Brett Morgen’s ‘Montage of Heck’ received seven nominations for the Creative Arts Emmys which took place on Saturday at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles, I don’t know how many he actually won but this is revolting,… revolting because Morgen has tried to sell this fiction for the truth, heavily promoting a story that simply is a lie. Didn’t Buzz Osborne say ‘Montage of Heck’ was 90% bullshit?
Producer Kevin Moyer revealed to Pitchfork that the track list had ‘20 Elliott songs from the film with only around four or five having been previously released’. ‘So hopefully we can keep him and his memory alive through the movie and of course his music too with this soundtrack release,’ he said Moyer to Pitchfork. I know that the producers have the best intention, Kevin was a close friend of Elliott’s and he obviously still misses him a lot, but is this the right thing to do?
It is well documented that he started a rehab treatment at the Neurotransmitter Restoration Center in August 2002, and according to what we know (Ben Nugent’s bio and Liam Gowing’s Spin article) moved in with Jennifer Chiba just after his treatment, fall 2002. By then, he and Valerie had split up. However, it looks like Chiba was in his life before the rehab episode, when he was still dating Valerie. This part may bother a few people who are used to a clean-cut story, he dated Valerie Deerin, then Jennifer Chiba, but the reality is much foggier than this!
Elliott Smith died in 2003 and the case has since been left open by the police, the investigation is in limbo and the homicide detectives who have successively been in charge of the case, have basically been waiting for new information to come to them, without actively investigating.
At worst, this petition will be an outlet for our collective frustration, at best, who knows, it may reach a good number of signatures and attract the media’s attention on a case that has been forgotten for too long.
In the Smith case like in the Cobain case (both cases have been heavily put in parallel lately because of these two recent movies), suicide is the easy way out for most people, suicide is more convenient, it is the lazy way of thinking since you could not have come up with an easier reasoning than this one: a depressed junky committed suicide, wow why would you believe anything else? And that’s the problem, at the end people pick what they believe, and believes work hand to hand with emotions, feelings, impressions and presumptions.
‘Your post was reported for violating Facebook’s Community Standards on nudity’? Of course it is totally false, Tom Grant has never posted any nude pictures, and he is a very ethical guy who has even deleted comments, if they were too accusatory against Courtney Love or anybody else.
The tiresome theory in this piece is that, blaming Courtney Love for the death of Kurt Cobain and Jennifer Chiba for the death of Elliott Smith is pure misogyny. I know his language,… people who express their skepticism are just ‘murder conspiracy theorists’ or ‘murder monomaniacs’ and he goes on and on, throwing in the text a few references to Greek mythology to make it sound more intellectual
I was with a friend who is an Elliott Smith outsider as she said, and I would say that the movie works very well for people like her. It introduces them to Elliott’s beautiful music and charming character, someone who just wanted to write songs and record them, someone who was living for his art
Stabbing is a very painful way to kill yourself. Those who commit suicide by knife tend to have very deep personality disturbances. And it is more difficult to stab oneself through clothing, requires a lot of strength to do that to yourself (unless the clothing is a thin T-shirt). Being very depressed won’t make it any less painful. There WILL be hesitation marks.
As everyone knows, we are in a dead end regarding Elliott Smith’s death, we may never know how he died, so I decided to contact Dr. Baden,… why not? He may answer? This is the message I left on his website.
When I got there I found him on the floor and I tried everything; CPR, I tried to stop the blood from the wound. Obviously there must have been an argument – that’s what my little brother told me, because I was asleep. He told me that they started arguing and they locked him outside.’
Suicide is the end of a persons story at the place they decided to end it, and murder is an interruption of a life just about randomly. It matters how people die, it matters how an artist dies. Would Sylvia Path read the way she reads if she didn’t kill herself?
I don’t know where these people get their information, The Smoking Gun showing the autopsy report is still online but it’s true there is a lot of confusion in the media. Still, misinformation is one thing, and these are not the comments which bother me the most.
He knocked on the bathroom door. He told Chiba he was sorry. He asked her to come out. He told her he knew he was crazy. He apologized for what he had said. But Chiba wasn’t ready. Impulsively, she told him to leave her the fuck alone. She was sick of the paranoia.’
