Doc Shoe's Music Blog

Oh shit, I can’t believe I forgot to post this a few days ago.  This song is called “Valentine’s Day” and it’s by Klaus Nomi.  Depending on your age, you either remember Klaus as one of David Bowie’s backup singers, or you remember him as Phantom Limb’s evil henchman from an episode of The Venture Brothers.

Either reputation doesn’t do him justice.  He had a vocal range that was out of this world.  He was infatuated with both Pop music and Opera and played to both influences in bizarrely stylized performances with costumes of his own design.  The guy started out as a pastry chef from Bavaria before moving to New York to make a name for himself, and who knows how far he might have gone?  But he died of AIDS in 1983 while he was working on this album: Za Bakdaz, an science fiction opera or God only knows what you’d call it, but like all his work it’s definitely worth a spin.

Check out this video of one of his performances.  Better yet, find a copy of his album Simple Man or his self-titled debut LP.  The first time I heard this music was like the first time I read Naked Lunch: I remember thinking, “Either this guy is a complete weirdo, or he’s a genius.  No, wait—could he be both?”