Tommy Jay - Tommy Jay's Short Sagas Of Sorrow LP [Hozac]

New Lost recordings from Ohio legend Tommy Jay!

First got into the Mike Rep stuff via Jeff Evans and Gibson Bros and was immediately sucked into the weird outsider / true underground vibe! These were folks making music for themselves and other "heads," inspired by The Velvet Underground, unheralded hippie / folk bands, and the protest movement of the late 60s / early 70s. Old Age / No Age was the greatest label, just releasing what they wanted for whomever found it. Great to have Hozac releasing these lost recordings!



A true Ohio outsider legend in every sense, Tommy Jay along with his producer/co-hort Mike Rep were recording like crazy in the mid 1970s and we’re so glad they did. What we have here before you is an unreleased 1974 studio album with another book of classics intertwined within, and if you’ve been following Tommy’s hypnotic trajectory with Mike Rep, True Believers, and the Harrisburg Players over the years, it’s another long-awaited reward for your faith in this underground system you’re invested in.



Pure Ohio Gold as they say, and as a recently unearthed recording, we’re proud to present it for the first time anywhere, solidifying Tommy Jay’s pillar-like influence in the sick and twisted Harrisburg underground. Forever underrated, Tommy shines hard here for the singer-songwriter era, keeping that creeping “punk edge” just under the surface for extra tension, even in 1974. In another world Tommy Jay would be as well-known as Skip Spence or Ron House, but his star still rises, albeit slowly & surely. Much like a companion LP to The Grim-O-Comix Sequence and his essential Tall Tales of Trauma LP, Short Sagas of Sorrow fills yet another void with it’s deep lo-fi goodness that has no problem hitting all of your unprotected sweet spots.