British Folk (and Revival)

FWIW - a few of my favorite original British folkies:
Shiley & Dolly Collins
John Kirkpatrick (early 70s stuff is great)
The Watersons
Andy Irvine & Paul Brady
A L Lloyd
Nic Jones (criminally unsung!?)
...and many more...

- Espers
- the return of Vashti Bunyan

I would recommend these records as a way of getting into folk, or just for any reason whatsoever bcz they're fucking amazing:

Fairport Convention - Liege and Lief (Tam Lyn is amybe my favourite song ever.)
Steeleye Span - The Lark in the Morning (a two CD comp. of their first 3 LPs which is all you need by them - includes a transcendent version of When I Was on Horeseback. These LPs are also a big fave with Simon Reynolds)
Shirley Collins and the Albion Country Band - No Roses (the only folk album to feature someone to have played on a damned LP)

They should all be able to be found cheaply.

Alasdair Roberts - Farewell Sorrow is an excellent modern LP and on Drag City/Rough Trade so easy to find for indie kids.

The show might've been talking about Spiers and Boden or Eliza Carthy, who're more part of folk music 'proper' or anyone though, so this may be of no help.

If anyone can point me toward good books on this subject I'd be very happy.

"English-rose front-man, Moray, laces the lyrics of folklore with powerful Matrix-styled guitars, film-score piano and a backing band which grinds together electric double bass and thundering drums. His presence on stage is something to behold. He looks scruffy on his website but he's beautiful in person.

Don't confuse this fresh indie approach with the folk rock of Fairport Convention or Steeleye Span, but rather be surprised to sense impressions of Ben Folds greets Depeche Mode greets Evanescence. It's all here, whichever musical genre ticks your box, Moray can offer it up without confusion or the awkwardness of musical experimentations. He even played the piano with his arms crossed at one point."

Re: Jim Moray - I suppose the artists that provoke the strongest reactions are the most interesting... I like the idea that folk can be moved in new and strange directions, but what I've heard of Jim's music does nothing for me - the beats and sounds seemed a little clichéd and it all felt a bit MOR to me, I'm afraid. Shame, because I'd really like to like him! :(

I don't know how helpful it will be to the original poster, but http://www.theunbrokencircle.co.uk/ might turn up some interesting stuff, although it's more concerned with psychedelic, odd and abstract folky stuff (oldies like Incredible String Band, Comus, Forest and new stuff like the 'New Weird America' thing).

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0747553300/qid=1134640482/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_2_1/026-1867087-2774036

... and this is significant in what way exactly?

The Eighteenth Day of May come closer than anyone else I've heard to that late 60s / early 70s British folk-rock sound. They're good.

Lucky Luke (from Glasgow) are great, though... go see them live and/or anticipate the next record.

Okay, so we're talking about folk rock here right,rather than straight-up trad folk, which can hot and heavy enough in its own addled way? I would love it if I could stumble on some decent bands that were ploughing the same sort of furrow as peak-era Fairport or Trees or whatever and that didn't suck outright. I know it's sort of backwards looking of me, but there's a certain clanging and organic feel and texture and god damn guitar sound that I never really feel I can hear enough of. Maybe I'm looking in the wrong places. All I can think of right now that fit the bill in any way are Ghost and Acid Mothers Temple ca. La Novia. Certainly no British bands that I've come across.

X-posts: I don't mind Espers, but they seem rather too gentle for me. Lucky Luke I've heard of, but am yet to hear.

this is the place to go: http://www.thegreenmanfestival.co.uk/

for all your brit-folk needs!

also worth looking out for, a new compilation called Strange Folk, with tracks from the aforementioned Vashti, Tyranosaurus Rex, Donovan, Espers, Incredible String Band, Lucky Luke (iirc) and loads of other ace people I can't remember cos i left it at home.

-- We Buy a Hammer For Dadaismus (dadaismu...), December 15th, 2005 9:56 AM. (Dada) (later)

I just thought it was ILM law to mention Reynolds whenever possible.

I wish there were more songs like Tam Lyn by Fairport, i.e funky Black Sabbath. Swedish doom band Witchcraft get there sometimes.

most of the the wyrd-folk stuff is only surface level weird. The second Steeleye recording of The Blacksmith is so much more bizarre than any of them, and that isn't even what it's trtying to do - what an amazing arrangement it has. Modern wyrd-folk types too much like Colin Hunt types... "You do have to be mad to work here but it doesn't help" etc.

You're right

The message I'm getting from this thread is that newer musicans aren't up to the standard of older musicians in folk music? Obviously ppl like mattacks, dransfield, guys from gryphon, thompson etc are hard to follow (evidence on eg Fairport's ROCKING live album "House Full") but I had kind of thought folk would be a genre where powerful/expressive musicianship/group playing would still be at some sort of premium. Dissapointing if not so.

Anyway, "No Roses" by Shirley Collins/Albion band is fucking great, and should get more props, basically.

AFAIK the terrible term wyrd-folk was coined by Stone Breath's Tim Renner.

But, before I begin to sound like a prog rocker, you don't have to be a brilliant musician to play folk music - in fact, one of the reasons I got sick of that whole scene was its muso-ishness (especially, fiddle players who only want to play as fast and as twiddly as possible!). To play like Fairport you have to be pretty good tho of course!

Morris On I like, other Albions stuff I'm not mad on, really. Perhaps the drums are why? I haven't listened to any for a while.

That's a good record that is. 'Lay Me Low' or whatever it's called just kills me. Totally tramples over any sort of aesthetic barriers I might have erected against that sort of soppy twaddle and stomps all over my jaded old heart. Sniffle.

Didn't really know there was any "revival" of British folk right now in terms of new bands playing it. I knew there was a revival of interest in the last few years, otherwise I wouldn't really know who Fairport Convention was, honestly.

I've often thought that 60s British folk revivalists treated folk music with much more respect and subtlty than their American counterparts did (who went for "simplicity" and "rawness"). This might also explain why I find Brit bands better at playing blues than their white American counterparts.

search: Shirley and Dolly Collins "Plains of Waterloo."

and sweet heavens, some forty posts in let me be the first to say the hallowed name of Davy Graham.

Have you seen them? Because they fucking do. Or did when they opened for Devendra in Edinburgh. But crap.

Espers draws far more influence from Pentangle and Bread, Love and Dreams.

Sorry. But you drew a very poor comparison.

Dave Mattacks was playing in bar bands here in Boston for a while a few years ago (and may still be). He was introduced to me by a friend who said "hey, you like Richard Thompson, don't you? This is Dave; he played drums with him."

As a huge fan of the complete family tree of Brit-folk(-rock), I don't think the entirely unassuming Mr. Mattacks was quite prepared for the amount of drool that ensued. It somehow seemed even bigger to me than meeting, say, Richard Thompson himself, because Mattacks defined that particular sound as much as anybody. Frankly, I think he was frightened by me.

When I asked him why he moved to Boston, he said, "just to try get gigs." As much as I know how small our idols' roles are in the world of commercial music, it was crushing to hear that out of him.

i certainly hear influences of the old stuff in the new, but nothing too much alike. espers don't sound much like fairport to me, aside from the pretty vocals. i saw them once live and they were more weird sounding, like almost "trance" and really dark. i don't know, i have looked into them and thier inflkuences, but most of the stuff they talk about or people who like them tal about seems so unheard of or really hard to find. i don't think devendra's stuff sounds like any of it. i'd like to hear that lucky luke band.

We seem to be agreeing on just about everything here

just not getting any of the uk folk music.

and however said that the espers sounds like bread over fairport is spot on.

18th day of may is too much of a fairport copyist band. pretty dull fair.

i have a lot of time for lucky luke..

lucky luke is dull as fuck!! its like listening to grateful dead b-sides.

dadaimus ... did you get the vashti record. its pretty. but there is absolutely nothing of substance. i couldn't remember one song after it finished playing!

i think with Vashti -- it has that hip 'quotient' ... nobody dareth say that the album was dull as fuck because you know, its like VASHTI, and its like so awesome she recorded something.

I prefer the second Steeleye Span LP to the first, and I prefer both to Liege and Lief.

Hello Doomie!

its funny re: patti smith. i remember in 87 i heard about her and i was like i have to hear some of this music and i went out and bought ... the book of life?? something like that? and it was so dull. i didnt buy another patti smith album for five years.

(Someone criticised VB on here many moons ago and received a not-very-impressed email from La Bunyan herself, I understand. How exciting!)

Folk divas. I can't think of anything more boring! Hey Tim!

REALLY curious about Alexander Tucker.

Anyone like Anne Briggs? Both squiffier and pithier than VB I think, though inhabiting a lot of the same territory.

yeah, he is. and he's like some fucked up guitar god! i can only think of him and voice of the seven woods ... i've seen so many bad contemporay uk folk acts ... devendra banhart has alot to answer for (and i like devendra banhart!)

yeah, i'd have to agree. i got some micheal chapman albums and still not sure what to think ... was he just a proto-david gray!!

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B00000JAXS.01._SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg

Aww, I think it's wonderful. I'm almost as fond of that as Shirley Collins. Someone else that refuses to sing anymore. Why was there this sudden loss of confidence in these people?

... and Linda Thompson!

Voice of the Seven Woods is one of the best things I've heard this year. I hope he comes and plays near me soon

so far: shirley collins and nic jones are GREAT. i got on reccomendation a shirley collins album with davy graham and i have listened twice, i love it. i have one of graham's solos, but no listen yet.

the espers vs lucky luke faux debate: esprs win by miles...i downloaded lucky luke and i do really like it, but it just doesn't measure up and sound as, um, "good". i guess you folk experts can rip me to shreds if i'm wrong.

i found this, too: http://www.wnyc.org/shows/spinning/episodes/05282004

from the espers.org site...

it's espers doing a really beautiful and haunting radio set and then playing some of thier favorite songs from other artists....more to add to my searchlist.

http://www.moorsmagazine.com/images3/gaughanhandful.jpg

I think an act needs to come along with the songwriting CHOPS to really do justice to updating the British Folk. Like some sorta Pentangle meets Sonic Youth band. Or Kevin Sheilds meets Shirley Collins. That would be interesting.

There's so much attention being paid to so many strands of music right now, that the effect of the song is being diluted. This applies to a ton of the US free folk stuff. Everyone is discovering early 70s Japanese stuff, European free improv, the more obscure strains of Krautrock, and all this crazy private press English folk and psych, and before they've digested it, they've attempted to synthesize it in their output.