The ‘innocent until proven guilty’ statement just applies in the courtroom, not only we have the right to express an informed opinion outside of it, but we should! Expressing and writing what we think is part of our rights. What are people so afraid of?
Elliott speaks about listening to Elvis Costello records and feeling like ‘a freak among other freaks’, about be given the ‘Folk music tag’ (which really bothered him) and about calling the addicts in his songs ‘the dependents’
“The year he died, Elliott came to see me play. He was excited about his studio and he hadn’t been doing drugs. He wanted to show me his studio. I was going to go after the show, but [then girlfriend] Jennifer Chiba threw a fit and made him leave. That was a bummer”
All these points are facts, not opinions, and I know that statistics don’t always explain everything, but suicide in Elliott’s case would make him an incredibly odd statistic. After going through all this, it is difficult to understand why many people still believe it was a suicide.
Thanks to (in no particular order) Alaska Monaco, Juanita Ignacio, Lisa Tyson Dunham, Esajoli D. Jones, Ellie Lowthere , Ro Smith, Local Stigmatic, Heidi Bridget Knight, Brian Cobehr, Yrlic Music-IIc, Hannah Everage, Crystal Jeffrey, William Holbrook, Luiz Felipe Marinho, Grace Moore, Kali Eli, Jade Wood, Amber Smith, Matt Clairmont, Emily Sipiora, Johnny Dalle, Sarah Norden, Damasca Lovecraft, Antony Stevo, Mahmoud Fawzy Khalil, Michele Dena, Micelle Moore, An Mir, Taylor Thomas Barnett, Holly Fields Sesco, Deb Croghan, Alex Rafael Rose, Dave James, James Delahunty, Emily Harp, Emily Smith, John Stanley, Ben Sherwood, Kyle McGill, Mil Reyna
Another person said ‘due to how much information can be ascertained I suspect there is enough evidence to suggest it wasn’t suicide but not enough information to charge or prosecute any possible suspect. That leaves them with an open case.’
He stabbed himself in the chest while arguing with her, according to a neighbor she’d stormed out of the house briefly after a loud screaming match, but then she turned around and went inside and found Elliott all bleeding. Did she drive him to the hospital? I want to think I remember it that way.
first, as you are going to see, it has a lot of similarities with Elliott’s, secondly, Eline’s brother, Daniël Melters, a postdoc at NIH/NCI, writes this blog to gather his meticulous research about his sister’s death, since he has been very suspicious since the beginning.
the reviews for ‘Heaven Adores You’ are in, and despite the fact that the movie doesn’t even come close to cover Elliott’s last time on earth, the media mentioning his death, stay very neutral, or even emphasize the inconclusive aspect of the case
Elliott was standing up, conscious, and gasping for breath, she pulled the knife out of his chest and saw two cuts on his chest. At this time, he walked away and she followed him to where he collapsed
About one in five people who commit suicide leave a note, so of course it makes a big impression when there is one, but there is a very large literature regarding studies which look for clues to determine differences between genuine suicide notes and simulated suicide notes
I just have a problem with the arrangements, why this terrible change in the chorus? To me, it brings the song down, it makes it less emotional and gut wrenching, it could even bring it in the easy-listening department, or Starbucks counter.
It’s difficult getting distribution when the powers that be don’t support us and have wielded their influence to block or try to block screenings in major cities. I’m also not willing to surrender control of the finished product. And not interested in releasing it online until I discover the best way how
It’s always the same story, or almost the same story, people start to talk to me and when I mention that I want to write about what I have learned about Elliott’s death, they withdraw and become silent… No exception this time! I had a conversation with a friend of Elliott’s, who will stay an anonymous source in this post
We briefly met at Rockfest festival, but later, when he had moved to Los Angeles, I asked my friend Steve [Hanft] to introduce me to him. We were both shy and were smiling while looking at our feet. He offered me a drink and we talked about Russian literature
It seems that no matter how many times we will repeat that Elliott’s death was NOT determined as a suicide by the coroner, people will treat it like a suicide. The LAPD has left his case open, I wrote this post to sum up the main points of what we know so far.
