Difficult listening week, Part 1: Jandek in London
In the days leading up to last night's Jandek show, his first ever in London, I'd been giving his work a little serious thought. What's it for? Why does he do it? Is the character portrayed in the music an extension of himself or merely a persona? And if the latter, how in Heaven's name can he switch that persona off & become Mr Normal with a white-collar job in the city? Last night answered precisely none of these questions, and threw up a good few more new ones.

I'd never really noticed St Giles Church -tonight's venue- before: it was just that building in between Denmark Street and The Angel. While the building itself is a little austere, it's quite substantial inside, and frustratingly inappropriate for tonight's performance. On entering, we were greeted by the organisers; former neighbours of mine, who were beaming with pride (as well they should) at actually pulling this thing off. Taking our pews next to another unexpected & familiar face (hi chiff_chaff!! What a small world it is...) we absorbed the atmosphere & ..ah.. prepared for the onslaught.

Opening act -a viola and harp improvisation duo- was a little dull, but they didn't outstay their welcome, and their sound -mostly clunks & drones- was far from abhorrent (a serious pre-show concern of mine, believe me). But it was all just marking time while we waited for Janky.

Who eventually appeared. Painfully thin, he slowly, deliberately, set up his guitar and mics, and placed his notes on the stand. For the first few moments it appeared that he was actually playing melodies; straight rhythms, even. I got quite excited: "This'll fox 'em!" But it soon became apparent that this wouldn't be the case. Indeed, having been told "anything could happen", I was rather disappointed at how similar to the records it all sounded. A uniform depths-of-despair death-bed-blues. I began looking round at the building, its architecture and its current occupants. This wasn't really what I wanted. I couldn't concentrate on what was happening onstage, or perhaps I didn't want to. The fellows sitting in the pews in front were recording the show on ProTools, and I kept finding myself following their monitor's display thinking, "hmm, that's a nice waveform". I looked across at Joni, who appeared similarly nonplussed, whereupon we both cracked up & started giggling. And, y'know, it's a church. There was plenty of stuff to distract one's attention. I would have preferred a bare black room with a solitary spot on Jandek. We were in the 2nd row; God knows what the people at the back would have got out of the performance.

Anyway, he continued making this ultra-miserable generic clanky racket for an hour or so, and then he walked off. Again, it wasn't so unpleasant that I felt I had to leave, but it was disappointingly unchallenging. Maybe I should go see Whitehouse.