Perhaps this bodes well for some really cool music in the next 5 years. The rediscovery of all this great music has taken place, and now artists are going to be able to soak it up and turn it into something new.

Does anyone have Within Sound, Shirley's boxset? I'm wondering if I should buy it, since I already have all of her albums that I could find.

I don't know of any comps, but I'm sure someone here could make you one.

OTM! They want to run before they can walk. sometimes this can work. there is something to be said for youthful hubris and ambition. for me, the tower recordings might have come closest. they were always trying something new years ago and they could play. and they had good songs. i don't know, not everyone is trying to do the same thing, i suppose. they might be inspired by pentangle, but know that they will never be able to play like them. something good can still come of pentangle-love.

Milkmaid, I bought the 4CD Shirley set because I was beginning to love her and I didn't have any of the LPs. Also it was £25 and that seemed the right kind of price to be paying. Plus it was a bad day and I needed cheering up. It's a very nice thing, but I'm not sure I'd want to invest if I had all the proper LPs.

A second helping of acid folk in its myriad, mystical and manifold forms from that great compiler and archivist of Britain's heritage past, Bob Stanley. Artists range from those wll known to the public at large (Donovan, Pentangle, John Renbourn, Roy Harper, Steeleye Span) across more traditional artists respected in their field (Shirley Collins, Sweeney's Men, Anne Briggs) to artists familiar to regular Freak punters (Mellow Candle, Mr Fox, Dando Shaft, Steve Tilston, Duncan Browne, Keith Christmas) and utter obscurities from the farthest-flung flodden fielde (Loudest Whisper, Shide And Acorn, Midwinter, Green Man, Stone Angel).

I think, for me, a lot of the focus is on the traditional material, the songs themselves. Hearing Shirley Collins and Jean Ritchie both sing "Sweet William and Lady Margaret" amazes me -- they're virtually the same, but the subtle differences (in pronunciation, phrasing, etc) are worth hearing side by side. Plus, it elicits a lot of crying.

When I saw Espers, actually, they had one huge-ass jam part that sort of approached this idea, The rest of their set didn't really stand up, though

... download this, people... and "Standing on the Shore"

band that could feel the folke vibe live really well (and can play their asses off): Ghost

Fledg'ling records catalogue

It's not listed. Fire off an email to them maybe? What a great, great catalogue, anyway. Plus, I didn't realise "Power of the True Love Knot" had come out on CD. (x-post, gah)

[OK, I edited the URL so it's the correct link, not an "owned" jpg. GAH. Apologies]

SIMON FINN + GREGG WEISS
The Freebutt, Phoenix Place, Brighton BN2 9NG Tel: 01273-603974
Tickets:£5/4 conc. available on the door/ Rounder Records: 01273 325440/
Resident: 01273 606312
Authentic "lost" psyche folk legend plays gig to promote the reissue of his sole LP...originally released in 1971 , it was re-released last year and picked up on by such knowledgeable heads of class underground as David Tibet (current 93) and Thurston Moore. Has recently toured Europe with Six Organs Of Admittance. Slightly too dark to be pure hippy, slightly too thunderous to be pure folk, this is truly a rediscovery to look into...

yeah, i take it back anyway. i was trying to think of something that i would have considered too old-fogeyish to listen to in the 80's, but i liked a lot of that canterbury stuff even then. and other pastoral folkish prog like curved air and such.

http://www.furious.com/perfect/shirleycollins.html

Yeah, the new Vashti Bunyan album has only two or three memorable cuts. As stated before; it's pretty, but also pretty unsubstantial (Maybe I'll get an e-mail from her, too!).
Still, I ADORE "Just Another Diamond Day" and her work with AC with all my heart.

Seconding the Mellow Candle respect. Swaddling Songs is a gem.

Anyone here familiar with Fionn McCool (sp?) I read about them in a newsletter over the past year, and I can't remember where. Maybe Other Music? They were a 70s band who were compared to Mellow Candle.

I love this stuff!!!

introduction to British Folk Music of the 1960s, a fine two CD set.
Donovan, Bert Jansch, The Incredible String Band, Pentangle, et cetera

The Oysterband are also not bad, Freedom and Rain with June Tabor is quite likable.

NICK DRAKE
BRIDGET ST. JOHN
MIDWINTER
STONE ANGEL
TIR NA NOG
JAKE HOLMES
ERIC ANDERSEN
KAREN DALTON
LINDA PERHACS
JUDEE SILL (reissue this year)
AGINCOURT
FLESH MAGGOTS
ANNO DOMINI
MAGNA CARTA
COMUS
SPIROGYRA
BARRY DRANSFIELD
DAVID ACKLES
BILL FAY
DAVID BLUE
TOM RAPP & PEARLS BEFORE SWINE
STEVE TILSTON
NICK GARRIE
GARY HIGGINS (reissue this year)
AMAZING BLONDEL
SPRIGUNS OF TOLGUS
GRYPHON
NUMBER NINE BREAD STREET
RICHARD & MIMI FARIÑA
TIM BUCKLEY
ARLO GUTHRIE
TOWNES VAN ZANDT
PHIL OCHS
JONI MITCHELL
JOHN RENBOURN
KATE & ANNA MCGARRIGLE
THE YOUNGBLOODS
FLYING BURRITO BROTHERS
MARTIN CARTHY
TOM PAXTON
FRED NEIL
CAT STEVENS

DEVENDRA BANHART DAY -- BANDS CONFIRMED SO FAR
DEVENDRA BANHART
VASHTI BUNYAN
VETIVER
ESPERS
BAT FOR LASHES
JANA HUNTER
THE METALLIC FALCONS
DANIELLE STECH-HOMSY
BERT JANSCH

There are worse reasons to go to Camber.

"FOLK IS BACK!" mrs anne ouncer, on the number one this week.

thirded! i know i've big-upped them here before.

Beyond the Carthy/Swarbrick and Nic Jones level of recognition, there are people like Pete Coe and Chris Foster (who are both still playing) that have made some excellent albums over the years. Also, I am surprised that Swan Arcade are not mentioned more often - I strongly urge anyone to check them out. I think you can get a couple of compilations of their albums that are now unavailable.

from http://www.daveygraham.moonfruit.com/
WHITECHAPEL ART GALLERY
80 - 82 WHITECHAPEL HIGH STREET
LONDON E1 7QX
Tel: 020 7522 7888
WWW.WHITECHAPEL.ORG
Friday 3 Feb, 7pm
DAVEY GRAHAM
Virtuoso guitarist Davey Graham plays a rare and intimate acoustic show at the Whitechapel Gallery. One of the key figures in the British folk-blues movement of the 1960s and one of the earliest exponents of world music, Graham has inspired a host of artists from Richard Thompson, Ry Cooder, Nick Drake, Jimmy Page, Bert Jansch, to Graham Coxon
and a ream of younger musicians.
Limited tickets advanced booking only:
£10/8 concs*
Book now : 020 7522 7888
CONTACT: BEATRICE DILLON
07940 464676 [email protected]

http://www.daveygraham.moonfruit.com/

It looks like he's another cult/off the critical map type UK artist who got fucked over by his record company (see also: bill nelson) w/no hope of recompense, & who is not "big" enough to get enough publicity to rectify this?

I'll stick an order in for his new self-produced CD, I think.

I ordered a copy of the forthcoming CD, anyway, looking forward to hearing it.

And Folk

I started to say Folk Routes/New Routes is stunning. I love the way DG adds a bluesy twang to the likes of Nottamun Town. Wonderful.

Espers I find pretty but they don't really have the songs. Maybe I need to give them more time, but live, they only got going in the last song.
Lucky Luke are great and as lovely as the record is they sound quite different live. More stripped down, with a more rockin' rhythm section. It really suits them, and Lucy's voice is getting stronger all the time.

Espers... oh dear. What is the point in this day and age of somebody doing the same old version of 'Rosemary Lane' ripped off from Anne Briggs or Bert Jansch? And doing it completely insipidly and unoriginally, moreover?

There's something a lot weirder about hearing the great above-mentioned Duncan Williamson sing an ancient traditional ballad such as, for example, 'The Lady and the Blacksmith' (Child #44) than there is about the output of some wispy-bearded bedroom boy with a copy of 'Pink Moon', a sampler an acoustic guitar.

Then again, most of what passes for contemporary 'traditional' British music such as Kate Rusby, Jim Moray and the dread Cara Dillon, et al, is IMO just as unpalatable. Your best best is to go back to the field recordings, the proper singers.

I love electricity too.

But don't you think that some great art can come out of romanticism?

This comment speaks volumes about your ignorance. You will miss out on some good stuff if this continues to be your attitude.

A lot of the people you disparage (probably without having listened to them properly) as 'whiskery old geezers' from the 'turn of the century' (which century?) are AMAZING singers. It's a shame that you won't be open-minded enough to find that out.

Of course there is a lot of great music and a lot of great singers nowadays too. But not in the field of 'folk' music or 'new folk' music.

I apologise. It's just that appreciating, say, Fairport or Steeleye Span etc but then not appreciating the source singers from whom they got a lot of their material... well, that just don't add up to me.

Can you recommend some titles on CD? ie pre-1960s revival?

First, it really comes down to a question of taste, and for me, music is all about the arrangement. Ed (of this parish) recently copied me a bunch of Nu Folk - mainly Bellowhead and John & John. Predictably, I enjoyed the Bellowhead a great deal more, even though it covered a lot of the same material, (same songs in a couple of incidences) because I just enjoyed listened to an 11 piece band with multiple harmonies more than I enjoyed listening to just two blokes, with more limited arrangements.

But that brings back to the notion of "authenticity" and which is more "authentic" - listening to some "turn of the century crackly voiced bloke on an old record" and field recordings or listening to more modern people reinterpreting or "romanticising" it.

Well, folk has *always* been a participatory artform. It's not just about one bloke with a guitar, it's about everyone down the pub, or on the village green, or wherever, getting together to sing songs they all know. The second point I wanted to make is that folk has always been about co-opting traditional songs, changing them to suit your conditions or your needs - every person who performs a song adds something of their own to it. That's what the folk tradition is. Not slavishly recreating whatever someone else used to do.

Anyway, that's just my 2p. I should get my dad in here to comment further because he knows what he's talking about more than I do.

