98) LP - Here's where they start to drag...

Fingerpainting is good, but I never bought it. There's a few holes for me, I need to get more stuff...

Coconut Hotel (Drag City, DC62) LP - the lost 1960s-era album (Mayo, Rick Barthelme, Cunningham lineup). Kinda like a rock band trying to play Morton Feldman.

The Parable of Arable Land - Probably my fave LP by them. Contains two bona-fide classic songs ("Hurricane Fighter Plane" and "Transparent Radiation"), a whole slew of good songs ("War Sucks," most memorably) and a bunch of "Freeform Freak-Outs" where they basically brought their Texas hippie friends into the studio to make noise. Essential.

God Bless the Red Krayola and All Who Sail With It (Radarscope, RAD 16) LP - The second studio album by the classic lineup, this one is much more structured than the first, and kinda takes a Coconut Hotel approach, but with actual songs. Mayo's wordplay really comes to the fore here.

Live 1967 (Drag City, DC92CD) 2CD - Actually, I need to listen to this again, so I can't comment.

Art & Language and The Red Krayola, Corrected Slogans (no label) LP - Mayo's first foray into resurrecting the Red Krayola after the orig. lineup imploded and his solo album (Corky's Debt to His Father) was basically buried. I think this is the first of the "exile-in-England" records. Notable for lyrics/contributions by the Art & Language collective, but probably not the easiest listen.

The Red Krayola with Art & Language, Black Snakes (Rec Rec, Rec Rec 002) LP - the first Rough Trade-y sounding record. Really good, kinda stilted punk/funk.

The Red Crayola with Art & Language, Kangaroo? (Rough Trade, Rough US 12) LP - Probably the classic of the England period.

Soldier-Talk (Radarscope, RAD 18) EP - Here the band is basically Pere Ubu, so...

The Red Krayola, s/t (Drag City, DC52CD) CD - New, 1990s version featuring (at the time) Chicago Illuminati Grubbs, O'Rourke, McEntire (I think he's on it, anyway). Some songs are recycled from older lyrics Mayo wrote in the 80s, but it's a solid rec.

Amor and Language 95 (Drag City, DC53) EP - Probably my favorite thing by the "new" RK lineup.

Hazel (Drag City, DC98) LP - Here's where they start to drag...

Fingerpainting is good, but I never bought it. There's a few holes for me, I need to get more stuff...

The Stephen Prina solo alb on Drag City, produced by Gastr Del Sol, is a real dog, however. Isn't there a Barthelme involved w/ the RC now?

Yeah, the first two International Artists recs are pretty spesh - would like to hear that live drag city thing (doesn't it have Fahey 'jamming' w/ 'em at one point?) The sound has always been really shitty, btw (at least on any reissue, vinyl or CD, since the early 80s, when I first scored these lps) - the first and second 13th Floor Elevators are even cruder-sounding - but it helps to make it sound more deranged and acid-y and Texas longhair, which is gd, no?

Oh, I know. 'Twas a joke. I like Dave, and I wouldn't know much about RC if I hadn't seen him with 'em, January '95 (best RC show I've ever seen with Mayo, Tom Watson, Grubbs-y and George Hurley on LIVE [i.e. not electronic drumpad] drums).

The Stephen Prina solo alb on Drag City, produced by Gastr Del Sol, is a real dog, however. Isn't there a Barthelme involved w/ the RC now?

Never heard the Prina, although he's a great guy with a great voice. It's the same Rick (aka Frederic) Barthelme on Fingerpainting as on the early stuff because Mayo took some early stuff and used it for that record. I don't think Rick's played with Mayo since the late 1960s...

Yeah, the first two International Artists recs are pretty spesh - would like to hear that live drag city thing (doesn't it have Fahey 'jamming' w/ 'em at one point?) The sound has always been really shitty, btw (at least on any reissue, vinyl or CD, since the early 80s, when I first scored these lps) - the first and second 13th Floor Elevators are even cruder-sounding - but it helps to make it sound more deranged and acid-y and Texas longhair, which is gd, no?

