Marc Plainguet – Mr. Skull’s Magical Eyeball Mystery Band [2021 remaster]

Marc Plainguet
Mr. Skull’s Magical Eyeball Mystery Band [2021 remaster]
2001 Corpqii Music

Marc Plainguet produced, engineered, arranged, and
performed all the music and vocals except…

Chris Yambar performed the vocals of the “Birthday
Boy,” vocals on “Hello Skinny,” and painted the cover art.

1. Birthday Boy
2. Die in Terror
3. Hello Skinny
4. Constantinople

This was kind of a surprise release (for me, at least). The original release of this was 2001. This is a 4-song tribute ep for The Residents, originally credited to Marc Plainguet and Chris Yambar. Of course, if you are familiar with Plainguet’s music, this still fits in with his style. I don’t know a lot about The Residents, so I don’t know how close they come to the originals or not. But, if you are a fan of Plainguet, you will still like this ep.

Marc Plainguet – Marc Plainguet

Marc Plainguet
Marc Plainguet
1989 Corpqii Music

1. In The Beginning…
2. Hole In My Body
3. Afterlifestyles
4. Hippocritical Oath
5. Glenn’s Being Moody Today
6. Barbie’s Lament
7. Blood & Fire (Parts 4 & 5) *
8. Psychedelic Catnip
9. Godzilla Vs. The World
10. Olympics For The Dead
11. The Repeated Course
12. Skeletons
13. The Church Of Holy Profits
14. La Valse Surreal
15. Spongebrain
16. The Final Dream (Excerpt)

First of all, I just have to point out that I did not actually get my hands on a read copy of this compilation. Apparently only 25 copies were made for friends of Plainguet’s. But I did find a track list online a long time ago, so I took the tracks I bought from the recent remasters and made my own approximation of the tape. I mean, playlists are the modern mix tape, right? Anyways, it is interesting how well these songs from different recordings with different styles also work together as a compilation. An eclectic experimental compilation, but a pretty cool one regardless. A few notes on a few  songs:

• “Blood & Fire (Parts 4 & 5)” is actually the 4th and 5th “movements” from “Blood & Fire Part 1.” I had printed out some “REMarc(s)” a long time ago, and those contained notes on the different “movements” of Blood & Fire. So I cracked open Audacity and hopefully got the trimming right.
• “Godzilla Vs. The World” is listed as “Godzilla Vs. The World / The Final Battle” on Strange Tales. I don’t know if “The Final Battle” was accidentally left off of the track listing or if it was edited off the actual song on this comp. I decided to edit it off just in case.
• There were actually four unreleased songs on this tape (“Hole in my Body,” “Godzilla Vs. The World,” “The Church of the Holy Profits,” and “Spongebrain”) at the time it came out (1989) that were released the next year on Strange Tales. I don’t know if these were early versions or not, but I had to use the versions from Strange Tales regardless because that is all I had.
• I don’t know which version of “Skeletons” was used here, so I went with the slightly newer version from Demovision.
• I couldn’t find any notes about what part of “The Final Dream” was used for the excerpt, so I played the entire 28 minute track.

Missing Information: Was there a cover for this? What did it look like?

Marc Plainguet – The Curiosity Shop

Marc Plainguet
The Curiosity Shop
1998 Corpqii Music

1. Why Hospitals?
2. Armor of God
3. Don’t Puke On Me (Excerpt 1)
4. Oblivion
5. Living Water
6. Sugar Halos
7. The Industrial Blues
8. Who Knows?
9. Don’t Puke On Me (Excerpt 2)
10. Rewind
11. Burned Scalded Mutilated Radiated Crushed
12. 73 Seconds
13. Friendship (In 4 Movements)
14. Action Movie Soundtrack
15. Don’t Puke On Me (Excerpt 3)
16. Francine
17. Why Hospitals? (Disabled Mix)

