Tweedles(2006)OverviewTracksLyricsStories
As we discovered in The Godfather, there are offers one cannot refuse.
In the fall of 2005 The Residents got such an offer.
A young gentleman in Romania had built himself a state of the art recording studio and had the wild dream of asking his favorite band, The Residents to try it out. As it happened, The Residents' own studio was undergoing a process known as seismic upgrade. In other words, strengthening the building to withstand a major earthquake. The group could not use the facility for a year.
Fate had again stepped in and The Residents saw no reason not to have a look at the studio. The group boarded a jet for Bucharest in early 2006 with the idea of recording a couple of tracks while taking a nice vacation in a country they had never visited. Since no ideas had been formed in advance as to what would be recorded, they felt it was appropriate to record everything during the trip, including the jet's take off.
However, once on the plane and bored, ideas started coming and soon The Residents were roughing out an idea for a whole album.
The group understood that their ultimate destination was not Bucharest, but a town 400 kilometers away, Hunedoara. Hunedoara was in the area of Romania known as Transylvania, historically the home of Count Vlad III, fictionalized by Bram Stoker as the vampire Dracula. Count Vlad III had even been imprisoned in Hunedoara for seven years. By the time they landed in Bucharest, they had outlined an album about a "vampire" of sorts. Not a Bela Lugosi vampire, but one that feasted on broken hearts; a man who devoured the romantic emotions of others as a source of power. A man who took the stance that anyone who would stoop so low as to love him was not worth loving in return.
As it turned out, the group fell in love with Hunedoara and as they produced their story of sexual compulsion, their impromptu recordings of street musicians, church bells and a small traveling circus soon made it into their electronic pieces. The circus had especially captured their attention with its strong Felliniesque presence. Additionally, The Residents product manager at Mute happened to be Romanian and he had connections with classical musicians in Bucharest. As a result, The Film Orchestra of Bucharest interpreted some of the group's electronic compositions and these recordings were also integrated into the new work.
These compositions tended to focus less on harmonics and melody than their previous effort, Animal Lover, and could only be described as a patchwork of new and often exotic textures. For the group, this patchwork was the reflection of an often chaotic, but uniquely immersive experience.
Dreams
Almost Perfect
Mark Of The Male
Life
Isolation
Stop Signs
Elevation
Forgiveness
Insincere
The Perfect Lover
Brown Cow
Sometimes
Ugly (At The End)
Keep Talkin'
Shame On Me
Susie Smiles
Expand allDreams
Conceived in hope and what could be
Dreams are delicate and free
But bitter is the aftertaste
Of a dream that dies
Own a dream and own today
...and own today
My memories are missing me
My memories are missing me
I disappeared without a trace
Like a sympathetic face
Inside a swarm of bees
Almost Perfect
In her favorite dream
Every cunt's a queen
In his favorite dream
Every cock's a king
I live a life of solitary sweetness
It's a life that's simple and clean
All I really want to do is please them
All I ask is stay in the dream
All I ask is stay in the dream
All I ask is stay inside my dream
What's your favorite dream?
