ILX Gonna Shine in My Backdoor Someday (new post-Fahey folk for ppl posting in Takoma/Tompkins Square threads Pt II)

Loving this Glenn Jones tune, "The Teething Necklace (For John Fahey)"
xxx.youtube.com/watch?v=6qd7pWITPQQ

Couple things I put together,

John Fahey's Adelphi Sessions, the Dance of Death outtakes. Uploaded as MP3's, posted on my blog:
http://broadcastsfrompoorfarm.tumblr.com/post/105403178308/john-fahey-adelphi-sessions-the-dance-of-death

Scanned my copy of the mail order catalog from Fonotone Records, interesting curio. Includes the numerous early Fahey comps Joe Bussard curated for Fonotone.
http://broadcastsfrompoorfarm.tumblr.com/post/105401770173/fonotone-records-mail-order-catalog-pdf-booklet

I finally put together some new lapstyle material and wanted to share it here. "Blue For al-Watawit of Yashkur" sits as is, in a sorta demo state. I didn't want to forget all the new ideas I've been having, yet also told myself I wouldn't record again until I bought a nice microphone. Of course, I got impatient, so here we are. Before they find a home somewhere, I do want to properly record them.
http://raglore.com/album/blue-for-al-watawit-of-yashkur

Link for the MP3's are posted here,
http://broadcastsfrompoorfarm.tumblr.com/post/105403934713/rag-lore-blue-for-al-watawit-of

Look forward to checking this stuff out

Cool, thanks Neal! Actually already listened to your "Blue For al-Watawit of Yashkur" tracks (Mr. Avant Ghetto threw them up on twitter yesterday), really enjoyed them. First track sucked me right in, so yeah make a recording you are happy with and I am on board!

neal - or others - what microphones/mic pres do you guys use? this coming year i need to get serious about recording an album

like your new stuff neal

the only Tashi Dorji song on Spotify is a cool little curio, electronic remix featuring his guitar of a song by some psychey dude name Al Lover

http://open.spotify.com/track/2HxzI5VuTvgdbTGolZ7x7G

Thanks dudes, I have always just been using a portable digital Tascam recorder from B&H Photo that I bought a while back. It fits in your pocket so I've used it while out and walking around, but it's not a good choice for recording guitar at this point, I loved it at first bc of how much of an improvement it was over using the internal MacBook mic. I sold my two amps (+all other musical electronics) years ago during collage, which I regret now. As I would like to record traditionally with a mic and amp set up. Either using the sound hole or install a pick up. How about USB mics? Been talked about here before I think. Decent clarity from the models available now?

I think the solution is to just meet someone in town with a set up :) - that way I can avoid all of this.

I've posted things upthread recorded with the Blue Yeti (120 new but you can def find a ton of these used on ebay, got mine for 80 on craigslist)
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=&sku=857749&gclid=Cj0KEQiA8MSkBRCP5LaRlcOAusMBEiQAiqldkgFeoLzZuCr_Hg1GQ03TBk1qSggFdqEqo5fQpNn1jLgaAgF98P8HAQ&is=REG&Q=&A=details

you can hear the stuff i've done, which is minimally processed, a bit EQd and maybe compressed slighty with some audicity plugin reverb on it, but overall I'd say USB mics have come a long way

of course, I'm just plotting about how I want to get a USB DAC/Mic pre unit and a better XLR mic so I suppose one is always unsatisfied.

gonna check out yr new thing neal! i've dug the rag lore things i've heard so far.
just got hipped to this thing via soft abuse's twitter -- maybe it was mentioned on the old thread? https://moonbros.bandcamp.com/album/frijolillo - kind of low-key/dreamy/fieldrecording-y/acoustic action. i like it!

Neal there is also a USB model of the Blue Spark which is supposed to be great on acoustics

Nice yeah, I remember reading a while back about you UMS using the Blue Yeti for your material. If you search a phrase like 'USB mic acoustic guitar' on youtube the Blue Yeti seems to comes up the most, also something called the Snowball. Though, I think based on the sound samples the Yeti comes out on top. I'll look into that Blue Spark too.

