JPF Home Page Forums General Messages General Message Forum Research into a Mysterious ~1968 Folk Song.

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Well, I will humor your diatribe this once, since you are new. I spent an hour helping you figure out on to get registered, and then was nice enough to respond to your post with solid experience and consideration. Your complete freak out got you nowhere as you did not really make an effort to "join" in with discussing anything, you just started asking for help and then sh*t all over the first attempt that was made.

My statement wasn't a brag, just a fact. I truly would LOVE to meet anyone living who had remotely heard as much or more music from as many different artists as I have or from more places. DJ's who listen to a playlist wouldn't come close as I often heard songs 1 time before the next artist played. We received music from 185 countries in 2009 alone, (or 42K albums and 560K songs). I had over 100K albums on every modern format just in my basement until recently. I started trying to GIVE THEM AWAY starting in the early 2000s. I tried and tried but no takers. So I had to pay to have them taken away. All that is left are the nominees from our awards and about 10-12K still on my porch. I have countless hard drives with digital files that nearly matched what CD Baby had for sale because we were partnered with them for many years and their members asked them to send them to us which they did, both physical copies as well as digital.

I have toured the Western World for the past 40 years hosting hundreds of musicians per night for showcases where as many as 75 artists have performed in a day, to workshops and events in 48 US States and 39 countries. I averaged hearing 40 artists (totaling over a hundred musicians on average, likely more (these are all LOW estimates), for over 200 nights a year. That 8K artists per year wasn't all individuals, many were full bands. They were not by any means unique, as we DID have repeats who played multiple shows and often would play multiple tours if I came through near to them, or somewhere they wanted to play. We sometimes had caravans of a dozen or more artists following me to multiple shows or even states or countries. We had photos of most performer starting in 1998-2010 and all were posted. We counted over 25K unique artists just in those years (when we first had a digital camera). We have never gotten an accurate count of ALL the shows as I was always on the road an didn't even have a camera until 1998 because film and developing was just too expensive for a FREE organization. I know I have 100s of boxes full of video tapes from showcase starting in the 80s using my VHS camera, then every type of updated tech through all digital. But I have no idea what is on what or who people are without listening to my introductions of those performers. I played a song, then Emceed and introduced every single artist. I figure it has to be a couple hundred thousand artists (and band members) that came through. We had 50 full bands in a single night in NYC in the mid 00s which was nuts because we had to be done and got everyone on stage at a rate of 10 per hour for 5 hours. They had to have at least 3 members to play that show but many had 5+. We were quite well known in the Western World, but had active members in every free country and live chapters in over 100 different cities that met monthly for over 20 years. (Last one closed just a couple years ago, though some still exist in name and occasion get togethers. I have mostly retired from touring. Too hard at 60.

I haven't even mentioned our Music Awards which were my main focus when I wasn't touring with shows. I spent 16 hours or more per day for months, sometimes YEARS! listening to songs. Usually a couple hundred by different artists PER DAY. If the songs sucked, I listened less, but the good ones all the way through. In 2009, I listened to at least 1 song from all 42k+ albums submitted, but mostly just listened to the first 5-6 songs long enough to put them in a genre to START their 5 round journey in our awards. They often moved later as things got sorted out, especially if they had multiple genres on the entire album. By doing so, we had a single consistent standard for each genre (over 100 by the end) and even if they needed to be changed, it made it possible to break the music down into smaller collections for the 10K+ plus judges that helped that year. You see, you have to invent ways to do stuff and I could pay someone to do that massive job, so I had to do it. No one else on the planet has ever done these things. No one else WOULD do these things. I dedicated every waking moment of 2008, 2009 up to the awards show working on that music from just one music awards. When it was all finished, I was rewarded with 3 near fatal strokes for the wear and tear I went through.

So yes, Mr. Swami, I have listened to more music from more artists than ANY other person, but if I am truly wrong, please bring that person forward so I can compare notes because it kind of sucks being in a club of 1 with that kind of experience. A guy named John Braheny, the Godfather of music songwriter education in the modern sense, dubbed me with that status as he had always been considered to hold that title but he said what he witnessed of my work first hand buried by an exponential factor what he had heard to be given that title so he handed it to me. So unless you can prove his assessment or all my history wrong, then your opinion happens to be wrong. And he sadly passed away years ago, and I have since finished another epic music awards in 2020 on top of that 2009 one.

I will address one more point you made before I stopped reading:

All of your claims of school boy bands have nothing to do with my points. In the 80s, those tools became AFFORDABLE to EVERYONE. Obviously, based on your rude response and obnoxious privileged attitude, you weren't a poor working musician in the early DIY era where ACTUAL poor kids could buy a 4 track. The Fostex 4 Track recorder was the start of a new era of affordable gear. I got mine in 1986.

But the REAL reason I discount OLDER creation dates was back then only rich kids and actual TALENT had that gear. Making Vinyl recordings was costly. Even in the early cassette industry, it was expensive and rare to have more than a low quality home made tape. Most poor kids used regular cassette decks. I also mentioned 4 track because the sonic quality of that recording is AWFUL. That does not remotely suggest pro players, singers or recording studios. It is a home recording, with live players (not accurate enough to be drum machines. I owned a LOT of them, at first I thought maybe it was a Roland Drum machine, but it is just better quality than that recording. It would stick out even in a terrible mix, which that is. It suggests bounced tracks on a 4 track or 2 cassette decks (did it A LOT) and no studio (not even owned by a rich kid) would sound so awful.

I didn't bother to read the rest of your diatribe and I do not expect many to read mine. I mostly posted this because it is good to remind folks who ARE curious, now and then, how much work I have put into this organization which turns 40 in 6 months.

My final thought is you are a lonely guy who has romanticized this urban legend (most likely a home demo from the 1985-1995 era) posted by whoever benefits from the traffic originally who LOVES to see folks like you burn away your life chasing a fantasy they created. I know of stories of people posting their old demos on these types of sites who later laughed at all the people who blindly bought into the hype. Even if I am wrong about the era (which I doubt) I offered an honest assessment to your question when no one else had responded.

As they say, no good deed goes unpunished.