Yeah, Fahey's on it, but I can't recall what his contributions sound like right now. Apparently after that concert, they cut a studio record together, but the tapes were lost and are now residing somewhere in the dustbin of history.

Corky's Debt is one of my favorite records ever.

And I think Grubbs borrows just enough to still maintain his own unique voice - ALWAYS liked him. Anyone heard the new duo recording with Mats Gustafsson?

anyone have any comment on _live 1967_? since i recently saw a copy for the first time since it came out, i was wondering if it was worthwhile.

http://www.dragcity.com/bands/prina.html

i haven't heard that prina record.

how is that singles compilation?

I haven't really absorbed the singles collection and only knew the stuff I already had, but first impressions are that it covers a lot of terrain and has some great stuff on it, so it's definitely worth it.

Are there RK albums with the Epic Soundtracks/Lora Logic/Ravenstine line-up?

The singles comp. is pretty damn necessary, if you're into the Red Krayola at all.

I need the singles comp. but goddamn am I ever broke and not able to buy records these days.

that's great.

how do people rate RK's drag city records? not the reissues, the newer stuff.

Amor and Language 95 (Drag City, DC53) EP - Probably my favorite thing by the "new" RK lineup.

Hazel (Drag City, DC98) LP - Here's where they start to drag...

Fingerpainting is good, but I never bought it. There's a few holes for me, I need to get more stuff...

-- hstencil (hstenci...), November 22nd, 2002.

xpost - am let's not speculate.

http://www.dragcity.com/bands/rk.html

I remember not liking Malefactor, Ade. I don't have any of the 90s stuff except for the 14 single, though I remember liking some of the early Drag City stuff.

'The Red Krayola': One of their finest LPs, I think. Rememeber the much ballyhooed "Chicago scene" of the mid 90s? This album has all the luminaries (Grubbs, O'Rourke, McEntire, etc.) and is about the only artifact from that scene that holds up today. Mayo keep their excesses firmly in check and, for once, hook them up with memorable music. (Do you really want to listen to a Gastr del Sol LP today?!)

'Amour & Language' EP (mini album?): In the same vein as above; very tight.

'Hazel': A mixed bag. Some great stuff here, but this has always seemed to me more like a grab-bag of tunes than a unified album. It sprawls all overe the place. Great songs, though, like "Jimmy Two Bad"

'Fingerpainting': I love this record. I've never read anything good about it, though. Terrific concept: take 60s Red Krayola demos and fuck with them relentlessly. A psychic version of 'Parable of Arable Land' perhaps?

'Blues, Hollers, And Hellos' (EP? Mini album?): Their latest "new" recording. What's been the hold up since then, I wonder? Also one of their best records.

In other words, all of their Drag City stuff has something to recommend about it. Some people find 'Fingerpainting' to be extreme unlistenable shit. I disagree, but each to her/his own.

That "14" single is my favorite of the Drag City records.

oh well, thee right links at least---appalling description of Houston even after Civil Rights Act. RK had to do something alright.
http://www.houstonpress.com/music/the-mystical-origins-of-the-red-krayola-8617795

Drag City alert:

Celebrating their 50th anniversary, The Red Krayola--recently dubbed the best Texas psychedelic band in history-appear for two nights with separate concerts. Band members performing throughout the weekend include Bill Bowman (bass);Dylan Ryan (piano, drums);Tom Watson (guitar, vocals);Sandy Yang (vocals, drums); and Mayo Thompson (vocals, piano). These performances mark the band's first in New York since their celebrated sets at the Whitney Biennial in 2012.
On Friday, November 4 at 8pm, the group perform the New York premiere of a new arrangement of Corrected Slogans (1976), their first collaboration with Art & Language.
As Art & Language says: "The texts-the lyrics-of Corrected Slogans, which consist of insecurely rhyming and metrical samplings of Marxist economic theory, historiography, and social critique, are in the main, 'not at home' in the music. Together, they make a chimera. It could be said simplistically that the rock n' roll of the music carries the message of the text into circumstances where it would not otherwise be heard (on the Salvation Army principle that the Devil should not always have the best tunes). Alternatively, it could be said that the improbable détente between music and text is a disguise for both: the music clothes the text in auditory garments such that it cannot appear as itself, and the text makes a semantic demand on the music that it can only hide."
On Saturday, November 5 at 8pm, the band presents a NYC jamboree (Cooking in The Kitchen), a survey of 50 years of their music with the Familiar Ugly. Preceding the Saturday performance will be a conversation with Mayo Thompson at 5pm.