No other time than now to get a project down. Should defiantly put together something. Stick it on a tape and send it to people, flinging around links is nerve racking sometimes though.

I used to work at the main public library of Virginia and was hired at the perfect moment where they were getting rid of all the old analog stereo equipment and vinyl records. It was a dream to hoard of that kind of stuff. I got a working reel to reel, but haven't yet grabbed any tape to use it. Would love to have it up and running.

Reel to reel would sound great

Grandavis did you end up heading to the hometown Daniel Bachman gig in Fredericksburg? A full video of it was posted a few days ago - includes some of the new material that should be coming up on the Three Lobed Record.

vimeo.com/114599709

Nah, I had to skip it as it was early in the day and I had too much to do. Watched the video already though! Wanna reiterate that I really like the new tunes that'll be on the next record. Bachman is chugging along into some sweet territory. The lap stuff is a real joy live too.

listening to that new Bachman right now, loving it, getting some sweet "Paris, Texas" vibes off of "Coming Home"

btw global is gonna be opening for bachman in mpls in the new year!

Very good shows happening in mpls these days, would love to catch that Metzger one (w/ Global and UMS) as well. Have fun with that.

Pretty nice playlist here from John Mulvey (his Uncut series). Lots of stuff hit up in this thread, but throwing more kudos towards Neal's Rag Lore "Blue For al-Watawit of Yashkur" tracks. Cool to see folks from here getting out there and bringing it. Hope you get that record made this year UMS!

my goal is to upgrade to a small basement studio, been scoping out gear and i think i get get a good setup going for less than $500

so easy to get obsessed w/researching gear/recording stuff but you also gotta remember that you won't ever make anything 1/2 as a good as a blind blake record that was recorded at less fidelity than the microphone on your iphone

i use my phone to record and i think it sounds pretty good!

for a basement recording with a device not built intentionally to record music

i am usually amazed by how good those iphone recordings come out. i mean, obviously not pro quality or anything... but good!

fwiw I once again voice my preference for separate threads for making this music / listening to this music. I'd frequent both, but these threads get p unwieldy as it is without microphone reviews and stuff.

merry christmas guys

"hello there, uh John Fahey here.."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrJQystmyl8

I thought "https" was supposed to block video embeds?

Oh well :/ still wishing well to everyone here anyway!

Alright, ventured into test threads.

Both "http" and "https" will embed viewable youtubes for me in Safari and Chrome.
If I use "www" as well as no URL prefix at all, the video won't embed.

Though, if I head back to the old thread, "https" links are still the way they were: not embedded.
That's all I've got, maybe this isn't the case for everyone else, but I'll leave out all http(s) going forward.

Always nice to spin the New Possibility during Xmas

this track here sounding awesome. wish records from these folks weren't so expensive to get shipped to the states... they're all so great!!

http://www.aquariumdrunkard.com/2013/12/10/black-dirt-oak-wayawanda-patent/

http://www.thefader.com/2014/05/01/another-country-folk-newcomer-myriam-gendron-sings-the-heartbroken-poetry-of-dorothy-parker

hey my wife came across this LP bc she's a massive dorothy parker fan and we mail-ordered it, it's music set to lyrics taken from parker's poetry. i think it would appeal to a lot of you guys.

heh, i just sold that to somebody. i liked it, but found i wasn't returning to it very often.

was listening to "the new possibility" last night and realized i don't really like it all that much. it seems very staid and unexciting compared to other fahey albums of the era. not the same heady mix of influences except in a few isolated passages. how to fahey fans rate those xmas albums anyway?

i think it sounds like a good idea on paper but it's a bit flat overall. especially as he kept on doing more and more of them. i think definitely an attempt to get some crossover money from the windham hill/leo kottke 'hot tub music' crowd.

don't really need to listen to it when i've got the Charlie Brown Christmas soundtrack

the crossover money must have worked for him, pretty sure every single fahey section in used record stores around town is stocked with multiple copies of those. i'm always hopeful when i start to rifle through and then i see a dozen xmas lps and one battered to shit copy of 'after the ball'...

The second Fahey christmas album is way better than the first because it sounds less like a christmas album and more like a proper Fahey album.

yeah, i do like that one better... ironically (?) that one is harder to find, i think it's OOP.