I live a life of solitary sweetness
It's a life that's simple and clean
All I really want to do is please them
All I ask is stay in the dream
All I ask is stay in the dream
All I ask is stay inside my dream
But they never stay inside the dream
Mark of the Male
Mark my feral finger when
Flesh arrives and it ascends
Under garments free and wild
Living life unreconciled
Life
Everything is hungry
Everything wants more
Everything will bleed you
Then beg for an encore
Everything is hungry
Everything wants more
Everything will beat you
And forget why you are sore
Everything is hungry
Everything wants more
Everything will eat you
If you don't eat it, of course
Everything repeats itself
Everything's been done
Life is just a struggle
Between nothing and no one
Isolation
Isolated like a stain
Isolated like a shame
Isolated like a brain
Without a sense of wonder
Isolated like a cage
Isolated like old age
Isolated like a rage
Detesting its own hunger
Stop Signs
He sees a sign from God
He sees a sign from God
He sees a sign from God
But it breaks my heart
He sees a sign from God
He sees a sign from God
He sees a sign from God
You're taking it too hard
He sees a sign from God
He sees a sign from God
He sees a sign from God
It 's time for me to part
It 's time for me to part
It 's time for me to part-y
Elevation
When you hear the clatter
Of the golden ladder
Remember that it's sadder
Going down
Forgiveness
Forgive me mother before you die
Forgive me please, I cry
And I will cover up my head
And paint my penis red
Insincere
Something soft and indiscreet
Something insincere but sweet
Making mildly sucking sounds
Sees its shadow on the ground
The Perfect Lover
I listen to my lover sigh as she entwines me
I listen to my lover cry because she blinds me
I listen to my lover laugh as she defines me
With every breath I wait for her to find me
Brown Cow
We put the old brown cow to sleep
Whacked her on the head
Then went to a picture show
And left her in the shed
The movie was a comedy
But I didn't laugh
So we bought a butcher knife
And a toy giraffe
He said that he loved me and
He told me that he cared
He said that he loved the way
I walked and I was weird
Now he hovers over me
And motions in the air
He's pointing at the oven
And I'm getting really scared
Sometimes
Sometimes you sit upon the brink
Your mind consumed with pointless pink
And so you simply take a drink
And everything's okay
Sometimes your jolly johnson shrinks
And every mucous burger stinks
And so you simply take a drink
And everything's okay
Ugly (At the End)
Ugly at the end
Ugly at the end
It's lovely when it blooms
But ugly at the end
Keep Talkin'
Keep talkin', keep talkin', keep talkin' ...
Keep talkin' - I should've known!
Keep talkin' - Where did you go?
Keep talkin' - Tell me more!
Keep talkin' - I need to know!
Keep talkin', keep talkin', keep talkin' ...
Keep talkin', keep talkin', keep talkin' ...
Keep talkin' - I'm over here
Keep talkin' - You disappeared!
Keep talkin' - No! It's not clear
Keep talkin' - Are you a queer?
Keep talkin', keep talkin', keep talkin' ...'
Keep talkin', keep talkin', keep talkin' ...
Keep talkin' - AN' TALK TO ME!
Keep talkin' - I disagree!
Keep talkin' - NO! I don't see!
Keep talkin' - Huh? Excuse me?
Keep talkin', keep talkin', keep talkin' ...'
Keep talkin' - BUT NOT TO ME!
Shame On Me
It's a shame
You know it's such a shame
Here I am - looking down
Stuck inside a frozen frown
When I coulda been a clown
It's a shame
You know it's such a shame
I'm all alone in a lonely crowd
Me'n my dick just hangin' out
When I coulda been a clown
It's a shame, it's a shame
It's a shame, it's a shame
Funnier than legless lepers singing "Born to Lose"
Funnier than Jesus crucified in high heel shoes
Funnier than Adolph Hitler butt fucked by baboons
Funnier than obese babies popping like balloons
Funnier than masturbating midget residue
Funnier than the Pope's penis being barbecued
Is the goofy sense of humor
That you never lose
Even though your drunken daddy
Loved you like a bruise
...on your big toe
...and on your ear lobe (is ear lobe funny?)
...and your spleen and your gizzard
...and your butt ...lots of bruises on your butt
...and bruises on your nose and your forehead and your knee and your pinkie finger ...BRUISES ON YOUR PINKIE FINGER! HOW ABOUT THAT!!
He said he wished his kisses could
Erase the traces of childhood
Elevating his manhood
Hour after hour
But he realized too late
That the finger of his fate
Led him to a life that wasted
Hour after hour, hour after hour
Life is just an open door
And nothing seems to matter more
Than someone worth waiting for
Hour after hour, hour after hour
Casanova's frowning
When no one is around him
The clown in Casanova is ...crying
Susie Smiles
Susie smiles like a movie
Susie smiles all the time
Susie smiles and I'm useless
Susie smiles and I'm blind
Sandy smiles like a movie
Sandy smiles all the time
Sandy smiles and I'm useless
Sandy smiles and I'm blind
Sonny smiles like a movie
Sonny smiles all the time
Sonny smiles and I'm useless
Sonny smiles and I'm blind
Simon smiles like a movie
Steven smiles all the time
Stacy smiles and I'm useless
Sally smiles and I'm blind
Skipper smiles, too
DREAMS
In my moments of reflection, often in the twilight time between sleep and consciousness, I contemplate my behavior.
