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Residents – Wormwood
Wormwood: Curious Stories from the Bible is a concept album released in 1998 by avant-garde musicians The Residents
The album’s purpose is to retell some of the more “curious” stories in the Bible, in order to give a greater understanding of them
Though some of the Bible is abysmal and boring, much of it is entertaining and important reading. The Residents have tackled this book in all its complexity without the responsibility of the scholar. Though many months have gone into research, the intent of the music and lyrics remain within the realm of the inspired poet.
The stories and ideas represented here are definitely in the Bible. The desire is to neither vilify nor sanctify the book, but to allow it to be humanized. For the Bible to be looked upon as spiritually uplifting is good and useful, but that view overlooks the Bible’s abundant images of plague, torture, and cruelty. It is this dichotomy that gives balance and substance to the book. Without both, the dark and the light, there is no measure of either, only the bland reassurances that pass for organized religion today.
Drawing inspiration from the likes of fellow innovators including Harry Partch, Sun Ra and Captain Beefheart, the Residents channelled the breadth of American music into their idiosyncratic, satiric vision, their mercurial blend of electronics, distortion, avant-jazz, classical symphonies and gratingly nasal vocals reinterpreting everyone from John Philip Sousa to James Brown while simultaneously expanding the boundaries of theatrical performance and multimedia interaction.
TRACKLISTING
In the Beginning
Fire Fall
They Are the Meat
Meloncholy Clumps
How to Get a Head
Cain and Abel
Mr. Misery
Tent Peg in the Temple
God’s Magic Finger
Spilling the Seed
Dinah and the Unclean Skin
Bathsheba Bathes
Bridegroom of Blood
Hanging by His Hair
The Seven Ugly Cows
Burn Baby Burn
Kill Him
I Hate Heaven
Judas Saves
Revelation