On today's plate of Leftovers is a bit of live music obscurity from February 4th 1990. Daniel Johnston is unfortunately more known for his mental instability than his remarkable songwriting talents. But if you look beyond his lifelong battles with mental instability you will find one of the rawest, most gut-wrenchingly honest songwriters ever.
This recording comes from an hour long variety show that Daniel did on WFMU. Daniel had pre-recorded advertisements, jingles, and fake interviews with Daniel voicing all of the parts and then playing them over the phone to be broadcast over the radio. But the shining moment in all of this was when he sang his song "Speeding Motorcycle" over the phone with the help of the band Yo La Tengo who had been booked for an in-studio performance.
What results nothing short of a lo-fi masterpiece. This performance is oozing with a sort of naive charm that any other artists would die to have. The innocence and child-like exuberance is apparent in Daniel's voice. And the way that Yo La Tengo are able to tenuously hang on to the performance using what they could hear over the phone is nothing short of incredible. The sound quality, is of course sub-par, and Daniel's voice may take some getting used to, but this is all overshadowed by the goofy boyishness of Daniel's voice which perfectly match lyrics like this:
speeding motorcycle
of my heart
speeding motorcycle
lets be smart
because we dont want a wreck
we can do alot of tricks
we dont have to break our legs
to get our kicks
They're silly, of course, but underneath that there is a kind of sophistication, an ability to explain something as complicated as love with a child's sense of simplicity.
Listen to the track below, and you can also find the entire broadcast of which it is a part here.
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