Faggioli, David Lamar

Blaine Hoopes

13w ago

I met David at Round Records when I moved to Salt Lake City, Utah to attend Westminster College in 1973. We became fast friends as we were both played saxophones and flutes and were interested in music that was outside the mainstream. I rented a room in David's house in SLC and lived there for a few years in the 1970's.

Here is a little story to show the kind of moral integrity David had in all his dealings: David had responded to a classified add (Big Nickle I believe) for some old comic books. What he found when he arrived at the seller's place was a gold mine of pristine Golden Age comics. The comics were in mint condition and there was A LOT of them. David could have simply paid the guy (probably $50 - I don't remember the amount he was asking) but instead David told the seller what it was worth and offered to sell them and split the proceeds with him. If only everyone in the world treated each other this way. When David was showing the comics to one prospective buyer, he noticed after the guy had left that SpiderMan #1 had vanished - the guy had pocketed it when David wasn't looking. That single comic would be worth over a million dollars today. But there were plenty more very valuable comics in the collection for him to sell and after splitting all the proceeds with the garage sale guy David was able to pay off his house and start Round Records.

AR

Aaron Ruscetta

49w ago

I saw in the moment we met that David Faggioli was a truly unique human being, and I loved him for that -- immediately knew we had a great deal of compassionate morality in common from our shared atheist world view. My friendship with him has a 50 year history, starting in my late teens and early 20's when I was a customer and fan of his Round Records head shop on 9th South and 9th East in Salt Lake City. About 1 out of 5 of the 300+ vinyl LP's still preserved on my shelves came through Dave, and he greatly influenced all my musical and cultural journeys since then, expanding appreciation for eclectic underground art, improvisational musical expression, erudite people and unique recording artists like King Crimson and Brian Eno. We briefly played in a Zappa cover band together -- him shining on sax and me sadly attempting to channel Ruth Underwood on vibraharp -- though his most notorious music fun was satirizing life in the delusional ZionnoiZ land of Moroni with the Plague of Locusts group. We lost touch for a few decades when I moved from Utah, but he looked me up and reached out from Hawaii about 2016, seeking help with reclaiming some of the Plaque's recordings and web archives, which are currently available on my web host at < https://xarxaion.net/_faggioli/ >. Their satyrical creation "Utah, Gateway to Nevada", became a popular entry to the Utah State Song contest in 1985, and the archives include videos of TV news features and Plague performances.
I'm happy to have enjoyed regular phone conversations and email exchanges with David over these past several years, sharing news of family and info about old friends, discussing mycology from his lifelong passion for fungi science, laughing at Stephen Wright jokes, sharing angst about the rising national tides of christianazi cult fascism, slamming repugnant con political figures, and reporting on trends in the world of underground comic art and classic rock concert poster collecting.
The 2nd to the last email exchange we had was on Nov. 4th, 2024, 16 days before he passed. He was offering to send some items of screen print art made by a mutual Salt Lake friend, Arlen. He kept offering to send me collectable albums and art as a way of paying back a small financial gift I had shared to help him through a housing crisis. Wish I had been able to accept some of them, but I already have so many shrines to the sacred parts of my past in this house, like the ashes of my life partner of 30 years, or the giraffe posters still on the walls in our daughter's old room, or, just as meaningfully, stacks of import LP's from Round Records. A few days later, after the flood of putrid maggot bile terrorists, arsonists, vandals, thugs and nazis were set loose to drown America and destroy the future of humanity, I received David's final email to me... a link to a collection of 19 brilliant, humorous quotes and life observations made by the inimitable Frank Zappa. Sadly, they weren't enough to keep David from leaving us. I think he simply didn't have the strength left to continue fighting for reason and sanity and joy and compassion in the perversely twisted and senselessly cruel Orwellian world we find ourselves in now.

AR

Aaron Ruscetta

49w ago

I saw in the moment we met that David Faggioli was a truly unique human being, and I loved him for that -- immediately knew we had a great deal of compassionate morality in common from our shared atheist world view. My friendship with him has a 50 year history, starting in my late teens and early 20's when I was a customer and fan of his Round Records head shop on 9th South and 9th East in Salt Lake City. About 1 out of 5 of the 300+ vinyl LP's still preserved on my shelves came through Dave, and he greatly influenced all my musical and cultural journeys since then, expanding appreciation for eclectic underground art, improvisational musical expression, erudite people and unique recording artists like King Crimson and Brian Eno. We briefly played in a Zappa cover band together -- him shining on sax and me sadly attempting to channel Ruth Underwood on vibraharp -- though his most notorious music fun was satirizing life in the delusional ZionnoiZ land of Moroni with the Plague of Locusts group. We lost touch for a few decades when I moved from Utah, but he looked me up and reached out from Hawaii about 2016, seeking help with reclaiming some of the Plaque's recordings and web archives, which are currently available on my web host at < https://xarxaion.net/_faggioli/ >. Their satyrical creation "Utah, Gateway to Nevada", became a popular entry to the Utah State Song contest in 1985, and the archives include videos of TV news features and Plague performances.
I'm happy to have enjoyed regular phone conversations and email exchanges with David over these past several years, sharing news of family and info about old friends, discussing mycology from his lifelong passion for fungi science, laughing at Stephen Wright jokes, sharing angst about the rising national tides of christianazi cult fascism, slamming repugnant con political figures, and reporting on trends in the world of underground comic art and classic rock concert poster collecting.
The 2nd to the last email exchange we had was on Nov. 4th, 2024, 16 days before he passed. He was offering to send some items of screen print art made by a mutual Salt Lake friend, Arlen. He kept offering to send me collectable albums and art as a way of paying back a small financial gift I had shared to help him through a housing crisis. Wish I had been able to accept some of them, but I already have so many shrines to the sacred parts of my past in this house, like the ashes of my life partner of 30 years, or the giraffe posters still on the walls in our daughter's old room, or, just as meaningfully, stacks of import LP's from Round Records. A few days later, after the flood of putrid maggot bile terrorists, arsonists, vandals, thugs and nazis were set loose to drown America and destroy the future of humanity, I received David's final email to me... a link to a collection of 19 brilliant, humorous quotes and life observations made by the inimitable Frank Zappa. Sadly, they weren't enough to keep David from leaving us. I think he simply didn't have the strength left to continue fighting for reason and sanity and joy and compassion in the perversely twisted and senselessly cruel Orwellian world we find ourselves in now.