With regard to the vocal qualities of some of the old singers - the important thing was the songs they sang, not the singers... and anyway, I'd rather listen to an unpolished singer than some Radio Two-friendly 'folk' singer like... won't name any names.

Also, the only way to avoid refashioning the past (in the mistaken belief that you're doing something 'new' - i.e. Espers, Tunng, etc) -is to be aware of the past.

Exactly. So is it really necessary to listen to unaccompanied field-recordings?

Of course you don't HAVE TO listen to anything.

Were they really "aware" of that? Or were they just people who weren't very good singers?

I'm not a folk expert, but to my ears thier version of that song sounds very much like thier own. They claim to have lifted it right off of Jansch who lifted it right off of Clive Palmer. When you read interviews with those guys, they seem pretty deep into the traditions and roots off all sorts of music, espescially British folk. I'm going to listen to it now!

The problem I have is that this is like the Lomax blues recordings, where Lomax seemed to purposefully seek out amateurs and field-hands and whatever thru some notion that they were more "authentic" - adn in doing so produced a distorted picture of what was actually going on. Actually expression or "chops" play a pretty big part in living folk traditions

Definitely... take, for example, Roscoe Holcomb. Technically dazzling banjo playing. And Jeannie Robertson could have been an opera singer! I love them both - but not necessarily for their technical abilities - but for their abilities to make me feel things.

The best singers/musicians make it sound effortless, as the above-mentioned do. They're technically accomplished but not show-offy.

I've never really liked show-offs in any sphere.

And if they're doing a lot to make people source out their influences, than kudos to them.

You could maybe argue they belong to some sort of British pastoral tradition that includes poeple like Robert Wyatt, but I guess that's not as snappy as "nu-folk", "wyrd folk" or worse, "folktronica".

Or you could just dismiss them as an indie band with a Wicker Man fetish.

http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/news/06-06/07.shtml

http://www.oldhamtinkers.com/index.html

This second Sweeney's Men record really is fucking fanTASTIC.

yeah, tracks of sweeney is some haunting stuff

anyone read this Electric Eden book (guess it is not out in the states yet)? Deals with "visionary British musicians" including a lot of british folk rockers. sounds like a good read anyway.

I raved about it in this thread:

Good books about music

oh cool -- looks like it is being published in the states this May ...

Reading it (v. slowly) at the moment. Makes me want to give Vashti Bunyan another chance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qs9PMky7Fj0

^ Fantastic clip of the Watersons singing 'Hal-An-Toe' in a pub in Hull in the mid-60's. Becoming slowly obsessed with this tune, gets me right in the guts every time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pEwl_nvtt8A

^ And here's the Shirley Collins version with of course that great jews harp solo in it. It's the dulcimer that really gets me though.

ah that's great, thanks for posting (the watersons clip)

I've got this folky musician friend who's been struggling with really bad depression for the last couple of years. Couldn't work, couldn't play, was just virtually housebound for that whole time. Finally about six months ago he started gigging again and I went a long and he played that. And that whole theme of the summer finally coming after the winter... It's been on my mind a lot since then.

the recent album by jo bartlett (of yellow moon band/it's jo and danny) is wonderful folky stuff, v highly recommended

electric eden won't be released here til May :(

But you can get this now...

http://www.amazon.com/Seasons-They-Change-Story-Psychedelic/dp/1906002320

Looks great and there's definite crossover. Got my copy the other day.

I'm a couple of chapters into Electric Eden, need to hurry up if I'm ever to finish the thing.

My partner gave me Electric Eden for Christmas. Perhaps I'll start reading it next.

I saw that one, Ned, but I don't know how much I want to read some pseudoacademic text on Joanna Newsom's relationship to Jacqui McShee or whatever

Actually it's not like that at all! What I've read so far has been a lot of good straightforward history and anecdotes, Leech knows her stuff but also how to write about it well.

Electric Eden was available from the Book Depositary for about 1/2 price from the time it was released last August. Free delivery worldwide if you don't want to wait until May.
Largely a rewarding read, I didn't really like The wind in The willows take off bit though.

& I found Seasons They Change a little too listy. Kept changing to a new subject just as i was getting into reading about things. I think its an interesting read though.

Not sure what else to reccommend, certainly that stays on folk as opposed to including non-folk psych & prog. Seems most countries' take on prog tend to include large amounts of influence from local folk traditions. Maybe that's not so much UK/US noot sure though, certainly seems noticeable in continental European stuff.

Essential Acid Folk -not all British
I've just gone back to the original Bruton Town list after getting Shide & Acorn's Princess Of The Island, looking for more information on the band since i wasn't finding much elsewhere.
This has led me to reading through a thread there talking about records people thought wwere essential in the genre. People were making lists of essential artists, this being back in 2004. Thought I'd stick a few of them up here and see what you thought

1)Comus: First Utterance
Extradition: Hush
Fairport Convention: Liege & Lief
Gallery: The Wind that Shakes the Barley
Gryphon: s/t: & Midnight Mushrumps
John Renbourn: The Lady & the Unicorn, & The Hermit
John Renbourne: A Maid in Bedlam
John Renbourne: Sir John A lot of
Linda Perhacs: Parallelograms
Mellow Candle: Swaddling Songs
Midwinter: The Waters of Sweet Sorrow
Mr Fox: Mr Fox, & The Gipsy
Oberon: A Midsummer's Night Dream
Paul Giovanni: The Wicker Man
Pentangle: Cruel Sister
Pentangle: Solomon's Seal
Perry Leopold: Christian Lucifer
Richard & Linda Thompson: I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight
Shide & Acorn: The Princess of the Island
Shirley & Dolly Collins: Anthems in Eden
Shirley & Dolly Collins: Love, Death & the Lady
Shirley Collins: The Power of the True Love Knot
Shirley Collins & the Albion Band: No Roses
Silly Sisters: s/t
Spirogyra: Bells: Boots and Shambles
Steeleye Span: Below the Salt
Steeleye Span: Parcel of Rogues
Steve Ashley: Stroll On Revisited
Stone Angel: s/t
Sweeney's Men: Sweeney's Men, & The Tracks of Sweeny
The Albion Band: Rise Up Like the Sun
The Albion Country Band: Battle of the Field
The Albion Dance Band: The Prospect Before Us
The Watersons: Frost and Fire
The Woods Band: s/t
These Trails: s/t
Tim Hart & Maddy Prior: Summer Solstice
Trees: The Garden of Jane Delawney
Trees : On the Shore
Tudor Lodge: Tudor Lodge
Vashti Bunyan: Just Another Diamond Day

2)Anne Briggs 'Time Has Come'
Forest - both
Bert Jansch - Jack Orion & Rosemary Lane
Third Ear Band - Fleance (just that song)
Incredible String Band - take your pick
Clive's Own Band (COB) - both albums
Lal & Mike Waterson - Bright Phobus
Tir Na Nog - first
Dulcimer - first
Mark Fry
Pearls Before Swine - Balaklava & The Use Of Ashes
Bread Love & Dreams - all three
Donovon - Gift From A Flower To A Garden (essential!!!!)
Broselmachine
Perry Leopold - both
Eclection
Fortheringay
Tony, Caro & John

3)Sun Also Rises
Northwind
Westwind
Wooden Horse
Young Tradition
A-Austr
Agincourt
Blue epitaph
water into wine band
Heron
Decameron
Spyrogyra

4)Carol Of Harvest,
Witthuser & Westrupp,
Emtidi,
Langsyne,
some Ougenweide,
Emma Myldenberger
Hölderlin's Traum

5)Sallyangie – Children of the Sun
Jan Jukes De Grey – Sorcerer
Fuchsia – ST
The Strawbs – From the Witchwood
These Trails – ST
Water into Wine Band – Harvest Time
Mandy Morton – Magic Lady
Tickawinda - Rosemary Lane
Trader Horne - Morning Way
Jade - Fly On Strangewings

So that was mainly individual's personal choices & 4) was specifically German groups the writer would have chosen over Broselmaschine. I'm not sure if much else has emerged over the last 7 years. I don't think anybody mentioned Pat Kilroy or The New age (&the latter of these wasn't available until a couple years later anyway. Had remained unreleased until RD did it)

Stevo

Sharron Kraus, yeah? didn't look below the fold but she seems to fit in here. She had a 2010 album "The Woody Nightshade" that I just listened to the other day.

Hey guys, I normally try not to spam ILM but you guys might want to know that Michael Chapman, UK folkie-rocker and guitar wizard, will be playing on my radio show tomorrow evening. 10-midnight (eastern u.s. time) on east village radio--www.eastvillageradio.com

wheeee

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3e8W7cRo12Y

don't think i know this guy! he sounds great.

Tyler, his album "Fully Qualified Survivor" was just reissued on LP (and CD??) by Light In The Attic; he's really fantastic.

Yeah, FQS is pretty essential. Pretty cool, Ian! I got to engineer a radio thing for a him a while back and he's still great.

Looking forward to this!

Hmm, very cool indeed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=an6EoevSSIs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eT9SCKnp91A

some incredibly pretty Anne Briggs-style vocals and intertwining acoustic guitar parts on Folkal Point's self-titled album from 1971. it may not be authentically English (at least half of the songs were written but Americans), but I'm not bothered. it's odd that Joan Baez's original recording of "Sweet Sir Galahad" (written about her sister Mimi Fariña after the death of her husband Richard) for the most part leaves me cold, whereas Folkal Point's cover version makes me cry. her delivery of the line, "will I fail at every single thing I try?" just devastates.

("written by Americans," I mean)

finally picked up Electric Eden today! looking forward to digging in (and listening to a bunch of brit-folk along the way)!

I got that recently too but haven't really started it yet. Not sure why, because the few pages I read were very good.

this book is so good! i will admit that i have lost steam as i exited the early 70s, but the first 300 pages are SO SO SO WONDERFUL.
you will enjoy it. spotify will be your friend along the way.

My favourite Brit-Folk song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MuJSC0o_egI

I couldn't get on with that album at all when I tried it. It felt like a 'Look Around You'-style spoof of a folk record.

i think that's maybe that's why i like it (although when you put it that way, i can see why it irks you). never heard the full album - just the song on a comp.

Recommend add "Handful of Earth" by Dick Gaughan to your searchlist - an album I have never once managed to listen to without crying (tho it helps if you're Scottish or Irish)

Finally got round to following up this recommendation, a mere 6.5 years on. Blimes it's a bit good innit? Haven't started crying yet, poss due to non Scottish / Irish status. Still, thanks.

