Out of Print and Unavailable – Page 11

Eight Folk Songs (2012)

These were the first eight songs I wrote as Cannonball Statman – all of which I wrote while my hand was still in a splint after my bizarre hand injury that inspired me to change my artist name to Cannonball Statman.

The reason I chose the name Cannonball Statman specifically was partly just because that’s the name of my childhood dog, who was still around at the time and he was a really great dog.

And, because a lot of the early Cannonball Statman songs – as you can see from the track list of Eight Folk Songs – are named after animals, like “Cat”, “Dog”, and “Tiger”.

So Cannonball Statman is all about connecting with something more primal and earthly than my earlier songs that were more about Venusian and Mercurial themes – romance, trains, social issues, dreams and other realms – writing more songs about animals (and monsters and serial killers) was a way of grounding myself in my physical body after this traumatic injury.

But also, most people outside of my neighborhood didn’t know who Cannonball Statman (the dog) was – and around the time of my hand injury, I had a show coming up on the other side of Brooklyn at Goodbye Blue Monday, where I wanted to do a different kind of set from what I usually did as Jesse Statman – so I asked Steve Trimboli (RIP) to bill me as Cannonball Statman instead. Just for fun.

And I drew up a flyer for this upcoming “Cannonball Statman” show, which I handed out to a bunch of people, including the musician Audrey Otherway, who I was in an experimental writing group with at the time – and Audrey was like “who’s Cannonball Statman?” – and I was like “oh, it’s my dog” – and she was like “that’s cool – but that would be a great name for a hardcore band.”

So I sat with it, and I really got to thinking – “hmm – maybe I should do more with that name.”

It wasn’t a hardcore band – but – somewhere between then and the actual show, I ended up meeting Alex Ashmun, who joined the “Cannonball Statman” project as a drummer – so we did that first show, only about a month after my hand got out of that splint, as this kind of noisy punk duo with me on electric guitar and vocals and Alex Ashmun on drums.

We did a bunch of other shows as a band, and recorded a couple CDs in that duo formation.

And the idea was – Jesse Statman is me as a solo artist, and Cannonball Statman is me with a drummer and maybe some additional musicians.

But later that year, when I was starting to get involved in the antifolk scene at Sidewalk Cafe, people on that scene got really into the idea of me also being Cannonball Statman when I’m a solo artist and when I’m with a band.

Which is part of the whole idea about people’s names in antifolk – people normally refer to Luke from Kung Fu Crimewave as Kung Fu Luke, or they call Chris from Crazy & the Brains “Chris Crazy” – so the idea was, I’m Jesse from Cannonball Statman, so I’m Jesse “Cannonball” Statman or just – Cannonball Statman.

And I’ve stuck with that ever since.

So you can thank Audrey Otherway for convincing me to stick with that name for the project, and you can thank the antifolk scene for making it the name most people call me by now, even when I don’t have a band.

As far as the track listing – “Horse” and “Tiger” are the first two songs I wrote as Cannonball Statman, and those are pretty well-known because I’ve played them live so many times and they exist on other albums of mine, like Icepick (2014).

But most of these songs are not on any other album of mine and I haven’t played them live since 2012. A bunch of people on the scene still have copies of this CD, and they’re like “when are you playing “Monster” again? I love that song!”

Unfortunately, I don’t remember how to play any of the songs on the album except for “Tiger” – but I might re-learn some of the others some day.

the cassette box set One Through Twelve (2012) also features Eight Folk Songs in its entirety

there was also a “bonus videos” VHS release that came with some early purchases of Eight Folk Songs

from Out of Print and Unavailable Discography (as Cannonball Statman)
NV (2015)
Five Feet of Raw FIRE! (2015)
Your Hair (2014)
Real Live Cannonballism (2013)
A Year of Cannonballism (2013)
A Demonstration of Cannonball Statman’s Musical Talent (2012)
Paint and Industry (2012)
Eight Unpolished Songs (2012)
Eight Folk Songs (2012)

(or, go to the beginning for the full list of out-of-print and unavailable projects)