JUst enjoying Corky's Debt To His Father.
Glad I finally got this earlier this year.

RK music in this:

Art + Language at Soccer Club Club, Opening September 15th!

Soccer Club Club is proud to present selected works from two different periods of Art + Language's illustrious visual career. For one week only, multi-media works will be displayed for the first time in Chicago.

Please join us for the opening on Thursday, September 15th at 7PM! Complimentary drinks will be provided by Illuminated Brew Works and records will be spun by the Drag City DJs!
Art & Language Sings a Song

The actors of the Jackson Pollock Bar perform a script written by Art & Language in which they pretend to be Art & Language learning to sing a number of songs from an LP by Art & Language and The Red Krayola called 'Sighs Trapped by Liars' (Drag City Records). In fact, they are lip-synching to a prepared sound track that includes all their speech as well as their singing. The performance was at ZKM Karlsruhe, March 2nd, 2008.

Posters for Art & Language Paints a Picture Installed in the Style of The Jackson Pollock Bar

'Art & Language paints a Picture' is the product of a particular moment in the early 1980s and it relates to a specific body of work from that period: a series of paintings of the Artists' Studio. The text was originally written as a kind of drama - which is to say that the dramatic form was used as a mode of representation of Art & Language's idiomatic discourse. But there was no intention or expectation that the text would be performed. And it goes without saying that there was no conception that anyone might go so far as to carry out the stage directions, let alone do so while miming the words in a language foreign not only to the original text but also to the principal actors themselves, for Horn and Cieslinski are both German. Yet this is the project which the Jackson Pollock Bar have undertaken: to mime the text in English while fulfilling the practical instructions which the text contains: to be painting actors, to act painting, not under any immediately familiar guise but under conditions of bathos and desperation.
ART + LANGUAGE
September 15th - September 23rd
Soccer Club Club
2923 N. Cicero Ave
Chicago, IL 60641
312-455-1015

JUst enjoying Corky's Debt To His Father.

Yes. Worried Worried is an alltime classic.

Heads up: Mayo Thompson is performing all of Corky’s Debt to His Father for free in LA next month: https://hammer.ucla.edu/programs-events/2020/mayo-thompson

Oh sh*t, thanks! I had assumed the Corrected Slogans performance downtown in 2015 would possibly be the last time I saw Mayo perform - thrilled to have another opportunity.

(My heart skipped a beat when I saw this thread revived, not gonna lie...)

Haha, me too. Roky and Mayo in the same year would be too much.

Saw the show in NY. with every other head in the city. It was fantastic.

The group played a few shows in SF recently, which Drag City had said would be recorded for a live album... but from what I hear (from someone who attended), Mayo ended up mainly playing Bob Dylan covers!

I've seen Mayo/ Red Crayola twice. Once amazing. Once terrible. Drunk and unable to play.

Let's hope he's up to it

He didn’t play so you don’t have to worry about that.

Saw him at the Kitchen 4 years or so ago. He didn't play or sing a note. Sat at a desk reading from a detective novel with random excerpts from Jansson's History of Art and his own interpolations. At the end, he asked the audience if there were any questions (there weren't). Couldn't tell if he was trolling.
Watched some video of the Corky's Debt Band at the Cropped Out fest around that time and it was a total shambles if memory serves.
Remaining tix for LPR show were $35 + 2 drink minimum when i checked. Gave it a miss.

I was at that kitchen "performance". It was totally impenetrable. IIRC he asked if there were any questions and immediately got up and left.