New database of collected archival material, project launched by Shirley Collins!

Welcome to the Take Six website, a searchable database of the manuscript archives of several of the UK's most prominent folksong collectors.
it's cool if you like to look at moldy old things like this
http://library.efdss.org/archives/images/blunt/BLU-01-668.jpg

I recommend looking at the tree view because it's more like browsing than searching blindly for the names of songs

oops here is the website
http://library.efdss.org/archives/index.html

Haven't heard the first Fotheringay album, don't know how Fotheringay 2 compares, but I really like it as well as the Denny-Thompson etc Fairport, in its own. kinda folk-country way. Farm and lane and tavern music, without trying to pretend they're recording with coal oil. it's not just one where I have to doze til Denny cuts loose again, it's the whole band. So glad the surviving members came back and finished it, 40 years later or whatever. (oh and speaking of Denny-Thompson FC, the live odds and sods album Heyday is good too, despite sound quality)

thanks for the link la lechera.

and dow, i think you should do yourself a favor and check out the first fotheringay record; it's great! many great songs and great playing.

Every time someone on the radio talks about how Oscar Pistorius shot his girlfriend because he thought she was an intruder, all I can think about is Polly Vaughn, Jimmy, and the swan. Just wanted to put this somewhere, and it doesn't really belong anywhere I have to explain who Polly Vaughn and Jimmy are.

Or Molly and Johnny, depending on your preferred version I guess.

:)

La Lechera's springtime thread has got me singing Hal-an-tow under my breath again:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhfNnurOxUY

you should belt it loud and proud!
jolly rumble-oh!

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kahaJGFYHDc/Tsbb58QEAVI/AAAAAAAABXA/mux_tPLNTqQ/s1600/advert_rumbelows.jpg

it had never occurred to me that it could be rum below. that would have made more sense, but in my mind it was a jolly rumble-oh. is rumbelows like rent-a-center?

rumblelows is?was? a domestic electrical goods shop. always thought it was rumble-oh, i don't really not what a rumble is though in this context

btw terry-thomas looks like the fat old fox I passed on my way home the other night

WOULD NOT TRUST HIM TO LOOK AFTER MY CHICKENS

it had never occurred to me that it could be rum below

I don't know if it is it just reminded me of Rumbelows, which I assume has gone the way of most high street chainstores. Hey it's folk music, so it's full of hey-nonny-nonsense words that happen to rhyme.

does anyone know much about toni arthur's folk stuff? i know virtually nothing but looked her up at random on youtube and got this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH5YzId9xB4

some otherworldy shit that imo

Never heard it but it's supposed to be good stuff

wasn't quite what I expected really given that i only know her from playaway - that one song there is fucking terrifying

That's so weird I was singing Jolly Rumble-Oh to myself this morning on the way to work! Even though I was listening to a different record!

i looked up the dave and toni arthur stuff after reading electric eden. never been reissued? kinda surprising in this day and age.

Their Discogs page looks quite incomplete, but as far as I can make out, they had at least three albums:

Morning Stands on Tiptoe (Transatlantic, 1967)
The Lark in the Morning (Topic, 1969)
Hearken To The Witches Rune (Trailer, 1970)

Looks like the first two got reissued on one CD in the 90s, and the second one is available digitally from Topic (also it's on Spotify). Think it's the third one that's the hardest to find though (that title is just collectors' catnip right?) and that doesn't look like it's been reissued at all.

Hearken To The Witches Rune is supposedly the most out-there musically, has Nic Jones playing in it and is on a label I've never flipping heard of: fat chance of ever finding that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fw9GVgAvCXU

^ good grief wtf is this

^ Mystic Challenge with Paul Ross - Guest Toni Arthur

Toni Arthur was about the first woman I ever fancied due to seeing her on things like Playschool and Playaway. I still haven't heard the 60s lps through though.

The albums with her husband all sound pretty out-there but they are really just doing pretty traditional English folk-singing in that particular unaccompanied style. They do a number of supposed comedy numbers and even they sound pretty terrifying. One is about a football match and documents the rapidly escalating violence. Supposed to be amusing but it's actually quite unsettling.

I used to have a copy of Harken To The Witches Rune, but I sold it at some point. Had a lot of tap dancing/clogging type stuff on it? I assume there's a proper name for that.

oh MAN! really!? i was already interested but dang, that puts it over the edge. i love percussive dancing!

there's a new official release of an ISB sounddesk from Fillmore East in '68 through Hux. Saw a review in one of the music rags this month. Not sure if it's the same set taht's been in circulaton before. there's one from a Fillmore that year that's definitely been on th etorrent sites.

Review said the sound was pretty good anyway.

wasting time today looking at this: http://archive.org/details/balladsweirdwond00choprich
Ballads weird and wonderful (1912)
http://ia700307.us.archive.org/BookReader/BookReaderImages.php?zip=/35/items/balladsweirdwond00choprich/balladsweirdwond00choprich_jp2.zip&file=balladsweirdwond00choprich_jp2/balladsweirdwond00choprich_0011.jp2&scale=4&rotate=0

Saw an announcement about this the other day:

http://www.vwml.org.uk/search/search-full-english

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51kk-qkKy6L._SL500_AA300_.jpg

^ I picked this up for a pound yesterday, lots of thee old favourites on it (The Captain's Apprentice, Geordie etc). All a bit more formal than later interpretations as you'd expect, but it's all quite enjoyable nonetheless.

Vaughan Williams' "English Folk Song Suite" is the bomb, he had a real flair for orchestrating tunes without getting all pompous about it

On the other end of that spectrum, Delius' 'Brigg Fair' is sheer bliss to me.

new book i wanna read --
https://www.facebook.com/FolkInCornwall

ok question -- has this band been covered itt? i turned on the radio to wash the dishes, heard a clip of them and was like whaaaaa how come no one has ever told me about this or if they did, why did i not listen?! anyway their sound is so cool, i love it.

The English trio S.O.S. — saxophonists John Surman, Mike Osborne and Alan Skidmore — was formed in 1973, and made only one LP for the Ogun label a couple years later. They didn't last long, but they were the first of many horn choirs born in the '70s and '80s, mostly saxophone quartets. S.O.S.'s trio voicings sometimes eerily anticipate the World Saxophone Quartet that came along a bit later.

The trio was tight and maneuverable, changing direction as one like birds in flight. That precision stemmed from extensive rehearsing, close listening on the bandstand and playing a little Bach. S.O.S. might sound like more than three players by moving the voices around, even when two reeds are riffing behind the other.

Tenor player Alan Skidmore is a Londoner, the son of a jazz saxophonist, while altoist Mike Osborne and multi-instrumentalist John Surman grew up closer to the countryside. There was always a strong whiff of agrarian roots and the English folk revival about S.O.S. They might literally break into an Irish jig. Their theme "Country Dance" was perfect for a romp around the maypole. A lot of '60s and '70s English jazz has that bagpipey energy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhrP9OT7FU4

Heard of them but never associated them with folk music!

they are so good! i love what i've heard so far -- there's definitely a droney folk quality in there, like david munrow crumhorn/EMC/the voice of jantina noorman but then they totally flip out with improvisational stuff too. i love them!

http://www.npr.org/2013/08/20/198076754/looking-for-the-next-one-reveals-an-underappreciated-sax-trio

yup i learned this from npr

(xp)
Never heard of them before today when I noticed the thing on NPR about them before coming to this thread.

spooky

when i turned on the radio and heard them i thought there was something wrong with the radio, it was awesome

also can someone please elaborate on this within the context of british folk?
They didn't last long, but they were the first of many horn choirs born in the '70s and '80s, mostly saxophone quartets. S.O.S.'s trio voicings sometimes eerily anticipate the World Saxophone Quartet that came along a bit later.

Not a lot of chatter on this thread about the Albion Band, which is a shame as Rise Up Like The Sun is top 5 Brit electric folk for me. The interesting thing about that album is that there wasn't as much Ashley Hutchings on it as on other Albions records, it was more down to John Tams who I see hasn't been mentioned once here but is imo a totally unsung hero of Brit folk. After that album he went on to form Home Service which really took up where Rise Up left off, their Alright Jack album is stunning. They spent a lot of time doing stage work like The Mysteries at the National Theatre in the 80s and are thankfully now on the comeback trail.

I have a late period robin Williamson album on ECM called skirting the river road of which John surman is a big component. That's been my only exposure to him (amazing record) but I think he has also done some mystic-improv John Dowland stuff for ECM too?

i have that robin williamson album too! i could never really connect with it but maybe that's because i wasn't trying very hard.

they were the first of many horn choirs born in the '70s and '80s,

First I've heard!

... in the context of folk that is

i think a committee should be formed to investigate this matter
many horn choirs sounds v interesting

Xxp I connect with that record best by just having it on and doing other stuff tbh. It's more of a mood piece than a moment by moment ride like isb.

surman has def made a number of recs for ecm and others that incorporate 'british' choral/classical music of varying traditions, inc. folk - but i have never found them v. compelling, i'm afraid, despite jack dejohnette being involved w/ some of them.

rightly or wrongly i think of alan skidmore as a bit of a brit journeyman - a player, a pro, cld be wild, but fundamentally a jazz musician, def not a folkie per se

the mike osborne stuff i know best is his pretty free/fiery post-ornette alto jazz stuff - his debut rec Outback is a scorcher

marcello cld tell us all a lot more, i'm sure

surman has def made a number of recs for ecm and others that incorporate 'british' choral/classical music of varying traditions, inc. folk - but i have never found them v. compelling, i'm afraid, despite jack dejohnette being involved w/ some of them.

titles? recommendations for the most formal and folky?

L L, i wld just be copying titles from his wiki entry - i used to work in a jazz rec shop and prob heard most of his ecm titles at some point or other, as i said they didn't make a huge impression

in fact the surman/ecm appearance i like best is thimar, by the Tunisian oud player anouar brahem - a different kind of folk music

That oud player is great, gotta check that out.

oh ok
i'll look around

s.o.s. band seems more like terry riley than folk

albion band rules

just picked up an old copy of steve ashley's stroll on, highly recommended to albion band fans

but don't take it from me, the album cover sells it!

