Added: 6 years ago
From: crushingdeath
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  • I wish the video was of better quality but Don's cool humor and vibe still manage to come through. Nobody like him. I'll quote," Its a bush recording. We're out recording the bush." from Trout Mask Replica.

  • Why are they laughing at his paintings? weird

  • Letterman is such a patronising wanker. Beefheart on the other hand is a true legend.

  • You have just got to love the mighty Beefheart!!!

  • F*ck, to hell with acid man....!

  • wow! when was this? I had no idea Letterman interviewed Zappa AND Beefheart! He's so lucky!

  • I don't know what the problem is. He's very funny in this interview. I doubt he'd want people to be all po-faced about his stuff anyway.

  • God I love this man so much

  • Beefheart was a master troll.

  • These days you wouldn't find an interview this obtuse even on cable access television.

  • "Do you always have the hat on?" "Not now."

  • IDIOTS IN THE CROWD

  • and this guy doesn't do drugs or alcohol?

  • @thevillagepeople999 I read in Nick Kent's (NME Journalist) Memoirs that he became so eccentric after watching The Incredible Shrinking Man while tripping on LSD or something...

  • he was a genius, far too ahead of him time for people to appreciate him...

  • Dali once said "It's not essential for people to know weather i'm joking or not, just as it's not essential for me to know myself". I think that definatley applies here.

  • Like the clip, thanks!

  • usually david bowie gets credited for first music video, so its nice to hear don get credit here. though the first song to get treated with any visual format which could be called a music video would arguably be bob dylans subterranean homesick blues.

  • its rely interesting to see that mentality of his woks here in chatter, and how that word-slip mind works, and he seems to be enjoying a state of mind that may have problems with. i guess this is before he really got ill.

  • Can somebody explain to me HOW I should approach understanding trout mask replica?

  • @fab186

    You know, I found thinking of it like this to help---focus on one part of a single song, like a guitar part. Hear how it repeats itself with subtle changes again and again. Repeat this with another instrument; you start to realize that what might have sounded cacophonous is actually just a wealth of different melodies in different rhythms, tightly integrated; once you figure out the knot there's really nothing like it. Also try not to think of it as being weirder than it is.

  • @GymnopedieTornado I love many styles of Blues and that has helped me with the insight that "most" of Captian Beefheart is fairly straight forward blues (not always 1-4-5, but often a heady mix of many chord combinations within the blues) his unique vocals, I think, hide that fact very well and in a positive way. He also plays a mean harmonica!

  • @GymnopedieTornado

    Good way to look at it, well put. It's not as frighteningly alien as you might think. There's a lot of subtle progression through the songs, the drums & guitars modulating, varying the theme and making for a ridiculously exuberant rush of sound that cuts a wicked groove as it shilly-shallys back & forth, all the while Don's vocals skronk away in a sublime mock-vaudeville playfulness. Ella Guru for instance with Antennae Jimmy Semens doing 'backing vocals'. A delight!

  • Powerful being + funny MTV Refused to show his vid--> he was a grass roots creator; of Vids with his music; + should have shared. HE has class + spirit that surpasses the Hollywood version of music today. LET the Musicians come out of the wood work bring your gifts to Mankind we WILL listen. He is sooo fantab. The Raven /Vanilla Ice cream Cool when he said he lived i the Mojave; he loves discipline; lived in a trailer next to the Ravens. DID you see him looking up at those Towers?:)NO MTV Duh!

  • one day my professor mentioned this band, and i heard of them bc john fruscianti used to love them according to anthony kiedies's biography, so i looked them up and now i can't get enough of them!

  • Letterman, although gently mocking/teasing at times, does seem genuinely interested in the art/music/answers that the Captain gives. It's the audience who are acting like retarded apes. Kind of embarrassing.

  • @faustbanana when has true art and great musicians been appreciated by the mainstream?