This Corky's performance was great. His voice isn't what it once was but it was good enough and his physicality was entertaining. The band was aces. Don't know if he played the cropped out fest but guitar was handled by Tom Watson of Slovenly who's played with him/Red Krayola on and off since the Drag City days.

Yeah, I knew it was a gamble. At that price it was a stretch, so the uncertainty as to whether he would put a good band together to do it properly this time or wouldn't bother was decisive for me. Glad to hear he did it up. That's one of my favorite records.

The Corrected Slogans thing at REDCAT was such a pleasure... talk about albums I never dreamed I’d see performed live!

Just a reminder for you LA folks, this free concert is on Thursday: https://hammer.ucla.edu/programs-events/2020/mayo-thompson

I will be there (assuming there are still tickets left by the time I get to Westwood!). Anyone else here going?

I will be there of course (did I mention I work at the Hammer).

No, I didn't realize that! Save me a ticket if you can, ha ha...

There’s apparently a pretty long guest list, but I’m confident I’ll get a ticket!

That was amazing. I’m so happy. It was actually a pretty emotional thing, to be there and see Mayo perform those songs. The band was terrific, too.

Thank you, pgwp, for posting about it here.

https://i.imgur.com/ycp3ZOD_d.jpg?maxwidth=640&shape=thumb&fidelity=medium

Yes, it was a great show! I think Mayo’s dogs sitting in the front row was the highlight. One seemed to know all the right times to bark.

FYI, he’s doing this again in Chicago, in March:

https://www.instagram.com/p/B7ocEkRgkdw/?igshid=13vhma8ks4m7n

bought a ticket! thanks!

I should go to this

I am going to this

chicago show cancelled :(

That's too bad. I wonder if it's b/c Mayo's mobility is limited (he was using a cane at the L.A. show).

I am not going to this

I happened to visit the Drag City website, for the first time in ages; saw this featured, snapped it up - https://www.dragcity.com/products/keep-all-your-friends

I'm not the world's biggest Kangaroo? stan, but I found that 'zine entertaining and informative. A real labor of love.

The interviews (and photos) in the zine are so great... it's really a dream come true if you're a fan of this era. Highly recommended!

Just thought I'd share this, as it really made me laugh:

MAYO THOMPSON: I loved the record. I loved that sound. I think it's a very successful record and I now understand why it was not a hit. I had never thought the content would be counted as controversial. It didn't ever occur to me until when I saw my father in Houston. He had been at a golf game with his legal cronies and one of them asked, "How's your Marxist rock band going, Mayo?" I didn't know that people saw it that way. I thought people just listened to music.

Hahaha. The Rough Trade era is just about the Marxist-est thing I can think of in all of popular music.Bless.

From Drag City News"

WHAT COMES AFTER ART, MYSTERY? DO THE MATH!

“After Math begins where Art, Mystery, the first installment in Mr. Thompson’s two-part novel, left off. The chrome trader Perlat Tile has just witnessed the criminal Pablo Palbon attempt to smuggle a small erotic bronze by Pollaiuolo out of Tirana disguised as a funeral urn. The ensuing trial — described in After Math — pits the gallerist Ms. Jasmine, who wants to acquire the work legitimately, against the state of Albania, which also claims ownership of it. Written in the impeccable prose that we have come to expect from Mr. Thompson, After Math proves that what happens after a plot is foiled can be just as delightful as the action itself.”

— Michael Sanchez

A new novel from the mind of Mayo Thompson is upon all who travel with us! Best known for his work with the psychedelic band, The Red Krayola, After Math is the sequel to Thompson's 2018 novella Art, Mystery. After Math retails what becomes of the cast of characters introduced in Art, Mystery, joint and severally pursuing an erotic Rinascimento statuette attributed to Antonio Pollaiuolo, a pursuit that lands them in court. On the way, their collective and singular fates are unfolded and accounted for, the consequences of the truth of matters for them are brought to bear and a kind of rough justice is seen to have been done, as is appropriate in rough trade.

