Why is John Fahey So Boring?

Dust To Digital has a Fahey box scheduled for next year:

John Fahey: The Fonotone Years (1958-1962)

John Fahey
Release Date: 2009
Description: A 3 CD set to commemorate the 50th anniversary of John Fahey's first recordings for Joe Bussard's Fonotone Records. Remastered from the original reels of tape, this will mark the first time this music is available on CD.
Genre: Blues guitar.

http://dust-digital.com/forthcoming.htm

ooh that sounds cool ... the Fonotone things have never been on CD, right?

Never.
Four 12" acetates compiling (most of?) the Fonotone recordings were just sold on ebay. I think the cheapest one went for $300-something, the others were all $500+

oh i guess it says that right up there, duh: "the first time this music is available on CD." anyhoo, cool!

anyone hear the blind thomas stuff on the fonotone box? where he plays with a paint brush? never could bring myself to summon the money for it.

the vrootz style set above looks superb, full marks to all concerned. i'm going to have a listen right now.

not I. the fonotone box is oop, right? been looking around for it lately. no dice.

Darn, I didn't realise that. Sure enough Dust-to-Digital don't have it for sale themselves.

wonder where nubbin is today? that was some B+ trolling there.

I better jump on that Fonotone box, thankx for the tip.

Do you know somewhere that has it in stock?

I listened to the "Deathchants, Breakdowns, and Military Waltzes vol .2" LP the other day while eating lunch. The one with "America" and "Episcopal Hymn" on it. He's still and will always be great, I think.

I have a bunch of random mp3s and the Red Cross, one of my favourite albums of all time, where should I start, Fahey is a little daunting even though I love everything I've ever heard, which is a lot, but there's so much meta in the titles of things that its easy to get lost.

The Rhino comp, Return of the Repressed is a good starting point ... Also that live record, the Great Santa Barbara Oil Slick is killer. Don't know if there's really a "bad" Fahey album up until the 80s when it starts getting a little sketchy ...

fare forward voyagers is a real standout for me. if the idea of fahey sprawling out over three long songs sounds interesting, definitely check it out.

'America' the tune from volume 2 is sublime Fahey groove.

Recommendations for depend on how keen you are/how much you'd like to hear.

Either: The first seven Takoma records (Blind Joe Death-Voice Of The Turtle) are all first rate cosmic sentimentalism, with the only caution being that VOTT is pure Faheylogic, eclectic and sort of ridiculous, the most characterful album as the John Fahey legend built up to a sort of Dionysian ecstacy before he took the torpor/Christmas/dixieland left turns and calmed down. The Yellow Princess&Requia are great also, Fahey sobre and in the studio but at the top of his game. America and Fare Forward Voyagers are almost the greatest stuff he recorded but I think Fahey collapsed under his own weight a little, so they're really epic and ambitious but he doesn't manage to build up the momentum I'm anticipating. It's like a set of enormous intros to the greatest Fahey ever. First two Christmas albums fulfill all yr hopes of what a Fahey Christmas album could be, pretty sure I don't want to hear the later ones.

The dixieland trio (Of Rivers&Religion, After The Ball, Old Fashioned Love) are uneven but try one at least. A lot of the stuff from the 70s/80s is great too, patchier, and getting increasingly less great, but new things like the Bola Sete influence and the awesome "Sandy On Earth" from God,Time&Causality. If you like Ananaias from Red Cross you should check out its younger, heavier ancestor, Melody McBad on Visits Washington DC. I'm fairly even in my semi keen approval of the 90s stuff I've heard. The solo electric guitar stuff is often really slow, heavy-going and sometimes impossibly sad, but I really like Hitomi, disembodied ghost Fahey, and Red Cross feels a bit odd but mostly good. Depending on yr appetite for Fahey's slow drawl monologues you might dig the Cul de Sac record and his trio stuff. The former is probably my favourite late Fahey record, the sound collages are refreshingly beautiful.