So the next re-issue by Plainguet is this 1998 odds and ends collection. This version is a “heavily edited” version, meaning that several songs he didn’t like were left off. Since these were often left over songs to begin with, that is understandable. On the other hand, you do get one song added: “Oblivion” was the one new song from 1996’s Alt.Music.Marc-Plainguet.Best-Of compilation. This is a rap song I believe – or experimental rap. “Metallic-Like Planets,” “Somewhere…,” “Outside Time,” “Brainthrob Headache Medicine,” “The Church of Holy Profits Love Line,” and “What I Want” were left off. Also, from what I can tell “Living Water” is “Living Water 1” from the original release, so we also didn’t get “Living Water 2.” I would have really liked to have heard “The Church of Holy Profits Love Line,” because apparently that was the  message you got if you called the number in the Strange Tales booklet. Anyways, this is probably more eclectic than other releases,  but if you are a fan of Plainguet… this is what you want. Songs like “The Industrial Blues” are just awesome – lamenting buying a Culture Club record, sampler machines not working, etc. I hope to get my hands on the original cassette someday, but this is still 17 songs even after being pared down! So the real question: is this it for the re-issue collection from Plainguet? Electric Campfire Songs would be cool, or even just the new versions of songs from Alt.Music.Marc-Plainguet.Best-Of. We shall see what happens next.

Marc Plainguet – Live at Cornerstone ’90

Marc Plainguet
Live at Cornerstone ’90
1991 Corpqii Music

Produced and performed by Marc Plainguet

Side 1:

1. Godzilla vs the World
2. Armageddon
3. Barbie’s Lament

Side 2:

1. Afterlifestyles
2. Spongebrain
3. The Lord’s Prayer

Can experimental music really be performed live? Sure can, especially if you can get help from Chris Yambar and other members of your artistic community. This tape was released after Strange Tales and the self-titled rare compilation tape, but also the same year as Electric Campfire Songs (which may not get a re-issue? Hope I am wrong on that front). If I am reading the discography right, 1991 was the last year for Plainguet releases until the best-of compilation Alt.Music.Marc-Plainguet.Best-Of in 1996 and then the extra songs/comp songs compilation The Curiosity Shop in 1998. Anyways, you get two songs from Strange Tales here (“Godzilla vs The World” and “Spongebrain”), two songs from Amebas in Love (“Barbie’s Lament” and “Afterlifestyles”), and two songs not on any other tape (“Armageddon” and “The Lord’s Prayer”), all recorded live at Cornerstone Festival in 1990. The crowd seems to be loving it – this is one of those live recordings that make you wish you could have been there.

Marc Plainguet – Strange Tales

Marc Plainguet
Strange Tales
1990 Corpqii Music

Marc Plainguet – All vocals; keyboards; drum programming; sampling; loops; water bottle and metal percussion; tapes; CD/8-track tape/turntable manipulations; voice synthesizer programming; wrote the story; co-wrote the activities for each chapter; performed all layout of the book; created the “Electric Brain” logo on the cover as well as illustrations on pages 3, 19 and 32; and colored all the illustrations

Chris Yambar – All illustrations not by Plainguet, the Prayboy logo, and accompanying Church of Holy Profits money tracts; wrote the introduction and co-wrote the activities for each chapter.

Mitch Coughlin – Vocals and co-wrote “Hell Sweet Hell,” intro vocals and wrote/ performed guitar on “The Church of Holy Profits,” and wrote/performed “Boy & Girl In Love.”

Chuck Greenland – Modified Casio on “Godzilla Vs. The World” and “Half Past Nine” (modified by Richard Marriott).

Side 1:

1. Prologue / Strange Tales
2. They Saved Gidget’s Brain!
3. Meanwhile…
4. Hole in my Body
5. Spongebrain
6. Something’s Going On

Side 2:

1. Hell Sweet Hell (performed by Eddie Ego & The Love Sticks)
2. It’s Showtime!
3. The Church of Holy Profits
4. Suddenly…
5. Descent into the Abyss
6. Godzilla vs the World / The Final Battle
7. Boy & Girl in Love
8. Half Past Nine / Strange Tales (reprise) / Epilogue

Whew! finally getting caught up with my Plainguet re-issues. I already have Live at Cornerstone ’90, but that one was released after this one, so I will wait to review it until after this one. As a follow-up to 1989’s Surrealism for Beginners, it took an even more ambitious turn. It came with a whole book that had a chapter for each story, as well as rubber gloves and “Church of Holy Profits Money Tracks.” Apparently there was a CD re-issue that led to a website and a recorded sermon? I wonder if they put those back online? I found the old web address, but the Wayback Machine didn’t capture it. I have web hosting space to put it up… just sayin’ 🙂 Plainguet calls this the album he is the proudest of, and again you can see why. Quirky, experimental, electronic, alternative of alternative, etc. Even a punk rock song. It’s quite the experience. Also kind of sad that all of the critiques of Evangelicalism that are leveled here are still pretty true, if not worse in some cases.

