John Fahey-- City Of Refuge (Tim/Kerr Records 644830127) John Fahey-- Let Go (Varrick Records VR008)
I do not, and have never thought of myself as a "folk" musician or a new age musician, guitarist, or sympathyzer [sic]. I despize [sic] all "revivalists" of folk music, and I despize all "New Age" music, even though Will Ackerman or some other equally obnoxious person might accuse me of being the grandfather of New Age guitar, music, piano or whatever... In all my music I have never tried to do anything except express emotions, sometimes very dark emotions, depression, hatred, etc., in a coherent musical language. In the current season, the only people who understand me and with whom I have anything in common are punks and alternative and industrial and no wave and anti-folk etc. ... My category is alternative, period. I object to any other categorization. ... These people understand what I am doing more than any other group of people ever has. Furthermore I am socially in with punks and alternatives. ... I am actively involved with a number of these groups, and am making records and record deals under this heading. Recently I participated in a celebration of Jerry Garcia's death. AND LET ME ASSURE YOU THAT WE MEANT IT MAN. I find [Alternative] to be the most accurate and friendly category that exists. ... I do hope that nobody will try to make me out as a child of the sixties. I was playing what I play before and after the sixties. This period had very little influence on me. I was never a hippie, and had no hippie friends.
So goes, in part, the typewritten letter to "Bill" that serves as de facto liner to "City Of Refuge," acoustic guitarist John Fahey's first new album in five years. Gosh. Well, after all those years of ill health it's nice that John's getting out and doing things with his young friends. And he's got a point about the categorizations. It's true, he was never "new age," he was never really part of any larger musical or social movement, he always went his own way, et cetera ad infinitum, so "Alternative" is as apt a term as any for him. Except that in the current season, "Alternative" applies to anybody from Derek Bailey and Gastr del Sol to No Doubt and 311. . . which is to say that the term has long since been rendered as pointless as "Rock"-- or "Folk" for that matter-- so it's kind of sad that John's chosen the current season in which to wave the "Alternative" flag. And that he's picked the current season in which to attack New Age music so aggressively, now that it's pretty much dead and buried anyway (maybe he just oughta leave Oregon). And that he seems to be trying to boost his street cred by aligning himself with lesser talents like Jim O'Rourke and Hope Sandoval (whom he was recently quoted as deeming "the outstanding female vocalist of the 20th century"-- he jests, one hopes). I mean, don't get me wrong, the guy can have his own opinions and choose his own friends, it's nothin' to me. . . Indeed, I could easily excuse all of the above, if only the music on "City Of Refuge" were the return to form I'd been hoping for. In fact, advance word that much of the record was taken up with tape-collage musique concrete had me excited-- he hasn't done anything of that nature since, well, since that "disgusting debacle of a decade," the sixties, and he has a definite gift for it. And it was heartening to know he wasn't going to be re-emerging with another dull Christmas album. Obviously City Of Refuge is a kind of catharsis for Fahey, a purge, a loud and defiant NO to all who/that would pigeonhole and otherwise constrain his creativity. But in the process he's also denied himself (not to mention his audience) those artistic strengths that give most of his earlier negations their positive power-- things like melodic and harmonic development, rhythmic structure, dynamics, wit, emotional range, and playing technique. Aside from the corruscating opening "Fanfare," there just isn't much on "City Of Refuge" that compels enthusiasm. Even the more coherent guitar pieces here are virtually devoid of melodic interest-- they function on the level of background music for a dry art-house flick, or even-- sigh-- a mildly ill-tempered New Age record, if there were such a thing. And bar a few brief captivating moments here and there, the musique concrete compares unfavorably to, say, Lou Reed's "Metal Machine Music," let alone past Fahey masterpieces like "The Singing Bridge Of Memphis, Tennessee" (see "The Yellow Princess" or "The Essential John Fahey" on Vanguard). The balance of "City Of Refuge" simply sounds like what you might get if you gave a six-year-old an acoustic guitar and a white noise generator and recorded the results-- except that there would be in the six-year-old's work a genuinely positive and creative exuberance that is conspicuous in its absence here. It's hard to know whether "City Of Refuge" is a noble failure or a contemptible one. But as a Fahey fan-- a fan of much of his darker and more experimental music, at that-- I prefer to see it as a faltering first step toward grander things. You can never count a genius out for good, and Fahey still has a lot to say; perhaps next time his sound and fury will signify more than mere petulance and contempt. The timing of Varrick's long-overdue reissue of "Let Go" (originally released in 1984) could scarcely be more appropriate, or more inappropriate. In all of Fahey's vast catalog you could not find an album further removed from the depression and loathing that consume "City Of Refuge," except perhaps for the collections of hymns and Christmas carols. Which is not to say that "Let Go" bypasses Fahey's darker side entirely-- he hasn't made an album yet, secular or otherwise, that does-- but the darkness here is more passive than aggressive, taking the form of melancholy or mild dread rather than rage. In the program notes Fahey writes of the title track (a Baden Powell composition): "In Portuguese ['Ossanha'] has the following connotations: 'Let it go. There's nothing you can do, so why continue fighting it. The battle is already over, only you don't know and you lose. Forget it. Give in. Relax.' Resignation. ... The major key bridge suggests a backward look at a pleasant time in life during which the petty pace, the clock-like descending notes, the Latin fatalism perhaps abated for a short period. But the piece ends the same way it began, expressing the inexorable goose steps of time and mixed metaphors." Clearly, Fahey's sense of humor is intact on "Let Go," fatalism notwithstanding. This is by far Fahey's prettiest album, but its prettiness is not in any way false or shallow; it's just, well, gorgeous, and genuinely moving, haunting, like a fond memory from the ever-more-distant past. Even the inexplicably faithful cover of "Layla" ("Talk about ambition, chutzpah-- that's us. Send money."), once you get past the inevitable whaat?! that results from hearing that overly familiar intro in this context, retrieves the wistfulness that subsumed the song the first time you heard it but that gradually receded over the course of the next several thousand auditions. Despite (not because of) it's lack of sturm und drang, "Let Go" stands with "God, Time And Causality" (Shanachie, 1990) as Fahey's strongest work of the last 25 years or more. And despite "City Of Refuge," I won't be at all surprised if I'm able to say the same for his next album.
-- Charles Olver