The Revenge of Blind Joe Death: The John Fahey Tribute Album
Encyclopedia
The Revenge of Blind Joe Death: The John Fahey Tribute Album is a tribute CD to guitarist John Fahey
released in 2006 by Takoma Records
.
, former art director and later Vice President and General Manager of Fahey's label, Takoma Records
. It contains a collection of interpretations of Fahey compositions and original compositions played in Fahey's style. All the performers were either friends, students, collaborators or label-mates of Fahey.
The final song, recorded to sound like a scratchy 78 rpm record, is credited to Blind Joe Death himself, Fahey's alter-ego during his early career. The actual performer is not revealed.
Daniel Spicer of PopMatters
singled out specific performances as "less successful" as others, but called the album "commendable and hugely enjoyable tribute to a unique giant of American music." He singles out George Winston's harmonica version of "Sally Goodin" as "a relentless, barrage of percussive blowing that whips up a dark vortex of drones and overtones, dragging the listener down to a tiny point of non-existence. It really must be heard to be believed."
John Fahey (musician)
John Fahey was an American fingerstyle guitarist and composer who pioneered the steel-string acoustic guitar as a solo instrument. His style has been greatly influential and has been described as the foundation of American Primitivism, a term borrowed from painting and referring mainly to the...
released in 2006 by Takoma Records
Takoma Records
Takoma Records was a small but influential record label founded by John Fahey in the late 1950s.. It was named after Fahey's hometown, the Washington, D.C. suburb of Takoma Park, Maryland.-History:...
.
History
This John Fahey tribute album was produced by Jon MondayJon Monday
Jon Monday is an American producer and distributor of CDs and DVDs across an eclectic range of material such as Swami Prabhavananda, Aldous Huxley, Christopher Isherwood, Huston Smith, Chalmers Johnson, and Charles Bukowski...
, former art director and later Vice President and General Manager of Fahey's label, Takoma Records
Takoma Records
Takoma Records was a small but influential record label founded by John Fahey in the late 1950s.. It was named after Fahey's hometown, the Washington, D.C. suburb of Takoma Park, Maryland.-History:...
. It contains a collection of interpretations of Fahey compositions and original compositions played in Fahey's style. All the performers were either friends, students, collaborators or label-mates of Fahey.
The final song, recorded to sound like a scratchy 78 rpm record, is credited to Blind Joe Death himself, Fahey's alter-ego during his early career. The actual performer is not revealed.
Reception
In his Allmusic review, critic Mark Deming praised the album and many of the performances, but also wrote "... the sense of creative adventure and musical risk that was so much a part of John Fahey's music is largely missing, and a number of the guitarists here offer renditions that are so close to the sound and style of the original that they seem almost pointless except as a show of technique..." and that it is "a well-intentioned labor of love, but its polished surfaces lack the edgy textures that were so important to Fahey's work"Daniel Spicer of PopMatters
PopMatters
PopMatters is an international webzine of cultural criticism that covers many aspects of popular culture. PopMatters publishes reviews, interviews, and detailed essays on most cultural products and expressions in areas such as music, television, films, books, video games, comics, sports, theater,...
singled out specific performances as "less successful" as others, but called the album "commendable and hugely enjoyable tribute to a unique giant of American music." He singles out George Winston's harmonica version of "Sally Goodin" as "a relentless, barrage of percussive blowing that whips up a dark vortex of drones and overtones, dragging the listener down to a tiny point of non-existence. It really must be heard to be believed."