THE RESIDENTS RADIO SPECIAL / EAT EXUDING OINKS

I believe this was released to act as a sort of "interview" that radio stations could play in an attempt to promote the Resident's music. A lot of the music on here comes from much earlier and hard to find releases such as their first release, "Santa Dog". These songs are framed by phony interview segments that have a supposed DJ in Houston interviewing their supposed band manager. Fortunately the interview is not a total joke, and does relate a bit of information about the band.

In the early to mid-70s the Residents form of deconstructionist rock was very fresh and innovative, unfortunately I think they lost some key member or members because their music really began to decline in quality as the band moved into the 80s. I actually got to meet a couple of the Residents in the mid-80s, while doing minor construction work at one (or more) of the member's 'residence' in San Francisco. They gave me a bunch of Ralph releases that weren't selling too well at the time. Soon after that the Ralph label folded and the Residents started having a much harder time booking shows because their popularity was dropping. I think their music just quit progressing, fortunately a lot of the music on this release is from their earlier more creative years.

The best cuts include a helium induced take on Zappa's "King Kong" featuring Snakefinger on 78 rpm guitar and an amazing collage of Beatles stuff called "Beyond the Valley". The Beatles collage is even more remarkable considering this was done before people had access to digital samplers. Some of the other earlier cuts are OK and show some Captain Beefheart influence. Unfortunately there is also some material that is either boring or outright annoying. I think the problem with the Residents is the vocals. I can handle shrieks on the sax, Sonny Sharrock sonically destroying a guitar or Sun Ra playing the piano with the back of his hands, but weird vocals just grate on my nerves and I ended up shutting down a couple of songs.

The fact that the Residents stayed anonymous during their career may have peaked curiosity in the early years, but in the long run I think it has hurt them because people like knowing something about the people they are listening to. A couple of these songs are really good, the rest is just worn out Residents shtick.

As a compilation I'm not gonna focus on the music itself that much and I'm gonna say that a lot of these supposedly rare songs at the time come with new editions of classic 70's albums which makes it less worthy a bit.

Songs are intertwined with a fake interview with the manager at the Cryptic Corporation or Ralph Records I think who takes care of THE RESIDENTS (they are walking around the studio during the interview). 30 years later I don't think there's too much obscure info in the interview; there are few lines about the upcoming "Eskimo" album and how N. Senada brought the recordings from the Arctic (well known story since it became their most famous feat), bits of small talk how THE RESIDENTS don't hate THE BEATLES but just find them boring, calling it hate would be overboard. The manager also dismisses some rumors of the time that THE RESIDENTS might be THE BEATLES. It seems that at the time (1977) public was maybe more curious about them than today, which is what made release this kind of material in the first place.

Music material is decent though, some stuff from singles and EP's, from around "Third Reich'n Roll" days and are not unlike collage songs on the albums themselves, avantgarde electronic manipulations with BEATLES songs mostly. "Satisfaction" and "Santa Dog" are for fans pretty famous so I don't think it would be interesting to them, anyone else would dismiss that banging noises than accept it as music, and I myself think that their early material is too raw. I do like "Looser=Weed" though, as it predates classic video games by a decade but I just can't remember where to put it, maybe some dungeon or Super Mario's sewer level. Real highlights are "Walter Westinghouse", a long pastoral electronic song with some talks by Walter and his wife from the song name (available on the album "Fingerprince" which reminds me a lot of KRAFTWERK's debut as ORGANISATION as it features similar avantgarde percussions that carry most of the song), and the second highlight is a rarity as I don't see it in compilations a lot and it's a cover of FRANK ZAPPA's "King Kong" with RESIDENTS doing their stuff they usually do and SNAKEFINGERS on guitar helps them out to make this wonderful tune. I'm giving it 3 stars as it is this compilation that introduced me to "King Kong" (which I don't see released on a compilation, maybe just another one), all the other songs are pretty easily available with studio albums and the interview itself isn't that interesting as it was at the time and that kind of compilation would indeed be something for collectors only.