  • @faustbanana I agree. Crowd os absolutely mocking, but screw em, they dont know from good music anyhow. They are jacked up on weird vibes like any late nite TV audience is...coached on pre show by some producer and ready and willing to laugh at the slightest thing. They are vultures

  • Letterman was doing 'mock the looney' like Wogan did with George Best and others .. but we all love a stoning! No wonder he kept away from people, to the detriment of his health in the heat, he could trust the ravens more

  • This is from the closed caption function on YouTube, from around the 14 minute mark:

    "hello welcome what the fuck that has to do with grover has approved by the life of the raven demoralized erroneous"

  • Back when Letterman used to have a good show...

  • station identififuckingcation??

  • LOL WUT?

  • Its Mucho-Loco bueno - good. 8/23/11

  • Letterman pretty much redeems himself simply by having the Captain on his show at all!

  • A genius !!!!!!

  • This man is a fucking GENIOUS!!!!!!!!!!!

  • if you wanna be a different fish, you gotta jump outta the school

  • letterman just doesn't get the good captain at all

  • I love the part at 1:25 where he makes that jump out of the school pun and it takes the audience a couple seconds to get it

  • This is one of the few times you'll see Letterman treat a guest as thought he/she weren't a total idiot.

  • @finallychrome

    I agree. I can't stand Letterman..never did.

  • @finallychrome What an interesting comment. Letterman is by default condescending--you might expect him to have a field day with this guy. On the contrary, he was quite respectful.

  • This was hilarious.

  • Transcribe audio isn't helping me at all >_<

  • Is it me or could he be Norm McDonalds father?

  • i hate when people laugh at art and artists, although in the end theyre the clueless ones

  • @badmammal american audiences in general clueless with eccentrics. I feel sooooo out of touch here. Thats why i am moving to Bali where artists can thrive

  • @baliscotsurf don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out

  • @badmammal Too right. Really annoying isn't it. His music and his art was really interesting. A great loss.

  • I love the Night Flight glimpse. I used to record those also!

  • he comes back wasted

  • a human great

  • Ahahaha, I like how he asks "What does that mean exactly" as if true art has some specific meaning.

  • This how charlie Sheen will look in a couple of years

  • i can't understand a word of captain beefheart... i'm so frustrated! i'm not english but i can speak it very well : / 

  • @unlikeanyotherhuman RIGHT ON MAN.

  • hes great but he does bullshit a lot

  • Oh. Thats the corn thief.

  • I don't like how it seems they are laughing at his art

  • After years listening to avant stuff I finally started listening to Beefheart, and I can't believe it took me so long! The guy sound like he's from the 24th century more or less. Just truly original stuff.

  • His humor goes over most people's heads. When Letterman says "that's major league sculpting" Beefheart acts like he's chiseling marble with a baseball bat. Fucking hilarious.

  • If you want to be a different fish you gotta jump outta the school lol

  • 13:52- "It has a lot to do with Reagan. I mean I mean uh, the style of substance harem tosses jellybeans through rope trick... he's a bad actor." That's the most sense I could make of that line, and I'm sure I messed it up.

  • @Wartler your translation makes more sense than mine, lol.

    13:52 "it has a lot to do with, uh, raygun...i mean, i mean, uh, the sound of subtance heron tosses jellybeans through rope trick...he's a bad actor."

  • @Wartler That makes perfect sense; well done.

  • if you like screamin jay,tom waits,captain beefheart and other crazy blues/roots stuff you may want to check my channel! got a brand new video for you!!cheerz

  • Captain Beefheat's name actually came from his Dad who, as a joke, used to pee with the bathroom door open and loudly proclaim 'what a great big beefheart!' he had. The whole 'beef' against society is just a story used for interviews like this.

  • 13:48.

  • hahahaha look at 1:18 look how long it took those people to get that joke!!

  • @AviatorAndyK couldn't hear what he said to Dave right before the break, what was the joke about his school?

  • @art9schw "if you want to be a different fish you gotta jump outta the school"

  • who is beefheart?

  • @sammy13576 ''Who is Letterman?'' Fixed.

  • he was turning himself inside out and

    he wears his hat like 73% of his time

    so what is the percentage of time

    the hat is on his inside?

