I thought and still think that he, more than anyone I know or have ever heard, plays the steel string guitar the way it should be played, and it's really incredible.

I'm Jessica Hopper. I'm from KCRW, this is Lost Notes.

John Fahey has long been heralded as a genius.

He's a master of the steel string guitar and a pioneer of what's called American Primitive.

He started putting out his own records in 1959, just him playing acoustic guitar.

And by the 1970s, he had a cult following.

By the early 1990s, Fahey's work was being rediscovered, and his music was being championed by

the likes of Sonic Youth, Beck, Pete Townsend. By then, Fahey had gone electric and turned

towards 20th century classical music.

Some of these later records were decidedly difficult.

But so was Fahey.

I'm literally listening to women talk about how he was bad to them.

And also, I'm enjoying his music. Like, should I not be listening

to it? This is Carla Green, a reporter with KCRW. Famous men generally, it doesn't happen often that

their story gets told through the eyes of the women that they interacted with or the women that

they loved. And that, you know, complicates the legacy of

men like Fahey, and I think that it should. So that made me want to do the story of John Fahey,

but through the eyes of the women who, like, knew and who loved him.

Right now, there's a lot of discussion of how to deal with problematic artists.

But for the women in John Fahey's life, their own reconciliation of Fahey, the artist, and the fey that they knew, is, at best, complicated.

He could be a charming romantic one day and a cruel bully the next.

The women themselves, the women who had this experience, I don't think, would say that they were in abusive relationships with Fahy.

...