Marc Plainguet – Surrealism for Beginners

Marc Plainguet
Surrealism for Beginners
1989 Corpqii Music

Written, produced, and performed by Marc Plainguet

Side !:

1. Palindrome 1
2. Dinner With Dali
3. La Valse Surreal
4. Day of the Dead
5. Glenn’s Being Moody Today
6. Palindrome 2

Side ?:

1. The Final Dream (Requiem for Salvador Dali)

This is Plainguet’s 7th release, following Cats Welcome You Home earlier in the same year. At some point in 1989, he also released a self-titled tape that was limited to 25 copies. That S/T tape appears to be a compilation of songs from other tapes (although I don’t know if they are different versions or not). But this tape was followed by Strange Tales in 1990. This is Plainguet’s second all-instrumental album, which he refers to as one of his personal favorites. He calls the final 30 minute track “The Final Dream (Requiem for Salvador Dali)” his “proudest moment.” You can see why: the music is complex and accessible at the same time. It sounds like it was satisfying to write something that has both elements. And, of course, this has been remastered and reissued on his BandCamp page.

Marc Plainguet – Cats Welcome You Home

Marc Plainguet
Cats Welcome You Home
1989 Corpqii Music

Written, produced, and performed by Marc Plainguet

1. Chats Valsant a’ Minuit
2. Cats Welcome You Home
3. Psychedelic Catnip
4. Furball

This is Plainguet’s 5th album – kind of an EP dedicated to cats. As a dog person, I’m a bit baffled by that in general, but if one felt that they just had to make an album about cats, this tape does a great job of that. I’m being facetious, of course – please don’t send me hate mail cat people. This tape is three instrumentals and 1 song with vocals. It was released the same year as Security Shelter Hope, and was followed by Surrealism for Beginners in 1990. Like much of his other tapes, you can get the remastered version of this on BandCamp.

Marc Plainguet – Security Shelter Hope

Marc Plainguet
Security Shelter Hope
1987 Corpqii Music

Written, produced, and performed by Marc Plainguet

Side 1:

1. In the Beginning
2. Security Shelter Hope
3. EZ2C
4. The Dam
5. Motions of Score
6. Into Eternity

Side 2:

1. Maria Durant
2. Somebody’s Knocking
3. The Island
4. The Dance of Truth
5. Walking against the Wind
6. …. Amen

Now we are up to Plainguet’s 4th solo album, put out the same year as Blood & Fire. But it would be about 2 years before we got his next solo tape Cats Welcome You Home in 1989. With this album, Plainguet says that he wanted to express his Christianity more explicitly than he had on past tapes. And that is definitely what happened here, but it is still the quirky electronic music he was known for by now. It seems like maybe the songs are a bit slower pace overall than the past? Not to the point that they are all ballads are anything, just something I kind of noticed. I still  love this quirky style of DIY music. This is the remastered version that I bought from BandCamp.

Marc Plainguet – Demovision

Marc Plainguet
Demovision
1986 Corpqii Music
Los Angeles, California, USA

All music and text was written, produced, and performed by Marc Plainguet

Side 1:

1. World Media
2. Afterlifestyles
3. Barbie’s Lament
4. Cubist
5. Skeletons*

Side 2:

6. Binary Life
7. Robotics
8. Facades
9. This Science
10. The Uncle Sammy Show

This was an interesting release as it was basically a collection of tunes from Plainguet’s first two tapes that he used to get live bookings. It was briefly up on BandCamp for free, but appears to be gone now. “World Media,” “Robotics,” and “Facades” are all from World Media, while the rest are from Amebas in Love except for “Skeletons” which is exclusive to this release. It is a cool collection that served as a “best of” the two releases. It came out in 1986, followed by 1987’s Blood & Fire.

Marc Plainguet – Blood & Fire

Marc Plainguet
Blood & Fire
1987 Corpqii Music

Written, produced, and performed by Marc Plainguet

1. Blood & Fire Part 1
2. Blood & Fire Part 2

Following up on his two full releases (Amebas in Love and World Media), as well as the compilation album Demovision – all from 1986 – Plainguet went the instrumental route with this album. Both sides are one 29+ minute song with samples over evolving music. Sometimes it sounds random, sometimes there are discernible melodies and hooks. The music is electronic in nature, not really in the noise genre, but I could see it appealing to fans of that genre as well. After this tape, he released Security Shelter Hope (also in 1987), as well as worked on the first Gadget album. This tape, like many other’s of Plainguet’s, has been remastered and made available on BandCamp.