Commercial DVD

Release date

October 24th 2004

Running time

1:05:00

Residents video chronology
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Golden Goat (2003)	The Residents Play Wormwood (2005)

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I Murdered Mommy! (1997)	Inside a Circle of Dreams (2021)

Commercial DVD is an anthology film produced by The Residents, released through Mute Film and The Cryptic Corporation on October 24 2004. Commercial DVD is an adaptation of the group's 1980 Commercial Album, and an expansion of the promotional short film One Minute Movies.

History[]

In 2004, while producing an animated DVD based on Freak Show, its director and main animator Jim Ludtke suffered from a serious illness, which halted the project completely. In the meantime, until work for it could be resumed, The Residents decided to consider new ideas to release for the format

The band decided to develop the concepts of One Minute Movies, which was a collection of four one-minute long films made to promote their 1980 album Commercial Album. They would make videos based on the rest of the songs of the album, and compile them in a DVD.

This task was way too challenging for The Residents alone. Therefore, after nine shorts were completed, not only the group decided to contact some of their previous collaborators to make contributions. They also made a call to action on their website to filmmakers, from industry professionals to film students, to mail their portfolios to The Cryptic Corporation, with a chance that they may be commissioned for the anthology.^{^[1]}

Sadly, Jim Ludtke died shortly after this announcement. He was scheduled to make a contribution to the project, a video for "Loss of Innocence". Instead of an original video, a reel of the 3D models created by Ludtke for The Residents' 1995 CD-ROM game Bad Day On The Midway set to the song was included. The video features a tribute to Ludtke at the end.

Moisture 2004 — Screenshot from the “Moisture” Easter egg. 2004

All 40 songs of the album were represented, some even more than once. "Shut Up Shut Up" and "And I Was Alone", which were part of Commercial Single, were also considered. The four original One Minute Movies were included. And the DVD contained easter eggs featuring The Residents' videos for new versions of "Moisture" and "Red Rider" made specifically for this release, featuring vocals from Carla Fabrizio and guitar from Nolan Cook. Ultimately, Commercial DVD included 58 short films in total, as well as a mysterious video of a monkey playing with water.

Interactivity[]

CommercialMaze — One of the maze's rooms.

The DVD was designed to play each clip in random order, to provide for a unique experience each time. In order to do so, it features a maze-based navigation format, randomly generated every time it's entered. Each room of the maze features two videos, with the possibility to navigate to a hallway on the right, on the left, or to go to a level below. Sometimes, a skull will prevent the viewer from picking a route.

To "beat" the maze, the viewer must find the easter eggs of the DVD, the new versions of "Moisture" and "Red Rider". These can be found in The Residents' Room, which holds all the videos made by the band for the project, as well as the One Minute Movies. Inside, there is a cut-out of a cat. The viewer must select it to be able to see the easter eggs in a secret room. They willl be transported to the main menu after they are done watching.

In case the viewer does not want to go through the maze, there are other methods of viewing available. They can view all the clips in order, select a specific song, pick a video from a song in particular, or even choose between some theme based playlists.

Release[]

Commercial DVD was premiered at the Film on Music-Music on Film Festival in Prague on October 14th 2004,^{^[2]} followed by its US premiere on the 21st at The French Fry Factory in Oakland.^{^[3]} The DVD was released by Mute Films and The Cryptic Corporation on October 24th, 2004.

This was the first Residents project to be released by Mute, following the group's departure from East Side Digital in 2002. The following day, October 25th, Mute released a new edition of Commercial Album with a 32-page booklet, to accompany the DVD.

Liner notes[]

"The premise of The Commercial Album, which was released in 1980, was for The Residents to create their own "Top-Forty" of one-minute songs - one minute being the length of a typical TV commercial. Taking over where the group's 1978 classic Duck Stab left off The Commercial Album further distills the music of The Residents into a stream of compact and multifaceted avant-pop fems. A model of economy, the songs on the kaleidoscopic album constantly convey more with less.

In addition, one of the most important aspects of the project was the accompanying release of their four one minute movies. These videos brought to life and exposed the visual imagery of The Residents much more than every before, and, since the band had not yet toured, these startling images revealed the world of The Residents in ways unimagined by unsuspecting pop audiences in the early 1980s, created before the existence of MTV, these short movies were immediately in high rotation when the fledgling music channel began broadcasting in 1982, and were soon incorporated in the Museum of Modern Art's [New York] permanent collection.

Twenty five years after the release of The Commercial Album, The Residents have lovingly undertaken the task of creating ten new one-minute videos in addition to the original four, and also convinced more than 30 outstanding artists to join in the fun. The Result is the Commercial Album DVD, containing 56 outstanding one-minute movies - a virtual film festival in a box."