“I don’t know if I could rap”: The secret singing talent of David Lynch
No other figure in Hollywood was able to depict with such authority the universal intersections of the human conditions and the surrealist energy that emanates from the unknowable corners of the psyche. From Eraserhead‘s industrial claustrophobia, Mulholland Drive‘s dark clouds over a dreamlike Los Angeles, or the subversive soap eccentricities that crackle underneath Twin Peaks‘ TV melodrama—David Lynch was gifted with an innate understanding of how dreams work amid his narrative nebula and elastic reality.
A student of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Lynch’s background in painting forever guided a creative path defined by artistry, film was merely one of many tools deployed to realise his absurdist visions. Boasting credentials in theatre production, architectural design and literature, his forays into music would stand in the eyes of many as his ‘second career’.
Any Lynch fan knows how essential music is to his work. Conceiving 1986’s dark psychosexual crime thriller from Bobby Vinton’s 1963 rendition of ‘Blue Velvet’, the power of a pop song could often prove the most significant part of any of his works’ pre-production process—famously eschewing storyboards in favour of a collated set of songs that offered conceptual springboards for Twin Peaks‘ third season.
Such an affinity for music resulted in earnest collaborations with other musicians and synthpop solo LPs under Lynch’s own name. Alongside his acclaimed work with Julee Cruise and Angelo Badalamenti, factory blues rumbles with BlueBOB, and his and Chrystabell’s ambient explorations, the closest he touched the musical mainstream was his guest appearance on 2010’s Dark Night of the Soul.
A joint effort between producer Dangermouse and indie rock outfit Sparklehorse, its nocturnal jamboree boasted a dazzling roll-call of guests including Iggy Pop, The Flaming Lips, Black Francis, and Suzanne Vega.
Featured on ‘Star Eyes (I Can’t Catch It)’ and the album’s closing title track, his nasal, semi-sprechgesang vocals cut a unique mark among the many legendary voices that glitter the record. With Dangermouse’s background in hip-hop remixes, rumours abounded that Lynch would add rap to his artistic arsenal. “I’ve never tried it,” he confessed to Dazed in 2009. “I’ve tried talking over music, but it’s not rap. I don’t know if I could rap! I love the concept though. It’s such an incredibly modern use of words and music”.
A deep affection for the easy-listening hits of Americana’s yesteryear need not conflict with an admiration for the modern developments in hip-hop. Lynch’s embrace of rap is another signal of his intrepid artistry, forever spotting a new opportunity to explore the creative world in new and unfamiliar ways. There was never much conscious process as to what triggered Lynch’s intrigues, be it rap or Dark Night of the Soul‘s joint creators.
“I’m sure there are others like me. I started singing, and I don’t quite know how it happened, but Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse liked it, so I sang for them,” he explained. “The songs just came out of their music. They give a sense of freedom and that’s the part of the concept that I like. They do the music and then they see what happens when they give it to person A, B and C. They share their music. I like that a lot”.