I'm ...I'm not terribly judgmental about myself - I do what I do with no second thoughts, but there is one strange thing ...one curious side effect of my obviously obsessive behavior. As ...as I look back ...I'm usually not there. Oh, something is there - a dark shadowy form interacting with my current lover, but it's not me. Other details stand out with complete clarity, but the me-figure, my stand-in, my ...my Doppelganger, is blurred - almost as if it has no edge, only a fuzziness, gradually congealing, as the eye moves inward, into a gooey, amorphous, and thick black liquid ...like a tar baby in the sun.
I think about him a lot.
ALMOST PERFECT
It's almost like I have this power ...the power of dreams. I see people, it really doesn't matter if it's a man or a woman ...and I can just feel their dreams, and then I become their dream. I guess it's kind of like hypnotism.
...I make them see me the way they want me to be. Some people like cruel lovers, some like giving lovers, some like submissive, some like strong.
The diversity of desire is endless.
But the beauty of it ...the exquisite beauty, is the world I create ...it's a perfect thing ...that world ...a magic place, a special place, a just-the-two-of-us place. Sometimes, it feels like it could go on forever, but it never does. No matter what they say in the beginning, no matter how much they love their husbands, or their boyfriends or their wives or kids or whatever ...they eventually want more ...more than I can give ...more than they should have ...and it's over ...it's over ...over
MARK OF THE MALE
There's no better feeling than a hard on. I guess the closest thing is the feeling of holding a gun, but instead of being cold and rigid, it's a gun made out of hot meat ...your own flesh and blood. It's warm and it tingles and somehow it's hard AND soft at the same time ...and it's yours ...it's your power ...it's your gun.
And what do you do with a gun? ...you shoot it. You look for a nice target, you take aim and you squeeze the trigger ...and that fucking gun goes BLAM! There's nothing like it. I guess the only thing that would make it better would be if you could put another bullet in it and just shoot that fucker again ...and again ...again.
Oh well, nothing is perfect.
LIFE
I'm not beyond criticism. There have been a few people, mainly my mom and few disgruntled cast-offs, who have attacked my so-called "values" They say I'm too selfish ...too apathetic ...too hedonistic and self indulgent ...it's bullshit. I mean ...I don't HAVE any values ...I just AM ...and I just DO ...and I DO WELL.
But still, I think about this criticism and how it always seems to come from those so much less successful than me. And I ask myself - where does my success some from? Why am I different ...and it's such a simple answer: DESIRE ...I want ...I need ...and so I take. I take from those who would take from me - I'm just a little better at it ...just a little better at it ...a little better ...better
ISOLATION
I watch other people, too - especially the families. It seems like condescension could come easily for a person like me, but ...it seldom does. Sure, I'd like to feel that my life is more important than theirs, but somehow it's not so easy.
I see the mothers intimately touching their children, the friends joking around in a bar, the old couples holding hands on a park bench. Sometimes I think ...I really don't have any friends, but then I wonder ..When I was in high school I enviously watched all the people standing by their lockers, laughing, teasing, sometimes yelling at each other, but ...but completely absorbed in social contact. What could possible be so important? I watched from the outside, looking in ...and wondered. But then I had my first girlfriend, and I became part of the club - I learned their secrets ...and the secrets were ...nothing. Empty, vapid chatter, filling the air with self serving noise. I loved my discovery, but now ...now I wonder when I left the club ...and if I was ever really in it?
STOP SIGNS?
Somehow, I always see the stop sign first. Why is it, I wonder? What gives me the clarity, the insight, the knowledge that it's time to move on. At first, it's always the little things. The cute winks that soon become self-conscious and contrived ...the messy hair that once seemed to be so refreshingly "natural" ...the hips that move so seductively beneath a dress that, once revealed, somehow droop, spread, and quiver, motivating my eyes to look away ...but worst of all ...easily, worst of all are the impassioned pleas, the OH BABYs and the FUCK MEs that sooner or later sound so pat, so programmed, so totally lacking in the passion they work so hard to imitate.
