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Tompkins Square: Imaginational Anthem compilations and American Folk Guitar

Started by Smeraldina Rima, August 01, 2021, 07:59:14 PM

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Since 2005, Tompkins Square label has been releasing American folk music and a few jazz albums and other stuff. It has a sublabel for its Imaginational Anthem compilations - which are named after a tune by Max Ochs, his tribute to John Fahey. Two versions of that tune and Fahey's own version of "O Holy Night" appeared on the first compilation, which had thirteen previously unreleased tracks. The tenth compilation - an "Overseas Edition" - was released last year.



Max Ochs's 2008 album Hooray for Another Day was an early highlight on the label besides the first few compilations. It has some spoken poems in between the guitar tunes that a reviewer thought were crap but I liked and thought made the album more enjoyable overall.

QuoteThe album, recorded last year, is a mix of instrumental guitar songs and spoken-word poems, and it's clear from both that though many years have passed, Max is still very much living in the East Village of 1967. And while Max is able to match his cousin for sheer musicality — the guitar pieces here are by turns impressive, absorbing, and moving — he simply does not have the same literary chops. These poems are not just bad, they're awful — boring, overly self-conscious, and almost laughable in their phrasing.



Besides the guitar compositions and the poems, Ochs sings on the last track, "Stranger", which the notes say was mostly written by his friend Mike Tucker after they had read the book by Albert Camus, and sounds a bit like Ira Kaplan from Yo La Tengo. The only problem with the tune "Imaginational Anthem" itself is that it has a bit that sounds to me like 'it's gonna be a beautiful day' from "Curtains" by Elbow.

Some other highlights from Tompkins Square include Harry Taussig's Fate is Only Twice which harks back (apparently hark and harken just mean listen) to his 1965 Fate is Only Once album that Tompkins Square had first re-released; the re-release of John Hulburt's 1975 album Opus III, followed by some lost tapes from 1998 released as Leap Frog; the English guitarist Michael Chapman's Trainsong: Guitar Compositions 1967-2010; Spine River : The Guitar Music of Wall Matthews, 1967​-​1981; and the recent five disc collection Songs Of The Avatars: The Lost Master Tapes of Robbie Basho.

The first Imaginational Anthem compilation also had a nicely clumsy 1996 recording of an untitled track by Sandy Bull.



Sandy Bull's classical and folk styles are very well represented on the Vanguard Visionaries compilation made from the best of his first four hit and miss albums for Vanguard. I'd consider that the best introduction to his music and I don't think Tompkins Square have had anything else by him. I'll also mention here the 2012 Drag City old live recording of him playing with his Rhythm Ace machine: Sandy Bull & The Rhythm Ace – Live 1976. There's a track in which he introduces the Rhythm Ace as his backing band before playing this song: Love is Forever (Not his normal kind of thing, although he doesn't really have one.)

I was moved to start this thread after listening to a John Fahey tune recently from a strange album of his: Requiem for John Hurt

Quote"Requiem for John Hurt" refers to influential country blues singer and guitarist Mississippi John Hurt. Fahey recalled "He was in his quiet way, a very great man, and I deeply mourn our loss of him. So, I wrote this requiem for him, about him, but I play it the way Charley Patton would have played it, had he ever thought of such a thing, which of course he never would have."

There is also a Vanguard Visionaries compilation for Mississippi John Hurt. It includes a song called "Make me a pallet on your floor" that's supposed to have been written in the 1890s and is similar in some ways to the song "Freight Train". I wondered if Elizabeth Cotton had heard it when she wrote the latter, or if that chord progression and the other similarities were a basis of several songs.

I suppose the thread is about the new interest in old American folk guitarists: reissues, new recordings, lost tapes and the new musicians that have taken inspiration from them.

chveik

i love Fahey and Basho.

this might be of interest to you

http://grapewrath.blogspot.com/2008/04/roots-of-john-fahey.html

a guy compiled a lot of songs that inspired Fahey in one way or another, hill country blues and appalachian music obviously but also Bartok, balinese gamelan and Harry Partch.

Thanks, it is. Downloaded the compilations and looking forward to listening.

I like playing John Fahey style guitar, and the mnemonic I use to remember how to put a guitar in open G tuning is:
Dog! Good Dog! Good Boy Dog!

sardines

My favourite of these is volume 8-the private press.
Mainly because it can lead you down a discogs rabbit hole of labels and artists you'll probably never hear (surely it is worth tracking down the only 2 releases on the brilliantly named 'collie-flower records'?)

In terms of new artists, everything I've heard from Matthew J. Rolin has been excellent and irritatingly limited and unavailable in Europe.

one_sharper

Quote from: sardines on August 03, 2021, 05:10:15 PM
In terms of new artists, everything I've heard from Matthew J. Rolin has been excellent and irritatingly limited and unavailable in Europe.

Seconding this - I only came across his music at the end of last year (heard 'There Is No Light and the Tunnel Has No End'). The latest Powers Rolin Duo album (Rolin on guitar; Jen Powers on hammered dulcimer and autoharp) is beautiful, and I really enjoyed the Gerycz/Powers/Rolin and Rolin solo albums so far this year.

https://matthewjrolin.bandcamp.com/track/there-is-no-light-and-the-tunnel-has-no-end
https://feedingtuberecords.bandcamp.com/album/the-dreaming-bridge
https://gprbeacon.bandcamp.com/album/beacon
https://aepowersrolinduo.bandcamp.com/album/strange-fortune

one_sharper

Also really like William Tyler, Steve Gunn (who has produced a couple of albums by Michael Chapman, mentioned up-thread), and Bill MacKay (who's collaborated with Ryley Walker a fair bit).

One of my favourite albums so far this year is Urban Driftwood by Yasmin Williams, a finger-style guitarist who's well worth checking out.
https://yasminwilliams.bandcamp.com/album/urban-driftwood

I've been listening to Gwenifer Raymond quite a lot too - most recent album came out on Tompkins Square last year.
https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/strange-lights-over-garth-mountain