#BESTTHINGS2011 // JOHN FAHEY - Your Past Comes Back To Haunt You: The Fonotone Years [1958-1965] (Dust-To-Digital)
A portrait of the artist as a young man, Your Past Comes Back To Haunt You: The Fonotone Years [1958-1965] showcases John Fahey - our hero - in his formative years. Well before he would become the master of his own invention - long form solo guitar compositions played in a folk idiom/world’s most haunting music/best stuff on earth - this 5-cd boxset features some real illuminating early experiments in folk guitar playing as well as a number of sides recorded with Fahey as a rural blues singer (probably best he dropped this schtick but cool as hell to listen to now in retrospect). Literally a treasure trove of never-to-rarely before heard stuff, the set also comes with 90-page hardbound book complete with archival notes on the records, anecdotes about the man himself as well as Joe Bussard, the record collector and proprietor of Fonotone who recorded him, photographs of Fahey graduating high school (no joke), as well as by-the-handful amounts of complimentary things to say about the man. I only picked this set up yesterday but that’s not gonna stop me from #bestthinging it today - I’ve probably derived more value and joy from just holding this heavy ass box in my hands for the past 24 hours than I have from records I played 30 times over this year.
John Fahey - “The Portland Cement Factory at Monolith, California” from Your Past Comes Back To Haunt You: The Fonotone Years [1958-1965] http://soundcloud.com/dusttodigital/john-fahey-the-portland-cement
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#BESTTHINGS2011 is a series focusing on the “best things” released in 2011. Bucking arbitrary numerical distinction, these postings will appear in no particular order with no particular concern for whether they are original releases or reissues from this year. I’m hoping to post one a day for the remainder of the calendar year or until I run out of best things to write about. Not sure which will come first.