<IMG SRC="http://www.recordsale.de/cdpix/s/steve_ashley-stroll_on.jpg";>

http://www.recordsale.de/cdpix/s/steve_ashley-stroll_on.jpg

i guess i'm talking about stuff like this that (imo) straddles the line between formal classical performance/early music and folk melodies? like anthems in eden.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRUkWm1jcSU

xp that is a super cool album cover

La Lachera, you might like this, though it has more folk appeal in feel than in any more definable connection maybe (though Dave's bass intro does seem to briefly quote the song I know as "Birmingham Sunday"; seems like Richard Farina might've set it to an older tune). From 1973 the title track of Conference of the Birds (most of the rest of the album is pretty freaky, though I learned to love it, for sure). A string band I used to know in the 70s covered this, in between Grisman and some Irish trad. Anyway: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2uoLafv5c0

1965 The Watersons - Frost & Fire
1966 Incredible String Band - s/t
1969 Ralph McTell - My Side of Your Window
1969 Al Stewart - Love Chronicles
1970 Robin & Barry Dransfield - The Rout of the Blues
1970 Mr Fox - s/t
1971 Dave Burland - A Dalesman's Litany
1971 Steeleye Span - Please To See The King
1971 Robin & Barry Dransfield - Lord of All I Behold
1972 Dick Gaughan - No More Forever
1974 Jack the Lad - The Old Straight Track
1975 The Watersons - For Pence and Spicy Ale
1976 Five Hand Reel - s/t
1977 Peter Bellamy - The Transports
1978 Paul Brady - Welcome Here Kind Stranger
1979 Cilla Fisher and Artie Trezise - Cilla & Artie
1980 Nic Jones - Penguin Eggs
1981 Dick Gaughan - Handful of Earth
1983 Andy M. Stewart - By The Hush

^ A list of records that people on the internet claim were once the Melody Maker Folk Album of The Year

(obviously they can't all be right unless this wasn't an award as such, but just a phrase used in reviews)

Don't know all of those but can't argue with the ones I do know, not many people seem to know about "No More Forever" but it's probably my favourite Dick Gaughan album.

I don't know that one. Sure is a grim and grimey picture on the cover.

The only one I know of these is Al Stewart but it's a great album.

the Nic Jones is classic but all of Nic Jones's are classic imo

wish all of the Nic Jones albs were still in print, not just Penguin Eggs

i've got the s/t on mp3 and a live one ripped from a library copy, it's ridiculous he's not more available

Was listening to Penguin Eggs this morning actually, excellent record. Nothing fancy about it really, just boom - great singing, great guitar playing.

That Robin and Barry Dransfield album is great. I need to track down a copy, haven't heard it in years. (My parents have it, played it a lot when I was growing up.)

Rout of the Blues, I mean -- I'm not sure I've heard the other one.

xxp that sums up his appeal to me i think, his voice especially is beautiful and less mannered than a lot of straight folk peoples'

Where's Shirley?

Bright Phoebus seems like a glaring omission here

There's no Shirley but Dolly arranged all the music on the Peter Bellamy album on that list.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDCj-5uBXQI

^ this is a song off it with Norma Waterson singing, it's lovely

DID she? I'll have to look that up!! Her arrangements are the best.

The Transports was a folk-opera written by Peter Bellamy and released on Free Reed Records in 1977. It is often cited as Bellamy's greatest achievement. It featured many artists from the 1970s English folk revival, including The Watersons, Martin Carthy, Nic Jones, A. L. Lloyd, June Tabor, Cyril Tawney and Dave Swarbrick. The orchestral arrangements were by Dolly Collins.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Transports

I've got that, some, uhhhhhhhhh, challenging vocals on that one.

Sure is a grim and grimey picture on the cover.

LOL, yeah, really selling it

Just seen that this is on BBC4 tonight -> The Enigma of Nic Jones: Return of Britain's Lost Folk Hero

yeah was gonna flag that. assume it's new?

cool, i've watched a clip of it, but didn't know if it was going to be shown or had even been completed.
http://vimeo.com/71491414

first time it's aired afaik

Think I read something on the programme a while back so assumed it must have been a repeat. Can't think when I read it or where though. Helpful. Did either Mojo or Uncut run something on him a while back with something on it? Or failing that the Observer?

gotta say i'm not mad nuts about programmes so heavily dependent on talking heads, but where so little archive footage exists it was always going to be the case here. that said, it was really good seeing nic soldiering on with that aura of peace and jolliness about him, though he does seem scarily frail for someone in their mid 60s; techy guitar bits were interesting, though i'm sure they'd mean more to tyler than they did to me; martin carthy was as good value as ever. that bit about them having to retrieve nic's teeth from his lungs after the car crash was plain O_O.

feel like a terrible curmudgeon not being 100% yay! about it though tbh

i think that's ok, its shortcomings - bits i saw whilst attending to kids, will catch up on iPlayer when i've got some alone time - are really the result of a career cut cruelly short

was pretty good i thought

made me want to pick up penguin eggs

not a sentence i thought i'd ever say

in the absence of footage from the era

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2PxsHBv0ps

so good

i've got the s/t on mp3 and a live one ripped from a library copy, it's ridiculous he's not more available

The unavailability of Nic Jones, Bright Phoebus and quite a few others seems to be down to the late Dave Bulmer who owned the copyright on them and for reasons best known to himself never released them properly. Doesn't seem to have been any discussion on this thread about this situation. More here:

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2013/oct/10/bright-phoebus-waterson-toured-hawley-cocker-album

a brief nod to this story from mike a couple of years ago

I saw Martin Carthy and Dave Swarbrick last week. First set a bit doddery, second set AMAZING. My partner asked Carthy about the "lost" 1972 Lal & Mike Waterson album Bright Phoebus, which also features Carthy, Maddy Prior, Tim Hart & Norma Waterson - there was a BBC Radio 4 doc about it the other week. Carthy told him that the reissue rights had been acquired by a "bastard", from whom no artist royalties flow. His advice: grab a free copy. So we did:

http://witchseason.blogspot.com/2007/06/cheap-red-wine-in-my-drunken-brain.html

It's a superb record.

― mike t-diva, Tuesday, 13 September 2011 11:18 (2 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I have a copy of that lp that was doing the rounds about 10 years ago. I think it's on cdr but has an official looking sleeve. Not looked at it recently but did burn it to hard drive a few months ago so that i could listen to it through my computer. has some great stuff on it definitely.

That Robin and Barry Dransfield album is great.

I love the title track, I forget what I thought when I finally heard the whole album. (No I don't listen to much of this stuff, but I have listened to more in the past.)

rout of the blues <3

Saw 'Bright Phoebus Revisited' last night at the Barb. It was v. uneven but there was more than enough mesmerizing brilliance on show to make up for the dud moments. I wish I could afford to see them again in Bristol at the end of the tour, when they will nail it.

Have been indulging in some epic dithering about whether to go and see that tour or not. Don't think we get Jarvis Cocker here, and much as I like him as a character and a performer, I could probably do without his presence overshadowing the songs. How was his turn?

He did two proper songs (The Scarecrow and The Beast), and a kind of cameo as the Magical Man. He seemed to change his mind about where to pitch The Scarecrow after the first verse, so it went from spooky and deep, but only marginally tuneful, to much lighter and more musical but without the weird edge - I'd be interested to see which he goes with next time. The Beast was really good, really drew you in. It's hard to convey the contrast between Cocker and the pro folk singers - it's not like they can't do expressive, intimate or scary/vulnerable, because by damn they can. But there's something about Jarvis that sets him apart.

So, I thought he added something v.v. interesting without overshadowing anything, tho putting the poor chap in a chorus line for the big closing numbers was an odd thing to do. The awkwardness and intensity that makes him so compelling when he's up there on his own becomes discomfiting when his voice is inaudible and he's standing in a row with a load of Waterson/Carthys. He looked like a beardy alien. <3

i fell out of respect with J Cocker a long time ago and am kinda sad that he has any presence in this thing amongst some of my fave writers and performers so i'm afraid i'm out

nose/face

he's not on stage for most of it and you will miss out on astonishing harmonies from Eliza, Marry and Kima, pshaw

Looks like my copy of Bright Phoebus came out on a label called Trailer sometime around 2000. Seemed to be an official release a t the time but the company was pretty small so was doing cdrs instead of actual cds. I think that was somewhat common at the time among labels doing small pressings, is it still? Don't think there was as much digital d/ld presence at the time, or if there was it seemed to be strictly mp3.

Got the lp lined up to play next after a '75 Rahsaan Roland Kirk live set.

http://www.standard.co.uk/goingout/music/bright-phoebus-revisited-barbican--music-review-8878576.html

"Jarvis Cocker of novelty band Pulp" ??

LOL

Went and saw the Bright Phoebus thing last night, have never seen any of the Waterson/Carthy tribe live before so it was great to see those people. Eliza Carthy especially did a great job, I think maybe the whole performance would have struggled without her - definitely the person who seemed to be having the most fun on stage and her voice is terrific. Norma too actually, but obviously she's getting on so was a bit less active. No Jarvis here, so it was a slightly creepy young guy called John Smith who sang The Scarecrow, but he did exactly the same gruff voice in the first and last verses that Zora described, gave it a slight Playaway/Worzel Gummidge let's-pretend-to-be-scarecrows vibe. Kind of a shame, it's my favourite song on the album - lyrically it's a pretty heavy meditation on mortality and generational succession, but it's also the difference in delivery between that and the likes of Rubber Band and Magical Man that make it hit so hard, like a raw winter wind tearing through to your bones. Richard Hawley turned Danny Rose into a bit of a Ringo number, but also told a good story - he was wondering about the mystical side of some of Lal's songs, so over a cup of tea one day he asked Norma whether Lal had ever taken any magic mushrooms. The reply was 'no, but she did eat a lot of pickled onions'. Also bloody hell, aside from her dad's red hair does Kamila Thompson (Dickie & Linda's daughter) look like her mother or what?

worth checking out if you're into this stuff! http://landless.bandcamp.com/

...and likewise, the new Lutine album is great. Quite sparse sounding but very soft and delicate. Love this song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9bhdCftGNA

http://www.theargus.co.uk/news/11705184.Sussex_Folk_legend_commemorated_in_with_ale_created_by_Harveys_Brewery_in_his_name/

https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-xpa1/v/t1.0-9/10922837_888522107846526_7811329269237289520_n.jpg?oh=5d74d3e4dbdff0b1cf9b90385eae8fe4&oe=552F1DA3&__gda__=1433372187_74fb11aebbd6d053600006f528577da3

some great names in that lineup. didn't know oak had reformed!

