The Voice of the Turtle
PART FOUR : EXCERPTS FROM IFC CORRESPONDENCE
SPECIFICALLY RELATING TO THE VOT.
Can you imagine the IFC around a table at a
pub talking like this?
Yes, and I can imagine people at nearby
tables drinking up and leaving with nervous looks
behind as they overhear "No, that was the one without
the Tibetan Monks!" "Gamelan Gongs were never on the
Black Label version!!" "I think you're wrong on that
one, let me check my copy..." "What's that you got
there, a Green Label edition...Green????" Etc Etc.>
I also imagine the IFC round a table in a
pub with Fahey. We each whack down onto the table all
the different editions of VOT and say "Now then,
Fahey, you're not leaving until you've explained all
this - and it better be good." First he blusters -
"C’mon guys, my memory ain't what it usta be, whatsa
sense in digging up all this anyway..." But the IFC
have posted a burly henchman at each exit. “It was all
a big joke…” moans Fahey. But the IFC aren’t laughing.
My money is on at least 3 VOT, although I
wonder about possibly a 4th and/or 5th, minor
pressings that were slipped into the racks in small
music stores during travels stateside and abroad,
unbeknownst to the poor shopkeeper who then had to
contend with irate Faheyites who discovered that
Johnny got a different VOT than me.
The whole thing is like that Jorge Luis
Borges story "Tlon, Uqbar,Orbis Tertius". Also, I
think the musical members of the IFC and their
immediate friends and family, should record a parody
of VOT replete with hideous discographical problems,
backward masking, hidden tracks, missattributed
titles, stolen songs, and so forth, and force Fahey to
listen to it and figure it all out.
This was the break in the case we'd all been
waiting for. We'd been sweating it out for weeks,
months, and finally it looked as if the chief suspect,
the big man himself, was going to cough. We had to
think how we were gonna play it. One wrong move and we
knew he'd skip for sure. We hadda figure all the
angles...
Voice of the Turtle