Album Notes

How can one describe “The Fan Fair Record”? To properly understand the album one must know the context under which the album was born.

“Fan Fair”, the band itself consists of two young men by the names of Richard Ringer and JT Hathaway. These two fellows often compose music together, and have been formally associated with, “The Hearts Club”, “The Happiness Package”, and “Octavius the Perky” finally, the twos collaboration have been named “Fan Fair”.

The album “The Fan Fair Record” is a long overdue album. While the duo write together often, both have focused on mainly their solo carriers.

Richard Ringer produced a not for retail album entitled “The Gates of Mars”, this told the tale of a fictional war taking place right after WW2. In 2006 Ringer produced “In Defense of the Madman”, an epic album (available only by digital retailers, itunes, rhapsody, yahoo music, ect.) which follows right after TGOM in chronicling the days after the end of earth. This was released under the independently owned label “Fan Fair Records”. In the album Ringer meddles in folk, post rock, lo-fi, and some strange sound that has only been described as “Ringer Rock”. Ringer was planning on producing a third, one that would complete the trilogy entitled “They Decayed Like Flags”, however this did not happen. The production was delayed, and eventually scraped. Many of the songs from the vision of “They Decayed Like Flags” have been redone and synergized into “The Fan Fair Record”.

Hathaway, currently not having any albums available at retail, had produced a collection of strictly folk songs, grounded in the theme of WW1. While the album is currently unavailable, he was able to develop a following from live shows and his myspace account. This album is called “Where the World Waits”. In an unexpected turn, his next project was an untitled one featuring mod-techno beats, strong punchy vocals, and a lot of distorted beat boxing. It was considerably different from his first project, but still carried with it the Hathaway touch of incredible lyricism and catchy layers of music.

There has always been talk of a “Fan Fair Record”, something that would bind these two powerful forces, Ringer, dipping into the darkness with depressing melodies of worlds lost, and Hathaway, with his sugar stained vocals piercing through the brightness and beauty of his upbeat riffs. This would be a grand collaboration. Then on April 23, 2007, purevolume.com users got a surprising message “The Fan Fair Record is coming…”

This was not your ordinary independently produced album. This was “Fan Fair”. The sound ranges from acoustic folk, to large orchestrations of electric and synthesizer, and sounds custom made. One must listen to fully appreciate the sound for what it is, unique and daring, complex and somehow grand.

Finally, “The Fan Fair Record” is available to the public. Treasure it, this has been a long time coming.