#music mystery

[arcticfoxfacts]

The Elephant 6 Lost Release: E6-013 - The Clay Bears

Below the cut for more info!

Okay, well it was never released, only catalogued!

“The Clay Bears” was, per the Elephant 6 Instagram, an experimental noise band from Ruston, Louisiana featuring a rotating lineup of Elephant 6 musicians. They were “known for their unpredictable performances and room-clearing live shows.”

One of the more well known quotes about the band came from the Elephant 6 website, which used to read “Clay Bears - One of the big mysteries of the E6. Apparently a super-group of some sort from the Ruston-era. The band had a revolving door line-up which at some points included such people as Scott Spillane, Jeff Mangum & Will Westbrook. They are thanked in the liner notes of Neutral Milk Hotel's album On Avery Island.”

And they are thanked on the On Avery Island linear notes! Taken from my personal copy:

That quote is no longer on the website, but it is archived on NMH fansite neutralmilkhotel.org. That website also contains this snippet of information: "In a BBC interview in August 1998, Jeff mentioned the Clay Bears had a double album which was poised to be released. This never transpired, however. Ross Beach, a member of the band for a while, told me the following: 'As far as I know, the Clay Bears never had any official releases, though there were probably some 4-track cassette one-offs floating around Ruston in the early 90's. That was also a Jeff solo project, only noisier and more chaotic. The live version that I was in was purely an experimental noise improv band.'"

So based off this, we can assume that The Clay Bears was a project possibly spearheaded by Jeff Mangum and there may be demo tapes floating around the Elephant 6 sphere. The double LP Jeff mentioned is catalogued (but not listed in the database) as E6-013 on Discogs.

There is supposedly a clip of a Clay Bears concert on YouTube, but the video's since been privated. A Reddit post on r/Elephant6 asked about this clip (but got no replies). This redditor also did some digging, supposedly uncovering news from the 2006 Elephant 6 website about a DVD release with a Clay Bears snippet. Whether or not the supposed clip would be the one from the YouTube video is not known. The redditor further opines that the DVD was never released. Another redditor on a different post asked Jeff (because this was back when NMH were on their reunion tour) if Clay Bears would ever see the light of day, saying "it’s up to the people to decipher." The post itself speculates that the Clay Bears would appear on the Elephant 6 documentary. Admittedly, I haven't seen the doc, but I would assume it didn't end up appearing because there's seldom any discussion about the band or any resurfaced clip.

In another Reddit post, a user shows the University of Georgia media archive, which featured several Neutral Milk Hotel stuff in the Robert Schneider Collection of Elephant 6 Recording Co. Records. There is a Wayback link, but it's broken and while I can see the first recording is NMH instrumentals, I don't know what the second recording is. Apparently, the Clay Bears is somewhere in the archives, but the University of Georgia seems to have removed the collection and the Wayback Machine only archived the two aforementioned files. Although according to a commenter in the Reddit post, most of the links (including the Clay Bears) didn't work and would require going out to Georgia to listen to the physical tapes.

So that's about where the whole Clay Bears mystery stands. It's interesting how there's been multiple possible Clay Bears leaks, yet none of them seemed to survive. The Clay Bears is still listed as an Elephant 6 band under "The Collective + Extended Family" section of the website and there was an (aforementioned) Instagram post by the official Elephant 6 account last year.

Last thing, the image up at the top was posted by the Elephant 6 Instagram, but I don't really know what it is. They don't explain it and reverse image searching turns up nothing. It could be one of Jeff's demo tapes, but that's pure speculation on my part. I might try to contact them in the future for clarity, but I'm lazy and shy so I dunno.

Anyway, here's a few posters also posted by the Elephant 6 Instagram:

[arch-aeology]

Hello gravity falls fandom. I couldn’t get it out of my head until I drew it, so here is my take on Ford finding out about 9/11. (Formatting is weird so click on the photos to actually see it lmao)

[spiralinaa]

I THINK THEY ROLLED UP THE WRONG MYSTERY TOUR GUYS

[angsty-art-ist]

and they would have gotten away with it too, if it weren't for those meddling adults!

[jellyskink]

Full credit to Tom Cardy for the amazing song!! The timing of this is better on TikTok, no idea why.

Sssoooo I wanted to practice animatics to get better at, like, actually telling a story with them. this is by far the longest I've ever spend on one. I don't really... know what I'm doing... but I wanna pursue learning about these. now go on, git, ya varmints, before I get too embarrassed about trying to post something halfway serious!! (and maybe tell me what you thought of it, I dunno)

[just-jae]

Mystery what did you eat :)

[luhvrlis]

can someone be fixed if they don’t believe they’re broken?

[heshemejoshi]

playlist moment. sometimes you have to be a little mentally ill in order to be ok etc you know the post

[heilos]

So this was a wonderful surprise even to me, but Luis just uploaded a whole lo-fi mix of the entire Mystery Skulls Forever album! If you liked the Ghost remix then I think you're gonna love this one too. Each song is also uploaded separately on his youtube page along with a 2 hour version. Go get yourself some good vibes!

[doctorsiren]

I love Hermes teehee also I decided that Athena should have the lightning scar from God Games so just pretend that I drew it on the other gf/epic drawings of her hehe

[azurityarts]

THEY BOOGIE

[atomic-chronoscaph]

Carrie Fisher and John Belushi on the set of The Blues Brothers (1979)

[aznisure]

14-15 y/o pines twins! had a lot of fun with this one,,,,

[tomatoart]

coffee cheetos chicken

[gossamerg1rl]

[aquanutart]