I saw this movie one time called "Imitation of Life." The movie was kind of shitty, but I love the title.
ELEVATION
Sometimes I wonder how it feels to be a predator. I even like the way the word rolls off my tongue: predator, predator, pre-da-tor. Circling my prey, searching, watching, its movements, looking for a vulnerable moment, then pouncing ...and finally the ultimate feeling of of blood flowing around my teeth, down my chin and onto the ground below. The moment of power, the moment of total control, the moment that life leaves - at my command.
Of course, it's boring after that. Boring, predictable and mundane. Their apartments are all the same, there's always the same pathetic look of confusion, the same pitiful attempt to recognize the person they fucked night before ...that perfect person ...that dream ...that love of a lifetime ...but he's gone. I got what I want. They're no longer worth the effort.
FORGIVENESS
What if, after years of avoiding them, you stepped on a crack in the sidewalk and then ...and then found out your mother had fallen, at like ...exactly the same time, and broken her back. Of course, nobody would believe it ...how can anyone actually believe that stepping on a crack could have any effect on anything, except maybe a few ants on the sidewalk, but how could you not think it? And how could you not feel responsible, on some level ...how could you?
We are all responsible for each other, aren't we? (How can I be saying this?)
INSINCERE
Sometimes, when I'm quiet and by myself, I do remember what it's like to be on the hunt. I usually manage to eliminate myself from those memories ...I think it must be some kind of self protection device, but occasionally I do coldly recall the complete lack of sincerity it takes to be successful ...the total dedication to the concepts of deception, manipulation and personal gain.
The memory thing is kind of like eating ...we don't bother to remember what it felt like eating that steak when we were really hungry ...slicing into the charred flesh and watching, as the ruby juice flows from the fresh incision, and out onto the otherwise pristine plate.
And the same single minded dedication that goes into eating that steak duplicates itself in the pursuit of physical pleasure. Hunger and sexual gratification ...is there anything else? Steaks and orgasms ...how empty life would be without them.
THE PERFECT LOVER
I guess the coldness implied by my calculated position in life must be disturbing to some people ...and maybe the lack of romantic pretense used to disguise or excuse my behavior is not normal, but it is honest ...more honest than most people can deal with, but still, it doesn't make me immune to romance ...I am human, and I do have my fantasies ...fantasies that I normally repress ...what good are they, after all ...but I can't deny them.
Usually, because I'm a man, I guess, these fantasies gravitate towards a female form and occasionally, I do allow them to run free ...dancing in slow motion through the flower fields of my imagination. I know it sounds silly, especially coming from someone with such a cunning and cutthroat attitude towards life, but sometimes I feel like nothing would make me happier than holding hands with a beautiful woman on the beach, watching the sun slowly descending into the pinks and purples of a perfect sunset.
Disgusting isn't it?
BROWN COW
When you've had as many lovers as I have, a certain blurring becomes inevitable. This one merges into that, a she becomes a he, and the he blends into the blobby mass of everybody. But some do stand out ...eventually becoming the white thumb in the black palm ...the albino in the beam of a flashlight. Marie was like that ...I guess it was her innocence that set her apart. I ...I don't normally hold innocence in such high esteem ...everyone has it and everyone loses it ...and sometimes it's my job to hasten that loss.
As one might expect, coming to grips with the real ME ...as opposed to the dream ME, is an inevitable step in most of my "encounters." There's always a slight period of disillusionment, but they eventually get over it ...or not ...whatever ...but Marie ...we were standing in the kitchen and ...it was almost like she melted ...one moment she was staring at me with a look of confusion and in an instant she was lying at my feet on the floor ...as you can imagine, the drama thing really doesn't work on me, but this was different ...I stood there looking at her, until ...hesitantly reaching out, I watched her eyes as they followed the length of my arm and moved over towards towards the stove ...she had the oddest expression ...and then, staring at the oven door, she began to talk ...about the cow ...the old brown cow and the day the cow died ...and then she began to blubber like a baby ...like that goddam cow was her pet bunny and fucking Charles Manson had just bit its head off ...it really freaked me out ...I think about her all the time.
