The Residents, while working on Eskimo, had built up a bunch of ideas for songs. However, the pressing need to finish the current project, with which NONE of these ideas related forced them to be shelved until its completion. Therefore, after Eskimo's release, The Residents had a healthy dose of stuff to use for their next project.
The songs on The Commercial Album are all one minute in length. The concept is that pop music is mostly redundant. You can trim the three minute pop song down to one minute and still retain its meaning. Also, commercial jingles are one minute long. Commercials are the music of America, hence The Commercial Album, fourty one-minute pop songs.
The songs were actually recorded without regard to the time limit, and then edited down. Some of the tracks are quite impressive within the limit, especially Japanese Watercolor, Perfect Love, Loss Of Innocence, Moisture, and My Second Wife. Others could stand to be longer, but sacrifices must be made for concept.
In addition to the fourty songs on the album, the Residents recorded two more songs, And I Was Alone, and Shut Up, Shut Up!. These songs were cut from the album for being too mainstream, but were released on The Commercial Single, and were bonus tracks on the original East Side Digital CD Release.
The Residents made a series of videos for Moisture, Perfect Love, The Act Of Being Polite, and Simple Song called One Minute Movies. These videos, like all of The Residents video work, is part of the permanent collection at the Museum Of Modern Art in New York City.
Of all of The Residents early work, The Commercial Album is possibly the most accessable. It serves as a good starting point for anyone curious as to The Residents style and sound.
Tracklist:
- Easter Woman
- Perfect Love
- Picnic Boy
- End Of Home
- Amber
- Japanese Watercolor
- Secrets
- Die In Terror
- Red Rider
- My Second Wife
- Floyd
- Suburban Bathers
- Dimples And Toes
- The Nameless Souls
- Love Leaks Out
- The Act Of Being Polite
- Medicine Man
- Tragic Bells
- Loss of Innocence
- Simple Song
- Ups and Downs
- Possessions
- Give It to Someone Else
- Phantom
- Less Not More
- My Work is So Behind
- Birds In The Trees
- Handful of Desire
- Moisture
- Love Is...
- Troubled Man
- La La
- Loneliness
- Nice Old Man
- The Talk of Creatures
- Fingertips
- In Between Dreams
- Margaret Freeman
- The Coming of the Crow
- When We Were Young