F: 'no idea who john fahey is but the guy with the beard and glasses looks a lot like twink'

once again fahey week ends in failure as even horsemouth's friends deny all knowledge of the curmudgeonly one. 

there's a cartoon. it shows a well-stocked second hand record shop. two men have reached for a paramount LP (surely some mistake?) at the same time, one has a guitar, the other has a beard and glasses. 

to recap;

the one with the guitar

john fahey 

john fahey was a confused teenager in takoma park near washington in the early 60ies. he was a big fan of the pre-war acoustic blues but he realised that as a young white guy (and one born in the washington suburbs) while he might be able to learn to play it he wasn't going to be able to sing it in any kind of a convincing fashion. his journey towards making art out of this predicament is his hero's journey.

he makes of this music instrumental music. 

he becomes a record label owner. he has brief moments in the sun, but he doesn't become ry cooder soundtrack king, he remains a cult artist. he ends up divorced, in ill-health and homeless and living in oregon. but then he is taken up by the likes of sonic youth etc. and has a second wind. and then he dies.

'the guy with the beard and glasses'

harry everett smith

harry everett smith gets into the anthropology racket earlier than fahey (basically he's a beatnik). he's also an avant-guard film-maker. like fahey he gets into collecting the pre-war blues and hillbilly records. eventually he sells a selection of his collection to moses ash of folkways records and makes the anthology of modern american folk music  out of it. this is the motherlode of the folk scene (and of that later  americana  style). 

the america that between them they depict is uncanny and dark, it is not a sunny uplands.

harry everett smith eventually gets his honours (he is in new york, he is more closely tied to a film-maker's, artists, gallery support structure) but then he too dies.

old age does for them both. 

fahey is the founder of a school. one of his major acolytes is robbie basho. today is the anniversary of basho's death and fahey's birth. basho stands in for all of fahey's acolytes who go forth to populate the world with fingerpicked guitar derived (in part) from the pre-war blues. basho dies young. he falls into obscurity. 

this is why it is fitting that in the cartoon they should both be contending over a paramount album (an early record label that released lots of pre-war blues and hillbilly music on shellac 78s). 

horsemouth was planning to give you a matsuo basho, robbie basho, steffen basho-junghans tale but he finds the cartoon more compelling. 

fahey week 2023 ends.

horsemouth is laid low by the cold/ flu (or whatever the fuck it is). symptoms - cough, sore throat, slight fever, headache. ian has come down with it also. horsemouth has a vague hope it will clear up by the weekend.