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Vic Chesnutt

Colonel_Mad

Colonel_Mad

pfm Member
Vic Chesnutt rarely if ever gets mentioned on this forum. I wondered if there were any other fans out there?

I was listening to Drunk again yesterday and it really is a wonderful album. I also have Is The Actor Happy?, Silver Lake, Left To His Own Devices and Nine High A Pallet, his first album with Brute.

If anyone can recommend any of the other albums let me know. I'm planning on getting a few more.

It's 12 years on Christmas Day since his tragic demise. Hopefully the music will continue to live on.

 
I bumped into singer-songwriter Vic Chestnut when R.E.M.'s Michael Stipe teamed up with his friend and countryman to record the song "Injured Bird" for Wim Wenders' "End Of Violence" film.

A car crash at age 18 left Chestnutt paralyzed from his waist down and he performed in a wheelchair. Vic spent much of his career heavily in debt because of medical bills, and very was critical of the American health care system.


Friends pay tribute to Vic Chesnutt
Tue 29 Dec 2009

A memorial service has been held for the American musician Vic Chesnutt, who has died aged 45. Chesnutt, described by REM's Michael Stipe as "one of our greatest songwriters", reportedly took an overdose of muscle relaxants.

A long-time resident of Athens, Georgia, Chesnutt was an anchor of the city's music scene. He collaborated with artists such as Lambchop, A Silver Mt. Zion and Jonathan Richman and every stripe of musician from folk-singers to psychedelic rockers. Chesnutt was partially paralysed after a car crash in 1983 and his 16 albums often touched on themes of death and loss – but also on life's cracked, crooked joys. "[He] was able to bring levity to very dark emotions and feelings," Michael Stipe told Spinner, "he had a humour that was really quite unusual."

Chesnutt struggled with depression, but also with the cold hard fact of his medical bills. In 1996, Madonna, Smashing Pumpkins, Garbage and many more recorded a Chesnutt tribute album, to benefit a fund for musicians' health costs. More than a decade later, the singer-songwriter was allegedly being pursued for $30,000 (£18,799) in hospital fees. "There's nowhere else in the world that I'd be facing the situation I'm in right now," he said in an interview earlier this year. "[Outside of the USA,] they cannot understand what kind of society would inflict that on their population."

On 23 December, Chesnutt reportedly attempted suicide, taking an overdose of muscle relaxants. He fell into a coma. At 2:59pm on Christmas Day, he died "surrounded by family and friends", according to his record label. A memorial service took place in Athens yesterday, with the family requesting donations to the Shepherd Center or Nuci's Space. His friend, the songwriter Kristin Hersh, has also opened a webpage soliciting donations toward Chesnutt's medical debts.

continues here -> https://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/dec/29/vic-chesnutt-patti-smith


The Throwing Muses' Kristin Hersh wrote a book about Vic:



Stipe produced a documentary titled " Vic Chesnutt - It Is What It Is":

 
An artist I need to hear. There’s quite a lot about him in the book about the Athen’s music scene I just read.

America’s health provision is a humanitarian scandal. Why did they need to raise money after he died? Surely that’s the only way to get off the hook!
 
Little, West Of Rome, Drunk and Is The Actor Happy areal yes everyone should hear at least once. The Sweet Relief tribute/fundraiser is an excellent accessible way into his work. Saw him several times live. Never less than memorable… for many reasons.
 
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