Speaking as a fan of Fahey and a fan of Christmas music, I don't listen to them much either - they sound too dry, austere to bring me much joy.

i th ink of them as being more conventionally pretty but less engaging than other fahey albums.

it's also sort of jarring to hear a lot of fahey's 'tricks' and picking techniques applied to something so straightforward as a christmas song you've heard a million times

"christ's saints of god fantasy" is a legit great piece, I like the slightly ridiculous russian christmas overture on the second album a lot too. all the best fahey duets are on old fashioned love imo but the ruskin ones aren't bad. I like some of the standards esp silent night on slide guitar, that's so gorgeous. the last piece on the second album is a bizarre mix of fahey in brooding bola sete mode and festive cheer that's my kind of christmas tune

^Agreed about "Christ's Saints of God Fantasy". From what I can recall, there were more than a couple moments that I do dig on the New Possibility. Maybe it's that all those moments came from this tune + "Silent Night".

The New Possibility (1968)
Christmas With John Fahey Volume II (1975)
Christmas Guitar - Volume One (1982)
Popular Songs of Christmas & New Years - with Terry Robb (1983)

I've always confusingly stared at inclusion of "Volume One" on the 1980 release, maybe it's because Varrick envisioned an entire series of "Christmas Guitar" on their label? Come to think of it, I've never listened to the 1983 release with Terry Robb. Not exactly a Christmas album, but "Yes, Jesus Loves Me - Guitar Hymns" (1980), could be included in this vein as well, and I'd say it's a pretty good one. Fahey is probably the only Christian music I've loved this much, hah! Imagine if his only recorded output was the Christmas albums and albums of hymns. What would our contemporary look like?

**I've always confusingly stared at inclusion of "Volume One" on the 1982 release

IIRC the playing can get a little sloppy (or "goopy" IMO) on yes, jesus loves me, but it's still somehow one of the better fahey albums, just because he draws a lot of inspiration from those old hymns.

i wonder why the 2nd christmas LP hasn't been properly reissued/remastered.

I was taking a look at discogs for that post and noticed Takoma & Rhino combined both Christmas volume 1 and 2 for a CD and cassette reissue in 1993. Then in 2012 Burnside Records cropped melodies and combined material from what looks like all the Christmas albums for a compilation generically titled "The John Fahey Christmas Album"... and in the process used a variation on the "Yes, Jesus Loves Me" album art for the cover of their comp. Man, if his catalog isn't one confusing thing after another.

Another bit of odd info is that Fahey used one of Ragtime Ralph's (credited as Ralph Johnston) compositions on the "Christmas Guitar - Volume One" album. I've always been bummed that Ralph's work still remain's officially unreleased at this point in time. Thankfully he used the resources of the internet though and has shared all his stuff with us that way. He says he's got a new album "Delta Slider Blues" ready for next year on his self-release label Empty Square.

I guess I'll be the one to stump for the New Possibility, where I can understand why people don't like it as a great Fahey record, and it is very autere and fairly unadventerous for him but I guess I sort of grew up going to a Lutheran church so I kind of find some kind of odd power in those fusty white key hymnal melodies and I think something in them resonates w.Fahey as well, whether it was greed driven or not it certainly wouldn't be the first or last time someone created art while trying to make a buck

but yeah it's very stately and sort of mournful to me, which i guess could be gloopy or overly staid to another's ears but something about it resonates w/me

it's definitely one of the most "uncool" Fahey records, maybe aside from the corny parts of Old Fashioned Love (which I kinda like too actually)

but yeah xmas hymns sort of resonate in some way back part of my mind being a little kid and going to "candlelight" xmas eve services w/my grandma or mom, where they turn the lights down and everyone gets to hold a candle which seemed really eerie to me in a way that stuff can only seem when you are very little

but yeah xmas hymns sort of resonate in some way back part of my mind being a little kid and going to "candlelight" xmas eve services w/my grandma or mom, where they turn the lights down and everyone gets to hold a candle which seemed really eerie to me in a way that stuff can only seem when you are very little

I have the same exact resonance with tunes like "Silent Night" and childhood church experiences. Can remember some seriously extended versions (that would be primarily instrumental) that would go as long as it would take for the candle-lighting to make its way to the back of the room. I got lost in that moment for sure, both eerie and beautiful and heavy all at once. Still love that tune (as evidenced by the cover I posted last year).