    (^^)v

  • Do you guys know that Captain Beefheart used to verbally assault his bandmates until tears? He also used to regularly beat them up too. He is a fucking weirdo. Zappa = better. Beefheart knows that too.

  • Watching this reminds me how many great acts rock and roll produced 40 years ago and what a great cultural club it all was with the DJs and the critics; and how it hasn't been replaced. The current generation doesn't have characters like this, or music that even compares. It's all dead out there.

  • @edmund184 you are a wanker. go back to the 70s boomer

  • @edmund184 beware of opinions stated as facts

  • He invented that clock that's on the wall behind him. RIP DVV.

  • How old is this?

  • oh yeah, btw. For those who DOES get Captain Beefheart...He tricked you!

  • Can someone tell me if this is spelled right?"A squid, eating dough in a poly-ethalene bag is ferstwin boulwards"

    And sorry for stealing your name, first antmanbee guy

  • @antmanbee1 Fast and bulbous, not "ferstwin boulwards".

  • if you want to be a different fish you gotta jump outa the skool

  • For those that don't get Captain Beefheart...you were never meant to!

  • Typical ass munch question of an artist: "What is it about?"

    Silly, stupid, nonsensical question-asking the why is like asking a bird why it sings...

    "The bird does not sing because it has the answer-it sings because it has a song."

  • This is beatiful.

  • Why is Jed Clampett calling himself Captain Beefheart?

  • Something interesting. Wild Man Fischer outlived both Frank Zappa and Captain Beefheart.

  • He was famously a non-drug user ...

  • @muley180 If anything, drugs make you realize that: WHAT OTHER PEOPLE THINK DOESN'T MATTER. They alleviate us of our ego, that little nay-sayer in the back of our mind that makes us not want to really be ourselves. You obviously don't understand this, I'm sure you're ashamed to listen to Beefheart in public.

  • @muley180 Fuck you.

  • @muley180, @srvgravesdime failed. Captain Beefheart actually never did drugs.

  • @Vaselineum According to the Mike Barnes biography Beefheart took lots of acid and dope in the 1960s but stopped completely in the '70s. With or without drugs, he was a genius.

  • @muley180 you are clueless... he was not stupid, he was just different... and if you can't understand and appreciate that then I think that makes you the stupid one

  • @muley180 That was just Don's way, the guy was just way ahead of everyone, it seems you are the idiot here, you may not like that opinion, but it is my opinion nonetheless!!

  • @muley180 Go spoon a stoat.

    

  • RIP, Don. Fast, bulbous and korn-fingered.

  • So many brilliant artists love Captain Beefheart, i keep returning to his music trying to see what they see and it's all just obnoxious.

  • What an embarrassing fucking interview. Regardless of his genius lapses.

  • "If you want to be a different fish you've got to jump out of the school." Now that's fucking briliant!

  • Such an interesting man...a true artist. 

  • The war is a pimple on a post - pep dragon??

  • @superkulmedkniv25 A pimple on the Pope's pet dragon

  • @vollsticks oooh, thanks.

  • what year was this?

  • @GraceLondonMusic

    The second interview was probably around 1982 since Ice Cream for Crow was shown in the interview. That was the year it came out. The first, I'm not sure. I think on David's desk was a copy of Doc at the Radar Station. So like 1980. I think.

  • 7:15 - "I had fun doing it though, i was able to turn myself inside out...." Beautiful. RIP.

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  • he went for a freaking bottle of water to a store during a break, cos he felt thirsty...

    f-ing legend... so simple, so funny.. he's one of the people that it's impossible to find on tv...

  • Letterman needs to eaten alive by a pack of mutated Tasmanian Devils

  • Am I the only that hates this arrogant, prick Letterman?

  • mr captain beefheart is properly famous - just don't ask where the name comes from dude

  • i didnt know he was famous enough to make it on letterman

  • 8:04 Sounds like Brad Garrett!

