Daniel Johnston
| Daniel Johnston | |
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Johnston in December 2006
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Daniel Dale Johnston |
| Born |
January 22, 1961 Sacramento, California, United States |
| Origin | West Virginia, United States and Austin, Texas |
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| Years active | 1978–present |
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| Website | hihowareyou |
Daniel Dale Johnston (born January 22, 1961) is an American singer-songwriter, musician, and artist. Johnston was the subject of the 2005 documentary The Devil and Daniel Johnston. Johnston has been diagnosed with schizophrenia. He has been regarded as an important figure in outsider, lo-fi and alternative music scenes.
Johnston was born in Sacramento, California, and grew up in New Cumberland, West Virginia. He is the youngest of five children of William Dale "Bill" Johnston and Mabel Ruth Voyles Johnston (1923-2010). He began recording music in the late 1970s on a $59 Sanyo monaural Boombox, singing and playing piano as well as the chord organ. Following graduation from Oak Glen High School, Johnston spent a few weeks at Abilene Christian University in West Texas, but soon dropped out. He later attended the art program at the East Liverpool campus of Kent State University, during which he recorded Songs of Pain and More Songs of Pain.
Johnston's musical work gained some notability when he moved to Austin, Texas. Johnston began to attract the attention of the local press and gained a following augmented in numbers by his habit of handing out tapes to people he met. Live performances were well-attended and hotly anticipated.
His local standing led to him being featured in a 1985 episode of the MTV program The Cutting Edge featuring performers from Austin's "New Sincerity" music scene. Subsequently, he performed at the 1985 Woodshock music festival in Austin, where he was featured in a short documentary of the festival, Woodshock.
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