I will also rep for New Possibility, my mom would play that during the holidays when I was young and I've always loved it, it is certainly a different beast though

i dig the new possibility, austere is a very good word for it though

http://www.discogs.com/artist/1846960-Ralph-Johnston

Over the past day or so I went all in and submitted all of Ralph Johnston's Ragtime Ralph/Blind Brand X projects to the Discogs database. Good lord is that a tedious process. But I wanted to make sure his solo guitar discography is noted alongside his past efforts as a member of various surf (!) and experimental bands. Then, when I visited the profile page for the surf band he founded in 1989, I came across this gem:

Vancouver’s The Surfdusters were founded in 1989 by lead guitarist Ralph Johnston and rhythm guitarist Rich Hagensen. The played their last live appearance in November 2001.
Eleven of their instrumentals, all from the ‘Save The Waves’ CD, have been featured in various episodes of SpongeBob Square Pants.

Thanks! Pedal steel is still such a minority niche, but at least we've got Dave Easley, Susan Alcorn, Greg Liesz, and records like this.
More upcoming from Drag City

:SHACKLETON & SIX ORGANS ALIGN

What might appear to be the most unlikely collaboration of 2024 proves also to be one of the most invigorating listens of the year! Shackleton & Six Organs of Admittance are in full aural/metaphysical alignment on Jinxed by Being: a no-brainer fusion of Shackleton’s bass heavy cosmic dread and Six Organs’ ritual folksong, out June 28.

Longtime listeners know that both Shackleton and Six Organs of Admittance have been unafraid to pursue their muse into any and all encroaching depth of darkness or outer boundary of potential dissonance. They also share that ol’ maverick psychedelic ritual transcendental music vibe, don’t they? And a fascination with repetition and cycles. And a mutual inspiration drawn from alternative tunings and literature… all this considered, it’s been basically inevitable that Ben Chasny and Sam Shackleton would work together. Jinxed by Being finds Shackleton & Six Organs of Admittance delighting in this synthesis, reveling in unique sonic textures, esoteric deliveries, and new reinventions. Sam’s vocals — a rare occurrence — find melody with Ben’s on several tracks; elsewhere on the record, drum samples by Chasny (recorded in Six Organs’ embryonic stage) are re-sequenced anew by Shackleton.

The first single, “Stages of Capitulation”, captures Shackleton & Six Organs of Admittance’s timely meeting in a marvelously organic playground of world beats, with acid guitar and deep bass oozing throughout. As they chant an arcane ritual, a widescreen stereo image of their exotic environs expands into a mix alive with details, flashing from left to right and back again. Chasny’s music video provides a potent incense to burn through the track’s seven-minute runtime

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ERSbUwGWT4

Against the categorization of perceived genre rather than intention, encounters like Shackleton & Six Organs of Admittance may never have found themselves sitting next to each other, beyond alphabets and other institutional organizing principles. Rearrange your libraries (vinyl and streaming, that is) on June 28, 2024 — or you might miss getting Jinxed by Being!

I’m seeing Gwenifer Raymond tonight at Public Records in NYC! Saving the new Daniel Bachman record for my drive down the 101 next week, thanks everyone for the recommendations.

she's great live, have fun!

Latest from Drag City

ITEM OF THE WEEKEND:
ALASDAIR ROBERTS' PANGS

Drag City's ITEM OF THE DAY program provides an amazing insider discount on a different Drag City release each day, exclusively for mail order customers! Every one of your favorite Drag City artists is eligible: it's up to our tireless selection committee, using a complex series of algorithms to pick a new one every 24 hours!

Friday items hang around all weekend and this weekend's item is Alasdair Roberts' Pangs! Following the acoustic austerity of his self-titled 2015 release, Alasdair’s applied himself to electric guitar and band once again for his ninth album, Pangs. While similarly broad in range, Pangs brings different forms of song-craft and modes of collaboration again.