Or: Days Have Gone By/Yellow Princess/Santa Barbara Oil Slick

Thanks for the post ogmor.

On the Fonotone Records box set front, I just ordered it from Cargo: http://www.cargorecords.co.uk/release/2022
Credit crunch be damned (with the special offer it's a well justified purchase) (guilt, guilt, guilt).
We'll have to see if they actually come up with the goods.

the Fonotone box is out of stock but will be repressed for early next year.
Keep an eye out on the website for it. I will refund you now.

Ah well.

Dust-to-Digital just tweeted about listening to the Fahey-Fonotone CD'Rs, and said this a few days ago, also on twitter...

Fahey-Fonotone set: split release b/t DTD and Revenant. 5 CDs & book w/ 100+ unpublished photos of John.

So it's increased from 3 to 5 discs. With both Dust-to-Digital and Revenant involved, this is going to be some serious fetish object. I can't wait.

urghhh. when is it coming out? it is going to be expen$ive isn't it ... also nice to hear that Revenant isn't totally dead ....

speaking of fahey http://grown-so-ugly.blogspot.com/2006/12/contemporary-guitar-spring-67-this.html

No mention of when, but I've embraced new media and gave them an @dusttodigital tweet to ask.

Aye, I expect it will be pretty pricey.

ah well, at least we know it'll be well done -- Revenant and DtD know how to do box sets!

Amen to that.

just to plug a local mpls dude that is brilliant, fahey fans should check out paul metzger (of mpls cult art punx TVBC in the early 80s)

http://www.myspace.com/paulmetzger

that contemporary guitar comp is grrrreeeat! it shouldn't be that there tbh.. there were several different cover variations. mine was a later pressing than the one pictured there.

speaking of fahey http://grown-so-ugly.blogspot.com/2006/12/contemporary-guitar-spring-67-this.html

― tylerw, Tuesday, September 8, 2009 5:37 PM (1 hour ago)

noise board lurker

lol i did see that on the noize board -- all credit where credit is due, noise dudes ...

Missed this from Dust-to-Digital's last newsletter, which says the Fahey box should be out by the end of the year:

We are very excited to announce that John Fahey's Fonotone Years is in production, and we are doing everything we possibly can to have the title out by year's end. As we wrote in a previous newsletter, the set will be a co-release between Dust-to-Digital and Revenant Records. As for the music the set will feature, we are including every recording John made for Joe Bussard's Fonotone record label. The result will be a five-CD box set of music that was only available in the 1950s and '60s in limited pressings on 78rpm acetate records. We will be mastering the audio from the original, pristine reel-to-reel tapes.

Also in the works is a separate two-CD set called Roots of Fahey, which will showcase the songs and musicians that inspired and influenced John throughout his recording career. Each track comes from the 78rpm record collection of John's lifelong friend, Joe Bussard.

whoa.

wannnnnt

Looks great. And there was me thinking I'd bought enough Fahey for a lifetime..

Just been inspired to put on the "On Air" live set.

I never realised that Bussard recorded so much Fahey, i.e. enough for 3 whole CDs.

Did you ever get the Fonotone set, krakow? It is a lovely, joyous artifact. I don't play it that often, but when I do, I can listen to it all night.

And there was me thinking I'd bought enough Fahey for a lifetime..
ha, yeah, i think this all the time -- "well, that's enough of that!" and then I hear something I haven't heard and I'm back into it all over again. Happened most recently with the Sea Changes Coelacanths set ...

just to plug a local mpls dude that is brilliant, fahey fans should check out paul metzger (of mpls cult art punx TVBC in the early 80s)

paul metzger's serious. dude is amazing

I've heard about Paul Metzger a few times. He plays a 16 (or more?)-string banjo (see here: http://www.paulmetzger.net/art/metzgerRM.jpg ) . I've never investigated further.

the metzger cd that archive put out a few months back is real nice. banjo ragas.

I never realised that Bussard recorded so much Fahey, i.e. enough for 3 whole CDs.

looks like it's actually FIVE cds! and yeah, pretty crazy.

