[Jandek] re: a letter from Jandek

[rangoon]

> A couple weeks ago, I sent a copy of an LP I released last year
> (Jeff Fuccillo with John Fahey, "Disturbed Strings") to
> Corwood Industries. Byron Coley had reviewed it in Arthur &
> noted Jandek's influence, among others, on Fuccillo's playing,
> and I was curious to see what Jandek's reaction to it would be.
> I got a package from him today that included a full-page
> letter of his comments on the record (or, more accurately, his
> thoughts on the stylistic comparison), a mention of his own
> contact with Fahey ("We received communication from John Fahey
> some 10 years ago or more. He sent "The Legend Of Blind Joe
> Death" along with personal correspondence...")

This is fascinating - I've always considered there to be at least a
superficial parallel between Jandek & Fahey, specifically in that
a) they both recorded and released self-produced albums into a critical
vacuum (Glenn Jones' notes for the CD issue of 'The Legend of Blind
Joe Death' says that "in retrospect not even the earliest Sun Ra
records on Ra's El Saturn label or the self-produced albums by Harry
Partch on Gate 5 seems as hard pressd to find an audience as John's
first effort...", easily as applicable to Corwood releases) and
b) Fahey's obfuscation of his own biography (especially his 'Blind Joe
Death' guise), as well as his consistently deceptive sleevenotes served
the same purpose of distracting and deflecting the listener as Jandek's
consistent absence of sleevenotes or information...I'm certainly not
trying to hammer this point (despite my earlier post about a parallel
between 'Later On' & a few Fahey albums), nor that Jandek is a 'serious
blues musician', but without ever really expecting any kind of reciprocal
'influence', the fact that this acknowledges that both artists were even
*aware* of each other's work feels really important (if only to me...) -
thanks for the information (and I need to track down the Jeff Fuccillo
album as well!)

Gavin

mailto:rangoon at ntlworld.com