Can also listen to some of it on bandcamp, along with tracks from his other DC releases:
https://alasdairroberts.bandcamp.com/album/pangs

Really enjoying the new Kevin Coleman album on Centripetal Force:
https://kevincolemancf.bandcamp.com/album/imaginary-conversations

Closing track on this is magnificent. Thanks for the heads-up.

Makes me weirdly think of East River Pipe (maybe I just mean 40 Miles).

damn, yes it is.

Glad to point some people to it! I think it's a great record and, yeah, that closer is just amazing.

Not sure if this is the thread where we talk about Myriam Gendron, but her new album is also fantastic. Might be my favorite of hers yet. A few tracks with Jim White and Marissa Anderson, plus a Zoh Amba appearance that works really well!

Kevin's playing is really great sounding, thanks for sharing. A long, long time ago I think had one of those moments you see someone and wonder what kind of music they'll be putting out in ten years, it's good to see it a reality! I'm pretty sure I used to see him around at a lot of shows in the Fredericksburg area.

Was gonna put this on the Hipster Kisses (for long-lost ladies of thee canyon etc.), but might not be appropriate for this pilgrim lady:

On August 30, Drag City presents the first official reissue of Dorothy Carter’s 1976 debut album, her folk-music exegesis: Troubadour. It’s been 20 years since Dorothy’s passing — but thanks to last year’s reissue of her second album, Waillee Waillee (1978), and this edition of Troubadour, her music is surging forward ever more powerfully. Today’s announcement comes with a visualizer for the first single, “The King of Glory”, a hypnotic hymn hammered by Dorothy evoking western medieval music.

In her lifetime, Dorothy Carter, a self-made traveling musician and folklorist, brought forth masterful evocations on hammered dulcimer and psaltery from a myriad of times and places. Following a childhood spent around New England, Dorothy Carter traveled abroad for her higher education and found herself in Mexico during the late 1950s, intent on becoming a nun at the Cuernavaca monastery. Instead, she fell in with a group of expats including David Demby, his soon-to-be-wife Constance Demby (her moment of New Age musical breakthrough still three decades hence), and aspiring artist and musician Bob Rutman. In the early ’70s, this bunch would together form Central Maine Power Company: a troupe of almost feral improvisers playing on a combination of self-made and found instruments, with live video feedback to boot, performing across the Northeast at planetariums and even MoMA.

Dorothy had been playing music for decades by this point, but it wasn’t until 1976 that she’d record any of it. That year, she went to Cambridge’s Studio B with Rutman and friend Steve Baer at the console, with Constance and Sally Hilmer accompanying her. The performances captured there were released later that year as Troubadour: a record where, in addition to hammered dulcimer and psaltery, Dorothy played the flute and sang. She chose songs from all over: Appalachian folk tunes (“Shirt of Lace”), old and ancient psalms and hymns, Scottish, Irish, French and Israeli melodies (“The King Of Glory”), with a few of her own songs for good measure (“Masquerade”). They all flow together effortlessly under Dorothy and friends’ hands in a syncretic space that we can identify today as a garden of world musics — a highly energized, alternately meditative and proselytic recital whose vitality has only burgeoned in the decades since it appeared. As it should be: the music of Dorothy Carter is akin to a portal, linking her and us with the eternal.

The mythos and arcana Dorothy Carter pursued in relative obscurity is now inspiring an audience larger than she ever knew — and now, a long-held family dream comes true with this reissue of Troubadour, out August 30, 2024. The vinyl edition reproduces the original album package, adding an insert adorned with additional photos of Dorothy and her collection of instruments, as well as notes from reissue producer Eric Demby exploring the era—his childhood—from a vantage point of some 50 years. After all: wherever his parents David and Constance took the family, there too was Dorothy, as she lived and breathed, playing her hammered dulcimer.
Dorothy Carter

Drag City: https://www.dragcity.com/artists/dorothy-carter

Bandcamp: https://dorothycarter.bandcamp.com/album/troubadour

Pre-order / Pre-save Troubadour: lnk.to/troubadour

For more information and press requests, please contact:

Bailey Davis | Drag City - baileyd at dragcity.com