  • 00:26 Lol

  • i watch this video every month

  • @phatboi96 Me too!

  • why is letterman.. nice?

  • A lot of people misunderstood his slurred speech, glassy eyes for drug use. Don suffered MS for many years before it finally took his life. RIP Don.

  • @Icco2011 He also dropped a lot of acid, especially in the late 60s, then lied about never using drugs. Not only that but  Beefheart & his girlfriend used to dose some of the other band members without their knowledge. Read the books by John Drumbo French & Bill Zoot Horn Rollo Harkleroad.

  • is what makes it so great ... the shitty questions !

  • God dammit, what shitty questions! :(

    <3 Beefheart

  • RIP Genious !

  • Anybody have any idea what Don says at 10:04? Made me laugh but wtf?!

  • @zachmasterzach war posted pimple on a dragon?

    idk XD

  • He sounds so drunk. :D

  • @Jman88 thats just how he sounds haha its a funny way of speaking i guess...

  • If you want to be a different fish, you got to jump out of school.

  • wait my hat size is 8.

  • @MelvinWren big head...

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  • He is so drunk! Strange fucker indeed

  • "If you're going to be a different fish, you have to jump out of the school" - brilliant!!!

  • MTV sucks, and everyone knows it now...finally.

  • Don brought me a lot of pleasure and Inspiration.

    Glad I got to see him once.

    Thanks friend, RIP.

  • R i P

    David postman

  • Oh look its a genius.

  • Man, he was either wacky as all hell, or he was high...or both. Good stuff. I gotta get myself some Beefheard on CD.

  • @hecbiz75 believe it or not beefheart was a anti drug musician as was frank zappa

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  • @wasupp134 Hmmm...After researching a bit, I wouldn't be so sure. Yes, he said no one in the band used drugs (including himself). But, it looks like people that knew him, band members have denied this (guitarist Bill Harkleroad and drummer John "Drumbo" French.) So, I wouldn't go 100% with either side. It's possible he did drugs, it's possible he didn't. *shrug*

  • @hecbiz75 i would think alcohol is more likely

  • @jaguar4499 Yep. That's quite possible. He does look a bit buzzed. LOL!

  • @wasupp134 bullshit, trust me....i talked to his guitar player extensively....nuff said.

  • I believe this was from 1982, the year he released what turned out to be his final album "Ice Cream for Crow". He quit music afterwards to focus exclusively on painting.

  • Everything right is wrong again.  TMGB and Cake got some cool shit from The Captain

  • GOD i had no idea he was on Letterman...what year was this?????

  • Saw this as a kid and it confused the hell out of me. Who knew I would become obsessed with all his music. THE KING IS DEAD LONG LIVE THE KING!!!!!!!!

  • Who the fuck is David Letterman?

  • @thenoisytrain Indeed.. Letterman is a twat extraordinaire.. out of his depth!

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  • @thenoisytrain DAVID LETTERMAN IS AN UNTALENTED IVY LEAGUE SHITHEAD WITH NO APPARENT USE OTHER THAN TO ENTERTAIN INSOMNIACS WITH SEVERELY LOW IQ'S.

  • @plasticjesus108 Ball State buddy.... NOT IVY LEAGUE!

  • I don't want my MTV either!

  • sad that he's gone...very sad

  • PAID TUINTION

  • Captain Beefheart knew exactly what he was doing.

  • Dang, first Lowell George, then Mr. Zappa, and now the Captain himself. Why must the times be so bad???!!!

  • His legend will live forever.

  • Two totally different planets there. God, I miss van Vliet and Zappa.

  • Maybe you're right, feedkillchain. Yet, in this interview, Letterman seemed somewhat ill-prepared.

    He's still a wad, whatever the circumstances, and his audience is generally an assortment of hicks.

  • @moosekarloff That sums it up.

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  • The great shaman of California--one of America's most important avant garde artists of the twentieth century!! Almost forty years since I first heard Trout Mask Replica and it still sticks in my consciousness. Young musicians should be inspired by his total originality.

  • RIP the good Captain