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A Singer Must Die (20th anniversary edition)

by !JP

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1.
Offices 06:52
lyrics
SS? Police? Arrest this one! He's talking mathematics and science I think he thinks he's the new Einstein But he sounds more like a broken typewriter SS? Police? Arrest this one! Her Hitler hairdo is making me nauseous Her intentions may be virgin-like But she took me by surprise overnight Play the records straight We have a shortness of offices SS? Police? Arrest this one! Clearing all the icons of our past Listening to the Music For The Masses Peacefully mating to attuned rhythms Take the record straight We have a shortness of offices Play all the records straight We have a shortness of offices Before they were towed away I've arrested myself SS? Police? Arrest this one! Trashed my office for the second time They will stop at nothing: it's just business But it kills me to read their VooDoo Economics Play the records straight We have a shortness of offices Before they were towed away I've arrested myself
2.
Not Even The Rain 04:33
lyrics
No one Not even the rain Has such small hands Am I floating? Am I? Floating? In the cold Lloyd sits and waits Lloyd masturbates In his bedroom Lloyd looks down and out Lloyd looks out and down Ain't nothing out there But town Am I floating? Floating? No one Not even the rain Has such small hands
3.
Christine Is Dead 01:48
lyrics
Wonder if you sleep at night Wonder if you sleep at all Remembering your daughter's name? Tell me, do you have a conscience at all? Children, remember, tonight is mine As they sit here with the telephone dead This is a series of dubious thrills As I sow the seeds of these shooting stars And I hate you And I hate you too My patience calls for a weirdo getaway As I sit here and sing to all the heavens above Counting money, and do it all in turns Counting money, and do it for my love And you're not here right now And you're the one to tell me too And the days are here No fear I hated you No word I faded, full on, faded, faded, faded for you I'm high
4.
ICE 04:32
lyrics
[whatever] It's me!
5.
Supermarket Shit 04:17
lyrics
[are we running?] it's 4 a.m. sunday morning in a town you wouldn't believe i'm still up and driving i'm going home that's obviously i was not their dream not fit not happy not productive comfortable? ha not allowed to drink any spirits three days a week exercising at the gym i had to get on better with my associate employees and contemporaries i'm at ease i eat well i had to get myself a saver car for the baby no paranoia will frequently check my credit at the moral bank charity standing orders on sunday the round road supermarket carwash also on sunday but no longer afraid of the dark and no chance of escape now i'm self employed and there is nothing as ridiculous as teenage and despair nothing as childish this is supposed to be the better place more calculated but i'm concerned yet powerless i listen to my tires gripping the concrete i'm barbwired i'm an empowered informed member of society pragmatism not idealism never cry in public there's less chance of illness here that's true but i still have my memories i still cry at a good film i still kiss and now i'm not longer frantic and empty [calm down] i'm going out of the cage i'm on antibiotics i'm here it's 4 a.m sunday morning i take the route of the blue sun transport motorways and tramlines starting and stopping taking off and landing sentimental journey i'm clinging on to my seconal clinging on to my xanax clinging on to my bottle of suds i know where i am into the great escape now the floor collapses i'm floating bouncing i know where i am i'm close to the edge i'm close to my edge please let me go clone [i was not their dream]
6.
A Singer Must Die 05:31
lyrics
A singer must die That's what the poet once sang Lovely, isn't it? Dry your tears with me Give it to me completely And rest assured, I'll fall for you But a singer must die That's what the poet once sang Lovely, isn't it? Dry your tears with me Give it to me completely And rest assured, I'll fall for you But little do we know Little do we know A singer must die That's what the poet once sang Lovely, isn't it? Dry your tears Dry your tears with me Give it to me completely And rest assured, I'll fall for you So sleep a while with me Dream a while with me Let us break All of their rules But a singer must die That's what the poet once sang Well lovely Lovely, isn't it? Little do we know Yes, little do you know Little do you know You know so little But I know I know I know so much Yes, I'm sure I know so much Because I know why the birds all fly And I know where the comets go And I know where the car is parked And I know why I'm afraid in the dark And I know the singer must die I said: This singer must die This singer must die This singer has to die This singer must die This singer has to die He must die He must die
7.
Summer Saw... 03:40
lyrics
Tired of the rain and the Dutch skies Here we're lying on the ground Summer loves, light tendencies A form of social politeness But the summer got us drinking till we're wasted everyday anyway Like a mermaid on the sand Having drinks on the terraces Sucking the ice-combs from your hand Kissing with you in the end But the summer got us drinking till we're wasted everyday anyway And the summer saw you riding on my past Riding in the sand What's it like to be in town What's it like to hang around Seven storms and seven seas Got me lying on the ground But the summer saw us drinking till we're wasted everyday anyway And the summer saw you riding on my path Riding in the sand Or in the shade In the shade But the summer got us drinking till we're wasted everyday anyway And the summer saw you riding on my lap Ride me in the shade In the shade You are my sunshine My only sunshine You make me happy when skies are grey You'll never know, dear, how much I love you Please, don't take my sunshine away
8.
The Ticket That Exploded 08:43
lyrics
[whatever]

about

The Twentieth Anniversary Edition of !JP’s “A SINGER MUST DIE” marks the second occasion to self-proclaim the label “Classic” to one of their─frequently overlooked─extremely artistic efforts in the form of an album.