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/jan/25/ten-thousand-times-adieu-review-bob-copper-cecil-sharp-house-folk

a shirley collins/linda thompson duet of a blind willie johnson song?!

blimey

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v472/birdnestsoup/shirleyamplinda.jpg

more info on the shirley collins movie facebook page btw, which was where that photo is from

From Rolling Reissues 2015:

Bridget St John has a 4cd set of her 3 Dandelion lps & some BBC sessions released in February. I know there were individual releases of the lps about a decade back. I'm not sure if these are those masters or not. The set is listed on the Cherry Red site at £13.95 and may be cheaper elsewhere.
Her voice has been likened to Nico and she mined a similar individualistic semiacoustic quasi-folk area to people like Nick Drake, John Martyn, Duncan Browne, Shelagh McDonald etc.

― Stevolende, Sunday, January 25, 2015 3:10 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

only know the 1st st. john album which i seem to recall features john martyn's slide playing on a couple of tracks (long time since i last played it)

xpost: nice photo and according to the facebook page, that's the very excellent john kirkpatrick way at the end there!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06mfqc8

Maddy Prior has been the lead singer of Steeleye Span since they first began in 1969. Since then the band has had dozens of members, some have left for good, some have left and re-joined, Maddy herself, who is still with Steeleye, describes it as a 'bus' with people jumping on and off.

In the first of two programmes Maddy and her daughter Rose Kemp discuss how music has taken them in different directions.

Whereas Maddy is at the very heart of the folk and traditional music establishment, Rose is a major artist in the doom and drone metal scene, the slower heavier take on heavy metal. Together Maddy and Rose discuss their music and how it was they have followed such different musical paths.

As part of this two part series Rose and Maddy have composed and recorded brand new, original songs alongside artists, especially selected by the other.

Rose has linked up with Bellowhead front man John Boden to record a song she has written to explore the difficult subject of rape in marriage while Maddy has been paired with Dylan Carlson, part of the Seattle music scene and head of the metal band Earth. Long standing fans of Maddy's and Steeleye will definitely be surprised at the way she uses her famous voice to fit the guitars of Carlson's arrangement.

Along the way, Rose and Maddy come together to discuss the world of folk and metal music, feminism and misogyny in the folk world, spirituality, and how they view the world and their relationship through their entirely different musical styles.

this sounds really cool although whoever wrote ^that up has either never heard Earth or Rose Kemp's music, or is wilfully exaggerating the degree of contrast to make it seem more striking

Interesting, Maddy is my favourite UK female folk singer (and, yes, that includes Sandy Denny and Shirley Collins).

whoa that is really cool, although yeah, they're all folk artists really, even ol' dylan

thought rose kemp had retired! her final album was flat-out incredible

Anybody hear that show? Was it good?

Bright Phoebus reissue on the way:

http://www.dominorecordco.com/uk/news/31-05-17/bright-phoebus-euro--songs-by-lal-and-mike-waterson-remastered-and-reissued-by-domino/

damnnnn, excited for that. such an amazing record (and so hard to come by!). glad it is finally getting the treatment it deserves.

My copy of Bright Phoebus arrived today. Haven't had a chance to listen yet, looks good, but that's pretty early, right? I thought it was supposed to be early August...

i'm enjoying the newest album from this Sharron Kraus project https://rusalnaia.bandcamp.com/album/time-takes-away

xp yeah, been seeing that people are getting that Phoebus reissue! jealous ... going off to order it now.

Strange stuff. Eliza Carthy just tweeted that the Bright Phoebus copyright holders (who haven't been paying any royalties, as I understand it) took Domino to court over the reissue and won, the Domino reissue being essentially unauthorised. The album has now disappeared from the Domino website.

Not good from Domino.

Jeepers, I actually know the copyright holder IRL, we drink in the same bars. He's inherited the rights from his late dad. I knew he was massively pissed off about the Domino reissue, but the release that his dad was flogging was a vinyl rip to CD - he never had the master tape, whereas Domino did get hold of it. I also remember Martin Carthy advising me to download a bootleg copy from an MP3 blog instead of buying the vinyl rip CD, as none of the musicians got royalties from it.

Damn that super sucks. Such a great album and I’d never even heard of it til this year.

so weird! domino did an amazing job w/ the reissue — totally definitive ... wonder how they would've gone along that far w/o actually getting the rights. i assume they were paying royalties to the performers?

Glad I saw this bump, just ordered a copy of the vinyl

I got a copy of the version from about 2010. So had it on the backburner.
wasn't sure how much better the new version was.

dammit, I've had the Domino reissue in my Amazon cart since it came out but never got it, what was the rush? hahaha

argh fuck i've been meaning to buy this for ages too

I bought the 2CD Domino set because it came with an extra disc of demos/outtakes etc, which again seemed to point to the legitimacy of the package. This brilliant record seems to be a bit cursed :-(

Reminds me of similar problems with records on CD Presents or SST where the label legally owns the records but don't pay royalties or allow anyone to reissue them

Fantastic record and the demos disc is/ was excellent. Crazy that it was all unauthorized!

if the musicians involved weren't getting paid anyway I don't feel too bad about buying the Domino reissue which I, uh, just did

But isn't the story that the Domino reissue was done with the master tapes - how did they get them?

Oliver Knight is a sound engineer and Lal Waterson's son... perhaps he had them?

This article on the proceeding doesn't do much clarify the dispute ("Domino was found to have no prospect of a defence, and the matter was summarily decided":

https://www.harrogateadvertiser.co.uk/whats-on/harrogate-record-label-wins-fight-against-famous-company-1-9471219

Confusingly, Financial Times at the time of the reissue last year:

Just 2,000 copies were manufactured in 1972, half of them unplayable because the hole was pressed off-centre. With lukewarm support from fans, the album went out of print. Financial problems forced Leader to sell his record labels. The new owner, Highway, sold the rights to a third company, Celtic Music, which focused on Leader’s recordings of Irish traditional music. Bright Phoebus remained unreleased.

But its reputation grew. In 2013 the Bright Phoebus Revisited Tour, featuring a band that included Marry, Carthy and Hawley with Jarvis Cocker, along with a BBC Radio 4 documentary, provided clear evidence of strong interest in the album. “It was ahead of its time,” says Marry. With demand for its release from a growing number of fervent fans unswayed by arcane arguments about folk music purity, Domino Records has bought the rights and remastered it. “It feels bloody great,” says Marry.

Eliza Carthy is retweeting folks encouraging people to buy the Domino release and calling it a "tragedy in performing art." It seems possible that ownership of the copyright was disputed between Celtic Music (the prevailing party here) and the Watersons' heirs (who Domino "bought the rights from," got the masters and were paying royalties to?).

In any case, a lovely record. Sad to have the copyright holder, with no connection to the artists, or even the original label, keep it from listeners (or keep a crap version in circ).

Yeah Domino don't seem like the bad guys here

I'm not sure I believe that only 2000 copies were ever printed story because, when I lived in Glasgow, I had a copy and at least two other people I knew also had copies - and it didn't cost an arm and a leg either.

... pressed, not feckin' printed!

original pressing was 2k with 1k viable, it did have at least two other vinyl pressings according to Discogs

i went to see one of the bright phoebus revisited concerts - eliza carthy, martin carthy, norma waterson, marry waterson (lal's daughter) plus richard hawley and some other people. really good, though martin c. was the only person there who actually played on the original record iirc

original pressing was 2k with 1k viable, it did have at least two other vinyl pressings according to Discogs

That explains it! I wondered why it was so cheap!

... other than the fact that no-one was interested it in those days.

I bought it when it was first (re)released on vinyl. And I love it. It bugs me if they get nothing from it, of course.

Some of this album is so very Hull it adds an extra layer of intimacy and relevance for me

It could really do without Rubber Band, Magical Man, and Shady Lady - but the rest is so good (including the early stuff on the second record.)

Ah they're part of the mix of the album. "Shady Lady" I really enjoy some days, obv those are three are probably nobody's favourites

They certainly give off a "Watersons gig in a lively pub" vibe

Loving Frost and Fire lately

Frost and Fire is fab. I like A Yorkshire Garland even more. Watersons is great winter music imo.

love 'frost and fire', never got round to 'a yorkshire garland'. noodle vague will know this but this is crucial, beautiful watersons viewing:

https://player.bfi.org.uk/free/film/watch-travelling-for-a-living-1966-online

twenty minutes into watching it again and even for a music documentary, there's so much booze and fags in that

other thing i loved was that norma seems to go on tour with a platypus nailed to a plank

Haven't seen the whole doc before! Only clips on YouTube.

ah well enjoy! rubber band haterz might feel differently after seeing it btw, mike seems like a sweet guy and that daftness is part and parcel of his charm

it’s the other guy with his hair and his porn and his beatles records you need to worry about

i’d never heard of bright phoebus despite yorkshire garland and frost and fire being long time favourites. i’ve listened to it now thanks to this thread and it’s wonderful.

i have a high level of tolerance for elastic band/magical man/shady lady - they’re cornball but the sound of having fun and sit well amongst the rawness of the other songs, not just in the aesthetics of the lp but as a picture of life. the beauty of this album is elsewhere but as slightly embarrassing, unbuckled, silly fun it’s enjoyable.

*rubber band

much prefer it to the latter day tweeness of eg nu-coppers - the melding of fun and foul doesn’t work for me. bob and ron incontrovertible in their tart-voiced sussex harmonies.

Folkers are fond of their whimsy, even Martin Carthy does silly numbers, Dick Gaughan doesn't though. I saw a Mike Waterson solo (unaccompanied) concert once and one of the highlights of his set was a song called (something like) "Them Geese Is Ducks".

THE IRON ROAD IS A HARD ROAD #dickgaughanwhimsy

He's funny, Dick Gaughan, all of these guys are entertainers, but he doesn't do whimsical, no sirree.

the image of dick gaughan’s face at encountering some unnecessary whimsy is making me laugh on the sofa.

but yes, whimsy def a part of english folk - feels like it’s about having a performing repertoire. but also the absurd logic is never far even from the grim songs

It's a part of folk music all over the world, not just England.

People are silly.

people like to laugh!
even a light lol is a lol

Too right.