AR

Alan Young Robinson

61w ago

I met David through my friend Dana Petersen in SLC and later was his roommate in his house on 6th south I think it was. I was electrocuted in his bathtub (Knob $ tube wiring) but got right up with no injury. I built a dormer on his roof and he was very kind to me let me work off rent . He introduced me to Scientology but that only lasted a couple months thankfully. David was a bit of an adventurer as am I. Of the mind or the Place. I left Utah in 1978 only to return for a visit now and then. and would see him like at Dana's wedding where he ran around shirtless with a vest on playing his saxophone, but then later He moved to Maui and I didn't see him again until 2008 when I Traveled to Maui with my girlfriend Marsha. I spent a day with him at his place, He had become quite eccentric had post its notes everywhere covering entire rooms of cabinets each with important information about supplements or sayings or things he wanted to remember, he did Tai chi and snorkeled in the bay. The last time he called me he was talking about going to Thailand and since I had been there he wanted to know a bit about my experience and if it was a good place to retire. But looks like he never moved there. Today I was thinking of him and looked him up as I had lost his number, I saw the Obituary. I'm sad I won't be able to talk to him again. May he rest in peace. A kind soul.

Mike Brown

66w ago

I first met David in Salt Lake City when my brother Marc and I met through our mutual friend Ken Sanders the great David Faggioli. My brother and I were both 14 as was Ken, and Dave was a year older. We were all comic book collectors who found each other through the letter to the editor pages of Spiderman, I believe. From that beginning we remained friends over the next 60 years. I can remember Dave's dad was a barber I believe on State Street. As we left high school Ken took ownership in Cosmic Aeroplane, and all of us worked there at one time or another. My brother along with friends including Dave, many of whom worked for or frequented the Cosmic Aeroplane, created the band Plague of Locusts along with Robby Jensen and others. Dave's saxaphone was important to the sound of the band. My brother stayed in touch through the years of Dream Garden Press. Dave worked as a salesman from many years for BrownTrout calendars and other products. I later lost touch with Dave as I left Utah in 1970 and never lived there again. But I kept in touch with Dave throughout his time in Maui and frequently spoke to him. I am shocked and sad to hear of his death. I know he was very into life extension, and because of my own numerous battles with cancer we had much to discuss. I will truly miss Dave, one of my few life long friends!

MD

Mike Daley

70w ago

In 1981 I applied for a job as a shipping clerk for a company called M.P.I. in SLC, Utah. I was hired by David Faggioli, who was the shipping department manager at the time. It was several weeks after I started the job that David and I had a conversation and realized we had a few things in common. We were both vegetarians and musicians. We had many great conversations after that about vegetarianism, nutrition, music, and philosophy. I learned a lot from David as he was very knowledgeable and enthusiastic about those things. He quit working for M.P.I a few years after that, but we still stayed in touch and ended up playing music together on multiple occasions, including the Utah Arts Festival in1985 with the band "Plague of Locusts'. He was a fantastic saxophone player. One of the topics we discussed often was synchronicity and the weird coincidences and timing of random events that somehow related. This seemed to play out again before his passing. We had lost touch a while back because we had been communicating through my work email and phone, and I had retired and lost access. I finally found an email address for him and contacted him for the first time in a long time. That was just weeks ago. We talked for quite a while and exchanged text messages. I was shocked and saddened to hear of his passing. He was in incredibly intelligent,creative, and talented individual. I will miss him and he will be in my thoughts forever.

MD

Mike Daley

71w ago

I applied for a job as a shipping clerk for a company called M.P.I. back in 1981. I was hired by David who managed the shipping department. We worked together for a few weeks before we really talked much to one another. One day work was slow, so we started talking. Much to our surprise, we had a few things in common. We were both vegetarians and we both played music. After that we had many great conversations about both of those topics and more. David eventually left the company, but we stayed in touch and actually played music together on a number of occasions. One of which was with the "Plague of Locusts" performance at the Utah Arts Festival in June of 1985. David and I had many discussions about music, life, philosophy, and I always appreciated and learned from his unique perspective on things. He was an amazingly intelligent and creative individual. One of the reoccurring themes in our discussions was "synchronicity", which was on display again several weeks before his passing. I hadn't heard from him for several years and had lost all of the contact info for him that was on a company email app at work that I lost since I had retired. I finally, through some internet sleuthing, found an email address for him. I sent him my number. He called me. We were able to have a great conversation and catch up on things. That was November 9th. I'm very sad for the loss of a very kind, creative and intelligent friend that I will always remember.

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