Heavily influenced by William S. Burroughs, maleficent hallucinogens, The War On Terror and visions of an apocalyptic landscape, the dystopian─and often dense─material makes sense even now, twenty years later.
The songs are constructed from a distorted mindset, effected by a downward spiral, which in turn is caused by a chaotic, egocentric society─easily retraceable to that one point in history, where hijacked planes flew into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon. The War On Terror, initiated by the Bush administration in means of retaliation to those─globally felt─terroristic events, is prophetically described in the songs of A SINGER MUST DIE, as a social leache, which every citizen of Planet Earth─regardless of race, identity, social or economical backgrounds, and sexual orientation─is being forced to wear, after 1984-like manipulating, dogmatic propagandas are being released onto those very citizens.
However, the 9/11-tragedies happened just a mere eight months before the album’s release.

Three weeks after their 2001 Summer festivals performances, !JP retired into the studio to record the follow-up album to their 2001 “Where Do You Want The Killing Done?”. According to logs, the working title for the follow-up was either “Industrial City In The Clouds” or “The Hippos Were Boiled In Their Tanks”, the latter being a Burroughs reference.
Experimenting with old tape-recorders and samplers, the band set out their initial plans. A more punk-music-focussed album, fused with samples from poetry-readings and manipulated field-recordings. The initial album they were working on also saw further experiments with drum-computers, fused into their pounding live-sound, which they began using in the late 1990s, and were first introduced on the album “Everybody Else’s Boy”.
But once the 9/11-tragedies commenced, which they followed on TV in the studio, all things were thrown overboard. The only song remaining from the pre-9/11-recordings is NOT EVEN THE RAIN.

Main songwriter Jean Koning withdrew from the project for a couple of weeks and read The Ticket That Exploded─the 1962 Burroughs novel─excessively. After every finished reading session, he rewrote the work-in-process songs for either “Industrial City” or “Hippos” with the style of that particular book in mind.
The new songs he developed in those few weeks, were created the way Burroughs wrote the book: using the cut-up technique, although for this book Burroughs used a variant called 'the fold-in' method.

Koning rejoined the band in the studio, after excessively studying the book, folded out his new plans, and the band reignited their usual midnight recording-sessions. The material they now recorded displayed─as well as Burroughs novel─an anarchic tale concerning mind control by psychic, electronic, sexual, pharmaceutical, subliminal, and other means.
Passages from the book and dystopian material from other songwriters like Thom Yorke, show up in rearranged form and are often repeated. It describes and brings to form Burroughs’ idea of language as a virus and his philosophy of the cut-up technique.

The now titled A SINGER MUST DIE (named after the Leonard Cohen song) lays the groundwork for !JP’s─and thus songwriter Jean Koning’s─ideas of social revolution through technology, which !JP would later detail on their ‘magnum opus’ “Notes From Purgatory”, and, subsequently, Jean Koning would build his entire solo career on the foundations of that philosophy.


The Twentieth Anniversary Version of the album A SINGER MUST DIE differs from the original version, since the overall sound of the album has been upgraded to a more ‘today’ sound. Enhanced clarity, balance and volume create a sound the way it was supposed to be twenty years ago. However, back then, destructed tapes transferred to a digital signal as well as integration with virtual instruments and production software was still in its infancy for bands working in the ‘underground’ modus. The software existed, but was used in extremely expensive studios only. Accessible to the Madonna’s of the world.
Additionally, the sequence of the songs has changed as well. The track A SINGER MUST DIE has been moved further to the back, while ICE is moved further to the front. The necessity of that decision is because the two ‘fillers’ NO GRRRL SO SWEET (from the “Industrial City”/”Hippos” sessions) and THE SPARKLE IN YO’ EYES were removed from the overall set, resulting in a more dense listening experience.
Consequently, the version of the track A SINGER MUST DIE is the “broken-tape machine” version, instead of the version larded with layers of samples from choirs and orchestras.
The final track on the original version SUMMER SAW… has been detached from the then hidden track THE TICKET THAT EXPLODED, which has also been shortened by almost seven minutes.


In conclusion, the Twentieth Anniversary Edition of !JP’s A SINGER MUST DIE is a renewed feast of anarchy; an artistic highlight in the world of music. Perhaps not the world of music you recognise from everyday kind of sounding stuff you hear in playlists, on the TV, or on (internet) radio all the time, but a sublime effort from a band, which didn’t want to sound like anything else on the planet, but tried to integrate sounds of chaos, which underlined “being alive” in 2001/2002, into their body of work.

credits

released May 1, 2022

Written by Jean Koning
Produced by Jean Koning and Van Weely

!JP is:
Jean Koning: voice, guitar
Van Weely: drums
Sylvia Selhorst: bass

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Jean Koning Amsterdam, Netherlands

Jean Koning has been a compelling force in the underground music scene since his unlikely folk&jazz debut transferring the band The Children of a Lesser God into the avant-punk extravaganza !JP in 1988. His star-studded career includes albums such as Notes from Purgatory, Man Enough to be a Woman and Wake Up In L.A.
Throughout his career, Mr. Koning has been honored with numerous awards. ... more

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