The Washington Post has done more digging about the new Elliott Smith’s song that has recently surfaced from a recording session at the radio station WMUC. There is a sort of controversy whether it was recorded in 1997 (according to Sam Chintha, who set up the microphones for this recording session) or 1996 (according to Eric Speck, a former WMUC DJ who booked him for the session). I don’t really care about this sort of things, but what is always more interesting is the impression Elliott left on people who met him.
This is what Eric Speck had to say about Elliott:
‘He was SHOCKINGLY shy and it became clear he had on air jitters. he pretty much locked himself in the promotion office – alone – to tune and practice. he was super nice, but very sullen and soft spoken. I remember thinking retrospectively over the years that he was very sincere because how he presented himself on my show was always how i saw him in later years on TV and live.’
The engineer for the session, Adam Wenchel, also added this about Elliott:
‘He traveled with his manager who looked more like a nightclub bouncer than a typical indie rock roadie… he was melancholy but not at all unfriendly or hard to work with.’
The whole session can now be found on line, and former WMUC general manager Anton Kropp declared about it: ‘It's kind of a sad thing to listen to.’
Sad? Oh I know what they are talking about! The Washington paper continues with the following explanation: ‘Some on-air sets can be rough around the edges, but Smith's stripped-down show is messy to the core. He stumbled through the rest of the session after playing ‘Misery Let Me Down’: He made two more attempts of ‘Division Day,’ a couple takes of ‘Say Yes,’ and also performed ‘Thirteen,’ ‘2:45 AM,’ and ‘Alameda.’ Along the way, you can hear him break-off mid-song, pause to fix his headphones, mumble, profusely apologize, and anxiously pick at his guitar.’
Yes, that sounds exactly like Elliott!
And unfortunately, the paper continues to see sadness and to draw some conclusions about Elliott’s personal problems:
‘In fact, between his first try at ‘Division Day’ and ‘Misery Let Me Down,’ Smith mutters, ‘I just need to wake up. I took some Nyquil.’ That could also partly explain his erratic behavior during the session, and why ‘Misery Let Me Down’ abruptly ends seemingly mid-song. Looking back on it, it's hard not to re-contextualize the event in regards to the painful personal issues Smith grappled with and his early death in 2003.’
Again, drawing conclusions based on a performance…. That was his style, that was him, he was unique this way, and I hate when people hastily make connections with his death, as the Washington post did in the first article about the lost song, writing ‘Smith took his own life in October 2003,’ when doing a brief bio…. just lazy journalism!