Pre-order your hardcover copy or audiobook (as read by Mayo himself!) before the publication date of September 1st.

Mayo Thompson Online:

Drag City -https://www.dragcity.com/artists/mayo-thompson

Pre Order- mayothompson.lnk.to/aftermath

Oh man. I saw him read a big chunk of this at the Kitchen. Had no idea what to expect. I don't know that anybody did. It was just billed as Mayo Thompson at the Kitchen or something. All the cool kids were there and he read and I was totally lost. I did not notice until now that Drag City published that first novel in 2018.

Cool, I gotta read these (I hate that Mayo is at an age where my heart skips when I see this thread revived).

Worried Worried

Mayo Thompson and the Corky Band are adding more shows, this time on the West Coast! With a NYC date already in place, Mayo Thompson will also be performing Corky's Debt To His Father in both Los Angeles and San Francisco later this August.

Celebrate over fifty years of Corky's Debt To His Father this summer and get your tickets fast!

TOUR DATES:

8/12/23 at (le) poisson rouge in New York, NY

8/30 at The Chapel in San Francisco, CA

8/31 at Zebulon in Los Angeles
Mayo Thompson Online:

Drag City -https://www.dragcity.com/artists/mayo-thompson

For more information and interview requests please contact:
kathryn at dragcity.com

Zebulon show doesn’t seem to be posted yet.

Mayo was awesome tonight! He seemed revitalized, compared to the last few times I saw him. And the band was hot! Such a great show.

rescheduled Corky's Debt to His Father show finally happened tonight. damn I love this album. anyone know who's in "the Corky Band"? not seeing in rudimentary searching.

It was a bunch of young-ish folks I didn’t recognize (in L.A.)

30 YEARS OF CORKY'S ON DRAG CITY
Happy 30th birthday to our reissue of Corky's Debt To His Father coming to Drag City Records! Mayo Thompson's masterpiece was originally released in 1970 - so happy 54 are also due to this album of such incredible properties that we can hardly believe it to this day. Surely one of the best records of the rock and roll age. Fortunately, LPs are in stock now, so if you haven't somehow heard of it in the last 30-50 years, you can get into its debt today!

Cassette and CD sold out, but still got MP3 and FLAC (as well as xpost LP)

Weird. Wound up with it on for the first time in ages this week. Didn't know anniversary was around now.
Just had it turn up as I went through a few cds. Pretty great.

Oops---sometimes it pays to keep up with your email. Sale is over, but alb I never heard of looks intriguing--is it good??

THE RED KRAYOLA'S JAPAN IN PARIS IN LA

Drag City's ITEM OF THE DAY program provides an amazing insider discount on a different Drag City release each day, exclusively for mail order customers! Every one of your favorite Drag City artists is eligible: it's up to our tireless selection committee, using a complex series of algorithms to pick a new one every 24 hours!

Friday items hang around all weekend and this weekend's item is Japan in Paris in L.A. by the Red Krayola, which just celebrated its 20th anniversary this year! What do you get for a 20th anniversary? This disc is the soundtrack to the Yonemoto brothers' eponymous 1996 short film, and was realized by the likes of Jim O'Rourke, Stephen Prina, Tom Watson, David Grubbs and Mayo Thompson. If it went under your radar in the time up til now, then a fresh, still-new CD is the best way to say, hey, 20!

THE RED KRAYOLA SAIL WITH CAP'N JAZZ

Los Angeles! The Red Krayola is set to return to the stage for their first performance in ten years. Mark your calendars, please: Friday, November 21, The Red Krayola opens for Cap’n Jazz at the Hollywood Palladium. That’s Mayo Thompson on guitar/vocals, Tom Watson on guitar, Bill Bowman on bass, Connor Gallaher on pedal steel, and Raul Morales on drums.

The Red Krayola are pleased to be opening for Cap’n Jazz for one incredible night. So — don’t sleep! Tickets are on sale Friday, August 22 @ 12:00 PM CT (use password SHMAPNSHMAZZ to access).

TICKETS HERE (ON SALE 8/22 @ 12 PM CST)