To celebrate the 20th anniversary of JOMF’s ‘Flags Of The Sacred Harp’, a re-imagining of traditional hymns and anthems from the original American songbook that was first published in 1844, Fire releases a double vinyl edition of this much-heralded work.
JOMF “patiently unravel their source material’s tangled threads, respooling them into wondrously evocative yet deeply personalized new devotionals.” Pitchfork
Imagine The Velvet Underground’s ‘Sweet Nuthin’ fed through a spirit glass; a super slow incantation haunted by the ghosts of the band’s 40 transient members. Mystical folkisms cluster as the songs come in and out of focus and their improvisational slew matures.
Recorded at Supreme Reality studios in Portland over the summer of 2005; Tom Greenwood had just returned to the City following a few years of touring and began recording over several marathon sessions.
“I did a lot of playing and recording with David Bryant, from Godspeed You! Black Emperor, and Set Fire to Flames, a lot of us from JOMF, and all the Montreal folks did a massive recording project in Red Hook, NY (still unreleased) where we rented a space and just kind of lived there for a while in the summer of 2004, recording beautiful, long-form, untamed ideas. It was incredibly inspiring, and really opened the door to what we did on Flags.” Tom Greenwood
This special edition reissue of ‘Flags Of The Sacred Harp’ is released with unreleased material that was written around the album’s original release.
“I tried to select material that was recorded near the time frame- we never did really do a proper tour supporting Flags, the material is not easy to re-create live, and we never had a budget to fill out the touring group to support the sound on the record. I think they reflect the fragility of that work.”
Formed in 1994, JOMF is an ever-morphing collective nudging the American experimental scene, drawing from a variety of subgenres including folk from around the world, drone, free jazz, psychedelia, and noise rock.
