Dirty Beaches covered the desolate "El Dorado" by Mattress at a recent Blackcat meltdown (and at other stops along the tour) and you would never guess how faithful he was being to the original. As mind-opening as the Dirty Beaches live set turned out to be, I realized that I'd have to chase this one to the root. Dismiss all the reverberations of Suicide and Roy Orbison and burrow my hands into the synth-loosened soil.
So without further fucking around, let's swivel our super awesome, spaceage Herman Miller chairs toward the CCTV. Now shut your eyes, little girl. Shut um and let's to see what we can see:
The opener from Low Blows:
Mattress :: El Dorado
Mattress :: Roll Roll Roll
From the Portland Mercury:
It wasn't mere '80s nostalgia that drew Marshall to synths. The groundwork of his appreciation for Gary Numan and Suicide was laid by his love of author J.G. Ballard, the sci-fi bard of synth-pop. Ballard spoke to Marshall's own pangs of future shock. "I'm overwhelmed by the pace culture's moving in," Marshall says with another chortle. "There no longer seems to be a zeitgeist. Or there are 1,000 tiny zeitgeists."
The Reservations (Rex Marshall's post-Mattress project) :: Live Forever
Mattress :: Bad Times
http://www.dirtybeaches.blogspot.com/
From Analog Beach (the Dirty Beaches blog):
Had the pleasure of finally meeting Rex tonight in Portland, AKA Mattress, AKA Reservations. Who was a huge influence on the conception of early Dirty Beaches back in 2006 after I saw him perform at Cagibi in Montreal all alone on a stage, crooning. Armed with tape machine back up tracks, pedals, and other machinery, he rocks the mic like a shadow dancer in the night. Incredible voice.
Mattress @ the Pink Room playing God knows what:
Mattress :: Pollution @ the Lafayette Footbridge:
From videographer's description:
On June 23rd Mattress brought his gritty, uncontrolled moves and electronic music to the railroad footbridge on 20th and Lafayette in Southeast Portland to perform his song “Pollution.” This turned into the craziest setup of any episode yet after the generator failed to start. We ended up powering the whole shoot (computer, mixer, amp, tape player and microphone) off of electricity from a car cigarette adapter. Our crack team of sound engineers — Matt Huiskamp, James Jacobsen and Clemeth Abercrombie deserve some recognition for their electronic miracle-making that day.
Mattress @ Burgerville (2 songs):
From Dusted Magazine writer's blog, Still Single:
There’s a little bit of sleaziness to the whole thing, like it could slip into some seedy, non-existent cocktail lounge or the middle of a Ween record, that really helps you notice that Marshall has written real songs and is not just dicking around with spontaneous, uninspired notions.
Now aren't you glad you let daddy have the remote?
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