Terry Folger - Folger/Armchair Macedonia, ca. mid-80s (2 .zip archives, download Side A and Side B, total size 112MB)
In the summer of 1983, when I first rang the doorbell at WFMU, it was Terry Folger who answered the door. He was music director at the time, and seemed to be the only person there. I was starting classes at Upsala that coming fall and was interested in getting involved with the station. Terry gave me a little tour of the studios and offices (situated at that time in the basement beneath the freshman dorm in Froeberg Hall), and we didn't meet again until classes started, Terry also being an Upsala student at the time. At that first meeting, I was sporting shoulder-length hair and a full beard, and Terry would later confide in me that he thought I must have been some sort of "classic rock freak." We quickly became good friends, drinking and talking for hours at a time in one another's dorm rooms.
Terry often encouraged me to start doing a show on the air, and I finally began my on-air tenure at WFMU in March of 1984. Sitting in on Terry's shows was always a treat for me, and I learned so much by just watching him test his own limits (and the patience of then-station manager Bruce Longstreet) and by observing the emotional transformations (and sometimes collapses) he would go through while on the air. Terry was also the first person to play me The Minutemen, Wire, No New York, James Blood Ulmer and Lester Bowie, as well as introducing me to the work of so-called "decadent" writers like Alfred Jarry (a passion that I pursue to this day.)
Lest he be remembered mostly for his infamous 1980 jump from the roof of the Hotel Chelsea and his untimely passing in 1994 from AIDS-related illness, I must add that I think of Terry often, and when I do it's his comic misanthropy, his abstract and bileful wit, his passions for NY baseball, subversive literature and unusual music, his writing and songwriting, his predictions of the coming "econo-cataclysm," and his capacities for free association and psychedelics consumption that most define him in my memories. All of these exceptional qualities are on full display with this tape, which was not so much a "release" as a tape he made in a various configurations over the years for different people. While Terry would some years later form the combo Van Gelder, these early solo recordings (many of them done via primitive multitracking in WFMU's old production studio) are hilarious, bizarre, gut-bearing blasts of idiosyncrasy. If there's one point I've been trying to make in this series of posts, it's that home recording at its best gives the listener a microscopic view into the mind and soul of the artist, a view that is most often diluted when professional studio recording comes into play. This tape by my old friend Terry certainly bears that out.
Highlights of this tape include: a few WFMU station-related promos; early versions of the mini-classics "Whose Birthday Is It?" and "Here Comes Fred"; the mind-bending "Clean Your Genitalia/The Undertaker's Instructions"; two versions of the song "Where's Kerouac When You Need Him?"; "Naked" (an R. Stevie Moore cover); and two tracks from Terry's slushy blues-piano alter ego, Ol' Prik McTig. Hope you enjoy. (Note: Where tracks ran together on the original cassette, they have been ripped as a single mp3.)
Oh William, you have done Terry so damned proud by posting this.
I still have the second- or third- generation copy of this which was sent to me by Barry Mann. (Speaking of which, where is Barry these days?) It's about time the great music and debauchery contained within got a chance to be heard by the rest of the world, so that they too can finally hear just how incredible and beautiful a person Terry Folger was.
The gods smile upon you today, Mr. Berger. Thanks.
Posted by: Ray Brazen | July 13, 2007 at 12:39 PM
Prik McTig AT LAST! Haven't heard that in a loooooong time. Bless you, my son.
Posted by: Krys O. | July 13, 2007 at 02:48 PM
It seems that my appreciation for TKF has grown deeper as I have grown older.
There's a certain nostalgia to his memory now. When I think of him, his sprit is there and it is tied in with the stations history.
I didn’t even know he was Armchair Macedonia, I heard him singing Sentimental Journey It was played on the radio with the 'oh Shit'(When Armchair Macedonia spilled his drink) left in Way before the FCC went totally Fascist.
We're talking about a guy who used to be hiding in his car in the Froberg hall parking lot with someone else, while listening to the final DJ sign off the air and then sneak back in and turn everything back on again, and start broadcasting. ( This was when FMU was not 24 hours).
He was not in favor of FMU winning it's lawsuit in 1989.
I thought that was surprising at the time. But now I can see why, he wanted FMU to stay integrally small with it's cult following and to stay in NJ and not become so New York Oriented.
He played and wrote the most eccentrically intelligent music too.
William, we should get together and make A TKF Tribute CD / Web page this fall. And put some Vanilla Bean stuff up there too, those guys were the Syd Barretts of WFMU, Left behind but essential to the spirit of everything that came after.
F the FCC YO!
Posted by: TJK Haywood | July 13, 2007 at 04:27 PM
I remember Terry and that time period well. Thanks for posting. Dave Baron
Posted by: Dave Baron | July 15, 2007 at 08:25 PM
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William Berger
Vitória - ES
Brasil
Posted by: William Berger | August 10, 2007 at 07:17 AM