Just got a copy of the Hangman's Beautiful Daughter by Incredible String Band and I'm very into stoned whimsy right now

not a bad place to be! :)

when will the Shirley Collins doc make it to my city?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!? that is what i would like to know

Yeah that looks amazing

A book on Dr. Strangely Strange coming out in March, looks promising (got a blurb from Rob Young who wrote Electric Eden):

https://drstrangelystrange.co.uk/index.html

Oof, I picked up a vinyl copy of the reissue and it's so, so wonderful. It's really, really got to me. Less than NV but I have some vaguer connections with the Hull area and it's enchanting me. Love this place, this is really unexpected.

Was surprised to see a copy of Domino's Bright Phoebus in Fopp and I bought it. I assumed they'd all be gone.

I freaked out and ended up with two copies - bought the cheapest new copy on discogs, then found one in a local record shop before the first order had been confirmed so I bought that too just in case

Does it have the second disc, the demos? I love Song for Thirza.

For those into ‘digital ownership’ and who are trying to figure out what to spend their emusic credits on as that service spins down the drain, they still had the expanded version for sale as of this past Monday

Hmm. The download code I got with my sealed vinyl copy didn't work.

I've just ordered the 2 CD version of Bright Phoebus on German Amazon Marketplace. I own the single disc version, but want to get the deluxe set.

The seller says they have one new copy in stock for standard price

C'mon "Shady Lady" and "Rubber Band" are amazing. Amazing how they made such a great song out of just effectively saying "you need more sun" repatedly. Maybe my second or third favorite.

RAG you are a mensch

I ordered from a Barnes & Noble marketplace seller, just got randomly refunded and order cancelled : /

Someone must've gone to discogs

Of all my favorite genres, I have the least experience with folk music and I'm quite scared to find how deep it goes (but I guess even with other genres I like, you rarely get a sense of how big the whole picture is). This feels long delayed because I got into June Tabor about 15 years ago (see my Tabor thread revive) and only occasionally dip back in to folk.

How good a guide is the Electric Eden book? I guess it leans more towards the psychedelic side?

Are there any guides that go through European folk that has a similar enough aesthetic to british folk?

How did you guys find your way around?

About 20 years ago a friend gave me a stack of C90 cassettes of mostly Enlglish fold and folk rock. I had just gotten out of a lengthy relationship and, because I worked retail, would be mostly alone during the holidays and unable to travel back home. I was unfamiar with the genre but these tapes really resonated with me and I was grateful for the time my friend spent recording the tapes which even included some handmade cover art. I still have these in a box somewhere.

Silly Sisters and Tabor's Airs and Graces comprised one tape. Fotheringay and Triona another? Definietly Steeleye Span and some Sandy Denny and Fairport.

Anne Briggs The Time Has Come was reissued maybe a month later and that record really broke the genre open for me. I essentially followed the thread created by those records and would flip through issues of Dirty Linen when I came across them for other names and connections. I feel like I've really only scratched the surface and haven't even really begun exploring other European folk music.

I learned about Shirley Collins, bought and read and listened to everything I could find, it led me to everyone else. Her stuff is still my favorite for Dolly's arrangements (Anthems in Eden with EMC of London in particular) and there is a huge family tree to explore from there. I was also really into the US/UK folk divide so I enjoyed all of the Lomax-recorded Child Ballads etc. Electric Eden is a good read and I would definitely recommend it.

European folk that is not UK/British folk is a total mystery to me but I would love to find an interpreter I love as much as I love Shirley & co.

Yes! How could I forget that Shirley and Dolly For As Many As Will was on one of these tapes. I need to rummage through my closet and pull my cassettes out and revisit them.

I remember seeing some intriguing but small RYM lists with Russian folk that looked like it should appeal to british folk fans. I guess French folk is fairly well known compared to a lot of countries.

Véronique Chalot’s J'ai vu le loup is a good mix of French and British styles, a bit like Comus or Catherine Ribiero in places, but mostly gentle pastoral.

Can't think of much European folk that sounds too similar to British/Irish folk music - Alan Stivell, of course, from 'Little Britain'.

She’s Breton too

I've been listening to Malicorne (amazing) and there's a lot of Scottish sounding stuff in there. I have heard that a lot of Scottish tradition comes from france though (I should know this, could have swore a music teacher told us that bagpipes and tartan were french).

There's bagpipes everywhere - even England!

Been topping up my amazon wishlist and Watersons - Yorkshire Garland isn't on CD.

Malicorne is the one French folk group I am familiar with and the records I’ve heard I absolutely love. The droning quality is blissful to me. If anyone knows more about the French folk scene, I’m all ears.

Re Electric Eden. I haven’t read it but the library has a copy I should borrow. Sounds like a good winter read

I read as much as google books would allow me of a folk/psych-folk book by Jeanette Leech called Seasons They Change - pretty absorbing.

I did a posts search for Malicorne the other day and found a lot of helpful info about French folk. I came at Malicorne more as a prog band but seemingly their early days were more in the classic folk rock mode.

I should watch BBC's Folk Britania again, that was very generous to give us a full 3 episodes because the other ones on metal, prog and synth only really skimmed the surface (although it was nice to see some less familiar faces). I didn't pay close enough attention to all 3 episodes when they first aired.

Electric Eden is a great read. Covers lots of ground - a lot of it probably familiar to many ILMers, but I'd definitely recommend it.

https://rateyourmusic.com/genre/folk

Checking all the subgenre charts could take forever but there's a lot of interesting looking stuff there (Warsaw City Folk?). Cant find a Russian category oddly. Charts probably aren't particularly reliable outside of the traditions most familiar to us (Robbie Robertson at no2 of Native American, Okami videogame soundtrack at no1 of East Asian).

How good a guide is the Electric Eden book? I guess it leans more towards the psychedelic side?

Are there any guides that go through European folk that has a similar enough aesthetic to british folk?

How did you guys find your way around?

― Robert Adam Gilmour

electric eden is a great book but i found it unfortunately not very useful as a listening guide. rob young has a real gift for describing music in a creative and tantalizing way that i found in many cases the reality didn't hold up to.

rym charts have some good stuff in them but require extensive filtering to get rid of, say, strasserites.

here i stumbled onto this list copied from holy warbles, probably better to go with lists than charts as a general rule on rym

https://rateyourmusic.com/list/ceesar/holy-warbles/

I bought myself 'anthems in eden' on vinyl as a xmas present. Been digging the other Watersons stuff I got too; was the 'soul cake' song really creepy for people in the past, or is it just modern ears?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQ20dtnZG14

It reminds me of a Xmas Carol, which I guess must have been made in the same mode...but I can't remember which.

"Christmas is Coming" has the same "if you haven't got a penny" bit

I can't quite remember what it was I was thinking of. We Three Kings is maybe similar in what seems to me like the 'flatness' of the tune?

Or maybe 'God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen' - I have no clue about music theory, they just have something in common to my ears.

I get you, I was also thinking about the Coventry Carol because of the eerie minor key vibe

It's kind of the old 'minor key = sad' kind of debate. Did the people at the time find these eerie and negative, or do we think they are because of associations we have.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5CZHHK2WQQ

I feel a wyrd Christmas coming on

I feel like there's something - maybe deliberate - that folk revival people were doing that generates a lot of the eerieness. Compare different versions of a standard like "Lord Bateman", Nic Jones's for example has a tune that's at odds with the lyric in adding this layer of melancholy to it

https://youtube.com/watch? v=wMI11GaHC00

https://youtube.com/watch? v=0C_wyEpaNP8

https://youtube.com/watch? v=wMI11GaHC00

https://youtube.com/watch? v=0C_wyEpaNP8

I'm in my cups listening to Bright Phoebus, which will probably be the tone of the holidays.

gah, phone links

so this is the one that really sticks in my head and i find myself humming loudly in public.
got good seats for Shirley's roundhouse show early next year and really looking forward to it

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mazxGlUoSQ8

I think "Winifer Odd" is the best demo on the second disc of Bright Phoebus. It has something a little different from the official version, maybe it's mostly the guitars?

I saw another two copies in Fopp and bought one for a friend. Surprised there's still a bunch sitting around in shops.

Listening to Once in a Blue Moon and Bed of Roses by Lal Waterson and Oliver Knight on this rainy November morning in the office. Lal's lyrics induce a pleasant vertigo, like being next in line for a roller coaster or when you get just a little bit of opiate and a chance to lie down.

i don't think i've heard that one ... will have to check it out.
i've been revisiting the Electric Muse comp in a big way over the past couple months — a really pleasurable and revealing listen.

It's two albums from the 90s that Lal Waterson recorded with her son... she sadly died while Bed of Roses was being recorded in 1998.

Thanks for the heads up, I saw them in Fopp and picked them up.

I rewatched Olivier Assayas's Something in the Air last night and really took notice of Amazing Blondel's "Fantasia Lindum" (1971). Afterwards, was able to order it and another of their albums as a twofer CD.

from Post-Fahey etc. Pt 2 thread:
Just listened to John Rebourn's The Attic Tapes, out Oct. 16. They go back at least to '62---he died before getting all the dates, but his commentary is really fluent, analyzing some of the songs, without getting pedantic, and talking about how several of them came together, incl. ones whose (probable) sources were unguessed way back when he learned 'em: who knew "Can't Keep From Cryin'" was a Blind Willie, and it's one of several familiar titles who sound really different from any version I knew.
He also talks about finding traces of the UK songster Davey Graham in various cities, ideas that lodged in the heads of musos who may well have had no reel-to-reels, or anyway didn't need one to summon the bits that JR puts together here. Mind you, he does give Graham the writer's credit for the opening tightly loose bedsit version of "Anji"(that's from the box marked "1962").
Most are like that, as he says up front, with no thought they'd ever be heard---apprentice JR, but he's already got it, and the audio's a lot better than I expected: just whoosh on the hemp carpet, and You Are There. Ditto the live tracks, where you can tell he knew somebody was listening.
He's an okay-to-good singer, maybe more the former, but we also get a couple of nice jolts from Beverly Martyn, on young Donovan's Jansch-y "Picking Up The Sunshine." JR mentions her being on the cover of a Jansch LP...need to check out more of her stuff; I only know her from the album with hubbie John. She's even better on a tight blues. Though actually most of this is pretty concise--20 tracks in 60'48"---with no lack of atmosphere.
Also a couple guest shots from the Hurdy Gurdy Man, Mac Macleod (vocals and guitar only), and the grand finale teams JR with Graham himself, on "Nobody Knows You When You're Down And Out": jazzy-bluesy, duh, and rawther magical. What other Graham should I check out?
Oh yeah, audio and more info here:
http://www.worldmusic.net/store/item/TUG1089/
PS: speaking of Jansch, this also has an intriguing solo Renbourn version of "Courtship Blues," which Renbourn says is Jansch's first song--they hadn't met then, and the writer hadn't recorded it yet, but Renbourn heard it when Tom Paley came down from Edinburgh.
Wantin those Graham tips yall.