People were jumping from electric poles, the crowd was pushing and the barricades were not holding up, it was scary! I have seen a guy passing out at a Shins in-store show at Amoeba, the poor kid had been waiting too long in the sun without water probably, but what else out of the ordinary could I remember?
Since his death, two books (biographies) and two movies have been made, beside the numerous articles printed in magazines. Before accusing the authors and filmmakers of anything, I just wanted to point out a few things I have noticed which make me cringe, more or less
As someone who has spent some years along with 2 other colleagues researching what is known of Elliott Smith’s passing, maybe I’m the wrong kind of person to review this film. Watching it felt a lot like a slow drive from a respectful distance past the remnants of a collision with the white sheet draped over the aftermath, far from hiding what remained beneath.
‘Elliott was interested in the dark side, but I don’t remember any obsession with death, I don’t know that he had a death wish’, but interestingly, Schultz relegates another part of the conversation to the notes at the end of the book, in tiny print: ‘Schoenkopf told me that, if Elliott had wanted to commit suicide he would have done it by heroin overdose not stabbing!!’
A month ago she wrote a lengthy post on the meaning behind Smith’s song “Everybody Cares, Everybody Understands”, which she described as “his most vitriolic song” about friends who sought to rescue him from drug abuse.’
A coffee shop will open this summer/fall in the same building that is home to the Sunset boulevard Figure 8 mural, or if you prefer, the Elliott Smith memorial. Ben Hantoot and his wife want to open there ‘Dinosaur Coffee’ but fans should not worry as the mural will be kept intact
All this focus on the respect of the music has always made me laugh a bit when so little respect is accorded to Elliott the person… Aren’t there other people using Elliott persona to sell books and movies, molding him according to their preconceived ideas of the Elliott Smith myth?
She had known Elliott for sixteen years and she is one of these friends who strongly think that more should be done to uncover the facts surrounding Elliott’s death.. Needless to say, she isn’t not one of these friends interviewed by W T Schultz, and absolutely convinced it was a suicide
‘I don’t like when people talk about all the bad things that have happened to them as if that makes them unique. Because I don’t think I’ve had a harder time than other people.’
Ten years have passed, magazines have published their homage, people have made movies and books but nobody is facing all these discrepancies, and Schultz and Reyes have chosen to believe one version when the story presents so many contradictions they refuse to see.
Justice always matters but past the question of the LAPD either investigating or closing the file on Elliott, or punishing wrongdoers if indeed there are any, what does it matter whether Smith jumped or was pushed?
They play the tune very gently, close to the way Elliott was playing it. Zac Carper takes his most fragile-broken-tired voice whereas the soothing guitars and beach-like noise in the background fit perfectly the melancholic, intimate and sweet ambiance of the song
There were too many people in Elliott’s life and he only talked to a few of them, so he should not have made some grandiose declaration as if he had interviewed everyone close to him. It’s not the case at all. Actually, at this level he didn’t do much better than Benjamin Nugent
In 1999, Elliott spent some time in Paris
I almost didn’t recognize him first. He was looking a bit fuller, in really great shape, jumping behind the drum set at times, moving fast, looking quite different from the weak Elliott I had met at the Echo in October. After the show, I talked to him once again, I guess it had become a habit!
always great when a talented and famous musician, who has a clear insight into Elliott Smith’s work, speaks up his mind the way he does, as so many other people remain silent, probably too concerned by their own career? It’s always hard and courageous to take a stand
it is interesting to note that he was very unwilling to recognize he had felt that way a few years ago. Of course, it was before he had met with Jennifer Chiba… She approached him later on, said she wanted to participate in the movie, and everything changed.
I dare her or Schultz to find any misquotation in what I wrote. Unlike Schultz, I didn’t twisted what I have heard one way or another. ‘This interview did not bring any answer’ I wrote at the end of the post, and this was true. Conversely, Schultz seems to have found his, the one that fits so well with the title of his book
Her performance is a bit strange, dragged on stage by some sexy prison guards (everything is always a bit about rough sex with Madonna), she kneels down and sings the song in a very emotional way,… and her voice isn’t that bad after all.
Schultz told me he spoke for three days to Dr Scheinin, who did the autopsy… and he doesn’t bring any new insight? He doesn’t put the controversy to bed, he ignores it.
