Daniel Johnston (b. January 22, 1961 in Sacramento, California) is a prolific American singer, songwriter and artist. He has been classified as an outsider musician.
His songs are typically painfully direct, and often display a disturbing blend of childlike naïvete with darker, "spooky" themes. Johnston's singing voice is rather high-pitched, and his performances often seem faltering or uncertain; one critic writes that Johnston's recordings range from "spotty to brilliant". He also draws and paints; his illustrations have been featured with most of his albums.
Johnston was born in Sacramento, California and grew up in West Virginia, but now lives in Waller, Texas. Johnston suffers from severe bipolar disorder, and has had varying luck with different treatments. He has been institutionalized for periods.[ citation needed]
In the late 1970s, Johnston began recording his songs on a $59 Sony Boombox, singing and playing either guitar, piano or harmonica. He gave tapes of his music to anyone who would take them. Johnston created the comic book inspired art that usually accompanied his own recordings.
His early songs established a number of themes that would persist through Johnston's career: Unrequited love, Casper the Friendly Ghost, and comic book superheroes, especially Captain America and Jack Kirby's other works. "Joe"—a partly autobiographical character—has been featured in a number of songs. Johnston has cited The Beatles as a prime influence.
A sizable proportion of Johnston's songs throughout the years have dealt with his unrequited love for "Laurie," a girl he became friends with in college, who was the first to encourage him to record his music. The Laurie character quickly assumed the role of the idealized female muse. The real life Laurie Allen married an undertaker, prompting Johnston to write lyrics in which the Laurie figure becomes strongly associated with the imagery of death in addition to her original role as a muse. For example, the song "Funeral Home" in which Johnston sings that he's "going to a funeral home" represents both the foreknowledge of death and Johnston's desire to be reunited with Laurie, who at the time worked at a funeral home. Laurie Allen has since divorced and filmmaker Jeff Feuerzeig arranged a meeting between Allen and Johnston.