Outsider music is music created by self-taught or naïve musicians. The term is usually applied to musicians who have little or no traditional musical experience, who exhibit childlike qualities in their music, or who have intellectual disabilities or mental illnesses. The term was popularized in the 1990s by journalist and WFMU DJ Irwin Chusid.
The Shaggs were an American rock band formed in Fremont, New Hampshire, in 1965. They comprised the sisters Dorothy "Dot" Wiggin, Betty Wiggin, Helen Wiggin (drums) and, later, Rachel Wiggin. Their music has been described as both among the worst of all time and a work of unintentional brilliance.
Norman Carl Odam, known professionally as the Legendary Stardust Cowboy, is an outsider performer who is considered one of the pioneers of the genre that came to be known as psychobilly in the 1960s.
William "Shooby" Taylor was an American jazz vocalist famous for scat singing over various records, including those of the Ink Spots, the Harmonicats, Johnny Cash, Miles Davis, Mozart, and Cristy Lane, in a baritone voice.
The Berklee College of Music is a private music college in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known for the study of jazz and modern American music, it also offers college-level courses in a wide range of contemporary and historic styles, including rock, hip hop, reggae, salsa, heavy metal and bluegrass.
Beth Nicole Torbert is a Canadian singer best known by her stage name Bif Naked. Between 1996 and 2016, she was among the top 150 selling Canadian artists in Canada. She charted #1 on Billboard Canada for the single Spaceman and was heavy rotation on MTV TRL for the video Moment of Weakness. The album I,Bificus was multiplatinum internationally.
Paula Dorothy Cole is an American singer-songwriter and producer. After gaining attention for her performances as a vocalist on Peter Gabriel's 1993–1994 Secret World Tour, she released her first album, Harbinger, which suffered from a lack of promotion when the label, Imago Records, folded shortly after its release. Her second album, This Fire (1996), brought her worldwide acclaim, peaking at number 20 on the Billboard 200 album chart and producing two hit singles, the triple-Grammy nominated "Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?", which reached the top ten of the Billboard Hot 100 in 1997, and "I Don't Want to Wait", which was used as the theme song of the television show Dawson's Creek. Cole was a featured performer in the 1996 prototype mini-tour for Lilith Fair, and also was a headliner for Lilith Fair in 1997 and 1998. She won the Grammy Award for Best New Artist in 1998, and also became the first woman ever to be nominated for "Producer of the Year" in her own right in that same year.
Y. Bhekhirst is an outsider musician based in New Hyde Park, New York.
Sally Taylor is an American singer, songwriter, artist, musician, writer, and educator. She has released three studio albums. Her songs have appeared in the films Anywhere but Here, Interview, Adventureland, and Me, Myself & Irene. She has performed on The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Martha Stewart Show, and The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.
Irwin Chusid is a journalist, music historian, radio personality, record producer, and self-described "landmark preservationist". His stated mission has been to "find things on the scrapheap of history that I know don't belong there and salvage them." Those "things" have included such previously overlooked but now-celebrated icons as composer/bandleader/electronic music pioneer Raymond Scott, Space Age Pop avatar Esquivel, illustrator/fine artist Jim Flora, various outsider musicians, and The Langley Schools Music Project. Chusid calls himself "a connoisseur of marginalia," while admitting he's "a terrible barometer of popular taste."
Sylvia Tyson, is a Canadian musician, performer, singer-songwriter and broadcaster. She is best known as part of the folk duo Ian & Sylvia, with Ian Tyson. Since 1993, she has been a member of the all-female folk group Quartette.
Naomi Hall is an American musician. She gained fame in the outsider music community after her music was featured on the Incorrect Music Show. After her introduction on that show, Hall was asked to cover another outsider artist's work, B.J. Snowden's "In Canada" and would record its introductory theme. Hall currently lives in Seattle, Washington and continues to record and perform her music.
Philosophy of the World is the only studio album by the American band the Shaggs, released in 1969.
Gordon Thomas was a jazz trombonist.
Downloading the Repertoire is a 1996 novelty album by American singer John "Jack" Mudurian.
Songs in the Key of Z is a book and two compilation albums written and compiled by Irwin Chusid. The book and albums explore the field of what Chusid coined as "outsider music". Chusid defines outsider music as; "crackpot and visionary music, where all trails lead essentially one place: over the edge." Chusid's work has brought the music of several leading performers in the outsider genre to wider attention. These include Daniel Johnston, Joe Meek, Jandek and Wesley Willis. In addition, his CDs feature some recordings by artists who produced very little work but placed their recordings firmly in the outsider area. Notable amongst these are nursing home resident Jack Mudurian who sings snatches of several dozen songs in a garbled collection known as Downloading the Repertoire and the obscure and extreme scat singer Shooby Taylor AKA 'The Human Horn.'
Victoria Davitt, better known by stage name Victoria Vox, is a singer, songwriter and musician specialising in the ukulele. A native of Green Bay, Wisconsin, Vox now resides in Costa Mesa, California when not on tour.
"The Little Black Egg" is a song first performed by Daytona Beach, Florida garage band the Nightcrawlers in 1965. It was a minor hit in both the US and Canada, reaching number 85 on the US Billboard charts in 1967, while doing slightly better in Canada, where it hit number 74. The song has been since covered by multiple artists including Inner City Unit, the Lemonheads, Neighb'rhood Childr'n, Tarnation, the Primitives and the Cars. It was the Nightcrawlers' only hit.
Malinda Jackson Parker was a Liberian singer and pianist. She composed her own music and recorded the album The Liberian Landmark Joy around 1971. She served a term in the House of Representatives of Liberia representing Montserrado County. A well-known figure in Monrovia, she graduated from Morgan College in Baltimore. Her songs were included in Irwin Chusid's 1999 compilation albums Songs in the Key of Z, which considered her an outsider artist.
Jet Lady is a 1982 album by Angela Masson, released under the name Tangela Tricoli. Masson is an accomplished pilot who flew with American Airlines, set several speed records, and was the first woman cleared to fly Boeing 747s. The album included songs that originated on her 1980s public access talk show Tangela Tonight. Only 1,000 copies of the album were pressed, and it loitered in obscurity until its inclusion in the 2002 outsider music compilation Songs in the Key of Z. Masson's singing on the album has been described as off-key and "deranged". The song "Stinky Poodle" from the album has been noted for its resemblance to "Smelly Cat", sung by Lisa Kudrow on the sitcom Friends. Jet Lady was reissued with bonus tracks in 2004 by Arf! Arf! Records.
