Eskimo (DVD)

Directed by

Release date

2002 (Euro Ralph)

2003 (MVD)

Running time

1:05:30

Residents video chronology
Previous	Next
Live! ...On The Outskirts (2002)	Demons Dance Alone DVD (2003)

Eskimo is a DVD by The Residents, featuring a 5.1 surround sound remix of their 1979 album of the same name set to still images depicting the stories told by the tracks.

The Eskimo DVD was released in 2002 by Euro Ralph, with a release by Euro Ralph and MVD following in 2003.

History[]

The group had wanted to create a visual adaptation of Eskimo for a long time. Shortly after its original release, they began developing a live version of the album, which would have been their first tour ever, but it did not end up coming to fruition. Then, in the 1990s, The Residents began revived their plans for a show based on the album, this time as an opera. They even comissioned a number of set designs from Ron Davis, but the project was also cancelled early in development.

At the dawn of the new millenium, the band started developing new projects that made use of DVD technology. So Eskimo was chosen for a DVD release. Not only would every song be given a visual treatment, using a slideshow of photographs of inuits, the album would receive a 5.1 surround sound remix, serving as soundtrack to what's happening on screen. The slideshow and soundtrack were accompanied by on-screen text from the album's original liner notes, narrating each of the Eskimo stories being depicted.

Additional content[]

The Eskimo DVD also features excerpts from the 1922 silent pseudo-documentary film Nanook of the North, a study of the Inuit people of Canada's northern Quebec region. The Nanook excerpts are presented with selections from the soundtrack to the 1994 Discovery Channel series Hunters: The World of Predators and Prey.

Also included is a music video for "Diskomo 2000", and The Esquimaux Village, a silent documentary short from 1901 (less than a minute in duration), which is presented unmodified. Finally, there is "An Inuit Legend", a short video consisting of still images, which tells an abbreviated version of the legend of Sedna, the goddess of the sea in Innuit mithology.

Inside the DVD packaging was included a booklet with all the stories, as well as press articles about the internal dispute between The Residents and The Cryptic Corporation during the development of Eskiom back in the late 1970's, and also reviews of the album,

Contents[]

Eskimal Residents — The Residents in the Arctic

Eskimo

Excerpts from Nanook

Building An Igloo
Crossing An Ice Field
Hunting Seal
Preparing For Sleep

Diskomo

Diskomo 2000

Easter eggs

The Esquimaux Village
An Inuit Legend

Liner notes[]

When The Residents first released Eskimo in 1979, it was well known that the inspiration for the album originated with actual innuit field recordings made by the group's mentor, The Mysterious N. Senada. What has not been known until this time, is that Mr. Senada was also an amateur photographer, and, along with the tapes of Eskimo chanting, dogs howling, and wind, were two undeveloped rolls of film.

With a great sense of anticipation, The Residents processed this film and viewed the pictures while listening to Mr. Senada's tapes. While the images did provide a fascinating, if somewhat obscure, frame of reference for the recordings, the group ultimately decided that the photos, like the tapes, worked best as inspiration for their romantic re-creation of Eskimo life.

It was almost twenty-five years before the photos were seen again. At that time, The Residents were discussing the idea of remixing Eskimo as a 5.1 Surround Audio DVD. But, as usual, the group was not satisfied with the obvious idea of remixing the original tapes. The Residents had always envisioned Eskimo as a visual as well as musical work, and until the visual component was realized, the project would remain unfinished. Finally, two decades after its original release, the DVD medium seemed to offer the perfect opportunity to rethink the project; but, with neither the time or the budget to mount a full production, how could Eskimo stories possibly be illustrated?

At that point, as it often happens with The Residents, two seemingly unrelated things came together to form a new idea: the box of N. Senada's photographs and the Internet. Long forgotten memories of the photos stimulated The Residents to start searching the Internet for similar material, and they were amazed by what they found. In various websites like the Library of Congress and The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Photo Library, they were able to find images that perfectly complimented their vision of Arctic life. Feverishly they went to work.

Finally, by processing these photos, along with a few of Mr. Senada's originals, and synchronizing them to the remixed music, The Residents were able to realize the version of Eskimo that they originally visualized in 1979.