SOMETIMES
Sometimes life is not so sweet. Sometimes nothing works. Sometimes I even understand conspiracy theories, as idiotic as they are, because sometimes it feels like life is working against you and it's being so successful that somebody has to be responsible.
...yeah, sometimes it feels like there's a whole gang of them working against you ...the fuckers ...they're too goddam chicken to take you on one at a time, so they hide away in their little rooms and plot and scheme and work like hell to bring you down ...stupid isn't it.
As if anybody cared enough about anybody else to waste their time formulating mindless conspiracies ...life is not that complicated, but it sure as shit doesn't work sometimes. And that's why God made alcohol ...especially bourbon.
UGLY (At the end)
So my mom died. It wasn't pretty ...yeah, it was about as far from pretty as you can get and still be on the goddam planet. I couldn't stop thinking about it, though, because as much as she criticized me and my "lifestyle," I kept thinking that her life and death was just like one of my "relationships" - to use a word I hate.
Life ...life is just so lovely when it starts and the expectations are so unlimited, like at the beginning of a vacation or buying a new car ...just like my mom when I look at her baby pictures, with her mother beaming and her dad so proud ...then it changes ...and changes ...and changes some more ...gathering more and more momentum as it rumbles and stumbles down the path to ultimate ugliness ...of course with relationships, when it gets ugly, I just move on ...there's always another one ...but with people, it gets ugly and then you die.
She was a bitch, but I miss her.
KEEP TALKIN'
It really wasn't my fault ...it really wasn't ...somehow I knew you wouldn't believe me ...This guy came along and he needed my help. I don't know, he said it was an emergency ...a gas leak or something ...no I have no idea why he asked me ...well, I did notice him staring at me while I was having a coffee ...well, yeah, we had to go up to his apartment. Like I said, he needed my help ...what was I supposed to do? WHAT WAS I SUPPOSED TO DO? ...look, you're paranoid, you know it and I know it and no matter what I say, you'll find something wrong with it ...besides I DIDN'T DO anything ...no, nothing of course not ...trust me...so then I was coming, I mean coming to meet you ...I was just a little late and there this chick with a flat tire, well actually TWO flat tires ...well, yeah, she WAS kind of cute, but look, she had these flat tires and she was just sitting there by her broken car ...it was all droopy on one side with two flat tires ...I think she was crying, yeah, she was crying so I had to stop.
Then I sprained my ankle changing her tire ...it really hurt ...and this nurse stopped to help me ...she could see how bad I was limping ...oh yeah, it's a lot better now ...and so she helped me ...well, we went back to my place, I mean where else would she take me ...Look, it's none of your business if anything happened or not ...either you trust me or not and nothing I'm going to say is going to make any difference ...I'm sorry ...look, I had no idea being in a relationship would be this complicated, what you think is REALLY IMPORTANT to me and I've never felt this way about anybody before, EVER! ...besides, I had jury duty ...I overslept ...I was up too late last night and just couldn't get up ...okay, I know it's not the first time ...if you really loved me you wouldn't pull this kind of shit ...I'm afraid I'm getting too involved with you.
SHAME ON ME
So now you know my little secret. I think I could have done it. I really think I could've ...but ...I wouldn't have been one of those happy clowns ...I hate happy clowns ...I'd be a sad clown ...a droopy clown ...a clown with class.
...okay, I know, ...I blew it ...I'll never make it as a clown ...but, hey! I can still give you a little treat. I'm gonna tell you my clown name ...are you ready? TAA TAA! Presenting THE GREAT TWEEDLES! Cool, huh? You see when I was a kid, my brother and me, we called 'em our tweedles ...our dicks, that is. We called 'em our tweedles. ...so, THE GREAT TWEEDLES!! ...and here's a little sample of Tweedles's! act ...okay, all eyes are on the center ring ...he stands alone in a spotlight ...and sings.