Outsider music. It's hard to say what it is exactly-- you know it when you hear it, and that's about all you can say. The Rokys, Syds, and Skips, the Jandeks, Johnstons, and er, Shaggs of the musical universe. Artists with inner visions that, when squeaked out into the world, were generally met with amusement if by anything at all. But there's something that unites them, and it's not just weirdness. For example, a lot of mainstream artists are absurdly weird, yet clearly not outsiders. Like, say, Tenacious D.
No, there's something more elusive to the whole outsider music phenomenon. It's a kind of hopeless, isolating weirdness, and above all, a mystique surrounding both the music and the musician. Irwin Chusid, author of Songs in the Key of X and perhaps the leading authority on the subject, says the defining quality of outsider music is that it inevitably raises the question, "What were they thinking?" As good a definition as any, I'd say.
Which brings me to Brother JT. Why would someone want to create faux-outsider rock? Simply, because it's easy. You just act all strange for a really long time, build yourself a cult following, and before you know it, you're an outsider. It may not be lucrative, but it's an easy path for the relatively unambitious to achieve some minor notoriety, and maybe even an occasional free drink down at the local watering hole.
Brother JT has been doing this a long time, so he's well on his way. Somewhat of an elder guru in the so-called Psychedelphia scene, JT's Maybe We Should Take Some More? is something like his fifth full-length. Before going solo he played in the garage group The Original Sins and he often hooks up with fellow Philly scenesters Vibrolux to make some noise.
On the surface, Maybe We Should Take Some More? is a fairly decent album. You got your acid-fractured folk of the Skip Spence/Roky Erickson variety, your feedback freakouts, and your distant, barely audible muttering filling in the gaps between songs: all the basic trappings of an 'out there' album. And, yeah, it's pretty weird, even a little disturbing if you can turn off your internal critic and just kind of go with it. Apparently, that's what Brother JT is counting on, because if you pay much attention to it at all, Maybe We Should Take Some More? reeks of premeditation, like a calculated attempt to weird you out.
Before you even get to the music there's the album title, the smeared cover shot, and songs titles like "Jesus Guitar/1st Thoughts" to clue you in that this is drug music. And after listening, it's clear that the good brother and his pals think we should be, like, really freaked out by all the drug references and drug-like imagery and, like, all these trippy sounds, dude. But the album lays all of its cards on the table, then expects you to be intrigued. Where's the hell's the mystery?
There are some highlights, the best of which is "Whatcha Gonna Do?" which asks the timeless question, "Whatcha gonna do when there's nothing left to do?" complete with a guttural blast of feedback and hilarious frog-croak samples punctuating the percussion. It's a great song that pulls you in multiple directions, both humorous and sinister, without making much of a to-do about itself. In short, pure mystery.
Unfortunately, there aren't many moments like this one on the album. It so obviously longs to be canonized alongside the work of such American originals as Spence, Erickson and co., yet so much of it just sits at the 'pleasant' level, leading me to believe maybe those involved took too much, got the munchies, and then went for burritos instead of pushing themselves creatively. I almost think that more downright obnoxious moments would help this album. At least then I might ask myself, "What were they thinking?" As it stands, the answer is all too obvious.
