Tim Buckley - Lorca (1970) paired with Institute Benjamenta (1995)
- 4 years ago
Definitely one of the strangest albums I have ever heard and no song stranger than the title track. Yet, contrary to the purported intent to alienate the listener, "Lorca" has always found me avidly absorbing every note of what is actually a very powerful melody. The vocal determines the tempo and rhythm, and the more insistent ... or obsessed ... Tim Buckley's voice becomes the more character emerges from both the vocal and the surrounding music. Dreamlike is probably the best way to describe it, and although I doubt very much that Buckley ever thought in cinematic terms, in places this would work wonderfully as a soundtrack for a film.
The song and album were named after Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca, a poet Buckley was reading at the time he began work on the album. Buckley, inspired, incorporated poetry with avant-garde and improvisational jazz and fused it to folk music on Lorca where his words take on a surrealistic quality similar to that of the dead poet. He would explore this concept further on his next album, Starsailor. Federico Lorca was executed by Nationalist forces at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War and to this day his body has never been found. Buckley himself died of a heroin overdose on June 29, 1975 at the age of 28.
Institute Benjamenta (1995) is a full feature film by the Brothers Quay, running 100 minutes. The scenes used are from the part of the film that focuses primarily on the relationship between Jakob (Mark Rylance) and Lisa Benjamenta (Alice Krige).
The song and album were named after Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca, a poet Buckley was reading at the time he began work on the album. Buckley, inspired, incorporated poetry with avant-garde and improvisational jazz and fused it to folk music on Lorca where his words take on a surrealistic quality similar to that of the dead poet. He would explore this concept further on his next album, Starsailor. Federico Lorca was executed by Nationalist forces at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War and to this day his body has never been found. Buckley himself died of a heroin overdose on June 29, 1975 at the age of 28.
Institute Benjamenta (1995) is a full feature film by the Brothers Quay, running 100 minutes. The scenes used are from the part of the film that focuses primarily on the relationship between Jakob (Mark Rylance) and Lisa Benjamenta (Alice Krige).