James Jackson Toth

Cult singer/songwriter James Jackson Toth first honed his craft leading the New York-based avant-garde/freak folk group Wooden Wand & the Vanishing Voice through its many shifting lineups. Now based in Memphis, the artist and his wife Jex Toth have issued numerous volumes of eclectic psychedelic folk-rock across a wide array of project names, with many of those recordings appearing on CD-Rs issued in tiny editions sold only at live shows. When assembling his debut “official” solo album, Toth recruited producer Steve Fisk (Nirvana, Soul Coughing, Soundgarden) and enlisted an array of San Francisco musicians drawn from Deerhoof, Vetiver, and Geraldine Fibbers, resulting in a nuanced yet direct set of songs that recall the work of Richard Hawley, Chris Isaak, Jason Molina, and Bob Dylan. Waiting in Vain was released in summer 2008 by Rykodisc.