That large Fahey quote by Dan Bunnybrains near the beginning of this thread reminds me of Gertrude Stein's "What Are Masterpieces and Why Are There So Few of Them" in content (and a bit less in tone, but that too, funnily).

looks like it's actually FIVE cds! and yeah, pretty crazy.
― picture me lolin' (Alan N), Thursday, 10 September 2009 20:05 (1 hour ago)

Ah, I thought 3 of them were Fonotone and the other 2 from Revenant vaults, or something. Even more astonished...

glad some ppl are digging metzger, yeah he plays a bunch of weirdly modified instruments...

my friend has a great label that has put out two great metzger records you can order them here:

http://www.roaratorio.com/

(he's got awesome stuff overall a great joe mcphee record and lots of cool shit)

Did you ever get the Fonotone set, krakow? It is a lovely, joyous artifact. I don't play it that often, but when I do, I can listen to it all night.

― Duke, Thursday, 10 September 2009 19:47 (Yesterday)

No, unfortunately not. I tried, but that one's out of print. This thread made me think about it again and I've contacted Dust-To-Digital to see if it's going to be repressed, before I start my exhaustive hunting.

Some cool looking OOP Fahey over here: http://grapewrath.blogspot.com/ Haven't heard either of these. Dude has a lot of albums!

<3 this cover
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Gun5Xkdl7TY/SqnPYQSzJmI/AAAAAAAACFE/fykYIElVbAw/s1600-h/bffa9330dca0c4ef07d06010.L.jpg

hmm that didn't work ... oh well, check the Fahey Railroad cover
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Gun5Xkdl7TY/SqnPYQSzJmI/AAAAAAAACFE/fykYIElVbAw/s1600-h/bffa9330dca0c4ef07d06010.L.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ot5mHAy6zjs

Awesome, never knew he appeared on any Rockpalast broadcasts. Lovely tune too.

BTW, dunno if this got posted anywhere:

2011-06-07: John Fahey: Your Past Comes Back to Haunt You // The Dust-to-Digitrial box set

Announcement:

The John Fahey 5-CD box set for Dust-to-Digital was completed today, as of a few hours ago! It goes into production almost immediately. It's street date is October 25th, this year.

As many of you know, I've been working on this project for 11 years. The last time I hung out with John, in the summer of 2000, was, ostensibly, to discuss the Fonotone recordings and this project. He died the following February.

I think the set honors John and the significance of his work with such thoroughness and in such detail, in a way that has never been achieved before. It is, I feel certain, a critical piece of the puzzle that is John Fahey, and it will be a significant resource for future scholars / fans.

There is, first of all, six+ hours of music here, virtually all of it unknown.

The set comes with a 90-page, 12" X 12" hardback book filled with the photos Melissa Stephenson (moderator of this site) and I got from Jane Hayes (Fahey's mom) in Louisiana in 2003, almost none of which have ever been published.

The book also includes extensive liner notes: there's a song-by-song analysis by our own Malcolm Kirton; essays by / contributions from some of the most knowledgeable Fahey scholars in the world (from Germany, the UK, Australia and the U.S., including a number of people on this chat group: Paul Bryant, Chris Downes, Claudio Guerierri, Charlie Schmidt and several others); reminiscences by childhood friends; a never-before-published interview with John from 1967, and much, much more.

Layout and design is by Susan Archie, who's overseen such sterling productions as the Charley Patton box for Revenant, among others.

Lance Ledbetter at Dust-to-Digital has discussed the possibility of doing record release events in various cities around the country following its release. If and when they happen, you'll be among the first to know.

I, for one, couldn't be happier!

Glenn Jones Cambridge, MA

More on what the box actually is here:
http://www.clashmusic.com/news/john-fahey-box-set-approaching

jf candyman otm

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Now available for pre-order from http://dust-digital.com/

http://www.dust-digital.com/fahey

Track list

$80 -- actually a little better deal than I thought it would be. looking forward to this!

yawn