― dow, Tuesday, September 8, 2015 6:11 PM (four years ago) bookmarkflaglink

lots of davy graham releases i've yet to hear but...

the comp that came out on see for miles is a great place to start, picks and chooses from most of his decca albums. not sure if this has been superseded by a more recent collection or not.

favourite dg lp of mine: large as life & twice as natural. stretched out folk blues jazz raga (love the joni both sides now cover that kicks it off), cd reissue has good notes from john renbourn himself.

& if you don't want to hear him sing (i like his voice personally) the collaboration with shirley collins is a+

― no lime tangier, Tuesday, September 8, 2015

This was mostly good too:
Artist: John Renbourn & Wizz Jones
Title: Joint Control
Catalogue No: TUGCD1095
Barcode: 605633009521
Label: Riverboat Records
Release date: 9 September 2016

Wizz is among a host of performers appearing at a special John Renbourn Tribute concert on Thursday 22 September at Cecil Sharp House, London.

Riverboat Records is delighted and proud to be releasing Joint Control whose 13 songs wonderfully embody the fruits of that friendship, capturing the two great artists and consummate guitarists performing together live and in the studio. The album is all the more poignant because it represents the final recordings by John Renbourn, the final tracks made just days before his death on 26 March 2015 from a heart attack at his home in Hawick in the Scottish borders.

At the time of John’s death, Joint Control was almost entirely finished. The pair had been working together since the start of the year in a small studio, about an hour from John’s Hawick home. Alongside the sheer artistry of their playing you can’t but escape the warmth of the camaraderie permeating these performances. Most of the songs are drawn from a repertoire honed through their touring together since 2012; the only original composition, Wizz’s instrumental ‘Balham Moon’, was recorded at the insistence of John, who also gave it a title.

Of course, many of the songs date back to that extraordinary period of the 1960s when Wizz and John first met, reflecting the ideas and techniques that were shared by all the young British pickers and the influences which neither Wizz nor John would have hesitated to acknowledge - Big Bill Broonzy, Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee, Josh White and Davy Graham.

The version of ‘Glory Of Love’ here is one of two performances taken from a brace of Edinburgh shows in 2014; it was learnt via a version performed by Big Bill Broonzy rather than the million-selling hit by The Five Keys. Broonzy’s ‘Hey Hey’ also fittingly opens Joint Control. The other song taped at these shows, ‘Great Dream from Heaven’, is from the repertoire of Bahaman gospel singer Joseph Spence. John was a great admirer of Spence’s work but the song was also a staple of Davy Graham’s set. “It was through Davy that we knew it,” recalled Wizz to Peter Paphides whose fine notes grace this collection. “We didn’t know much more about it than that, but then John researched it and went back to the roots of it a bit more.”

Joint Control is fundamentally steeped in the history of British folk music in the 1960s with many songs by Wizz and John’s contemporaries such as Al Jones and Archie Fisher. Another on the scene was Jackson C. Frank who first arrived in London in 1965; his most famous song, ‘Blues Run The Game’, was one Wizz had never got round to recording. It was only in more recent years that he started to play it, albeit it from Bert Jansch’s version.

Bert Jansch himself is appropriately represented on this album by no less than three performances each one bearing the hallmarks of his unique technique and great songwriting. The unreleased instrumental ‘Joint Control’ is an early example of the reflective, intricate filigree work that would dramatically bear fruit on 1966’s Bert & John album. It was actually recorded for Jansch’s It Don’t Bother Me the previous year but inexplicably left off the final selection. Masterfully interpreted here by John with Wizz, it makes it’s presence here all the more special and significant.

The anthemic ‘Strolling Down The Highway’ first appeared on Jansch’s debut which in the hands of Wizz and John - as eloquently described by Peter Paphides: “now sounds like a careworn validation of the bohemian aspirations parlayed by Bert and all the contemporaries for whom the guitar represented an escape route from the expectations of their forebears.” The other Jansch song, ‘Fresh As A Sweet Sunday Morning’, from his LA Turnaround album, always provided one of the most moving moments in Wizz and John’s shows together; Wizz would usually look skywards at the song’s close. In the wake of John’s death, this recorded version becomes even more heartfelt and moving.

As much as Joint Control is steeped in the celebrated history that its two participants shared, these genuinely historic recordings also sound utterly fresh and contemporary. John and Wizz had only rarely appeared on record together in the past. John produced (and played a little) on Wizz’s 1972 album Right Now, as well as on 2011’s Lucky The Man so we can be particularly thankful that these recordings were made. As Peter Paphides concludes: “Joint Control is a fitting testament to two musicians who never forgot the spirit of joy and exploration which made them pick up their instruments in the first place; two fires of more than fifty years standing. We’re very fortunate that they managed to capture it in time.”

should be tracks from this and The Attic Tapes here:
https://soundcloud.com/world-music-network/

― dow, Monday, July 4, 2016 5:18 PM (three years ago) bookmarkflaglink

Re "Glory of Love," John Martyn used to do a good extended version of it also.

― dow, Monday, July 4, 2016

Oh, here's what I said about it later:
Listening to that John Renbourn & Wizz Jones set, Joint Control, which I posted info about recently. Somehow not yet into the opening and closing instrumentals---though appreciating the latter's it-ain't-over-yet diligent picking-as-digging as an end---but the one in the middle, Jones's "Balham Moon," is pretty cool, and the singing x playing of the others also bring several cycling shades of blues-as-a-feeling vs. purism, even in the Renaissance Faire come-on, "Fresh As A Sweet Sunday Morning," JR's notes got thee pangs. Mostly, though, it's closer to the relatively expected sort of UK and American rare birds, "Buckets of Rain" aside. Distinct approaches, but very cohesive (think Renbourn plays most of the solos).

― dow, Tuesday, July 12, 2016

And this:

Listened to this---circle of friends on the living room carpet, late night but not too laid back---agreeable vocals, lyrics add roadmarks, guitars keep it moving through my attention (same label that put out those aforementioned posthumous Renbourns, the most recent a live set w Wizz):

JONES, BERRYMAN & JONES
Come What May
Artist: Wizz Jones, Pete Berryman &
Simeon Jones
Title: Come What May
Catalogue No: TUGCD1102
Barcode: 605633010220
Label: Riverboat Records
Release date: 26 May 2017
RIVERBOAT RECORDS PRESS RELEASE
Fellow acoustic guitar innovators and long-time friends Wizz Jones and Pete Berryman have
unmistakable styles that beautifully complement each other. With textured accompaniment
by Simeon Jones on saxophone, harmonica and flute this is an album of great song writing and
seamless musicianship.
Inspired by hearing Big Bill Broonzy and Ramblin’ Jack Elliot, Wizz Jones learnt his guitar licks from
the likes of Davy Graham and Long John Baldry whilst playing in the coffee bars of London’s Soho
in the late 1950s. He then followed the time-honoured buskers trail from the streets of Paris to the
markets of Marrakech during the early 1960s and returned to Britain with a unique acoustic guitar
style, an eclectic repertoire and a right hand worthy of Broonzy! Eric Clapton, Keith Richards and John
Renbourn have all named him as an important early influence and in May 2012 Bruce Springsteen
opened his Berlin show with Wizz’s song ‘When I Leave Berlin’.
Back in 1960 a be-suited reporter Alan Whicker had filmed a piece for the BBC’s ‘Tonight’ programme
reporting on the ‘beatnik menace’ in Newquay, Cornwall. It included two musical offerings from Wizz,
one of them a song in the style of Woody Guthrie called ‘Hard Times In Newquay’ (if you’ve got long
hair!). The youthful Wizz explained to Alan ‘All I’m interested in is playing the guitar and travelling.’
Unfortunately for the local councillors who spoke about how they were trying to expel the beatniks,
the latter had already had a profound effect on the local youth in the shape of Pete Berryman; Pete’s
first experience of live acoustic guitar was seeing the very same Wizz Jones, barefoot and busking on
the beach in Newquay.
Pete Berryman arrived on the music scene in the 1960s with the Famous Jug Band which also
featured Clive Palmer of the Incredible String Band. At this time, he also recorded with Ralph McTell,
Al Stewart and in 1971 his influential LP with John James,
Sky In My Pie, was released.
Simeon Jones often travelled with father Wizz during the 1960s and 1970s to Cornwall in a variety of
jalopy VW buses and Citroens as well as to numerous festivals in the UK and Europe. Avoiding the
guitar (perhaps sensibly!) he developed into a superb sax, harmonica and flute player and has been
playing since the 1980s a wide variety of music in sessions and on tours with countless blues bands.
The music on this album results from three musicians who have nothing to prove, getting together
for a few days and playing assuredly on a few songs and tunes they all love. There are original songs
from both Pete and Wizz along with Bert Jansch’s ‘Moonshine’ and Fran Landesman’s wonderful
‘Ballad Of The Sad Young Men’.
Wizz’s song ‘Alone In My Car’ perhaps sums up the overall mood; driving through the night, heading
for Cornwall, looking forward to playing some music with Pete and other friends. ‘Playing the guitar
and travelling’ – still doing it after all these years. Long may it continue - come what may!
For more information, visit www.worldmusic.net

― dow, Monday, May 1, 2017 5:08 PM (two years ago) bookmarkflaglink

booklet:

01 YOU’RE BLASÉ
(Hamilton/Sievier) pub Chappell Music Ltd
A song composed in 1933 and featured in a
stage musical called ‘Bow Bells’. Hearing this
on a cassette transcription from an old 78
rpm disc played and sung at the piano by that
old rascal Leslie ‘Hutch’ Hutchinson reminded
me of musical evenings when as a child at
home in Croydon, listening to the BBC, the
wind-up gramophone and my mother jauntily
playing the piano during the dark winters of
the 1940s.
02 SEE HOW THE TIME IS FLYING
(Tunbridge) Copyright Control
I make no excuses for revisiting this beautiful
Alan Tunbridge song yet again. There must be
so many generations who’ve yet to hear it!
03 POACHER’S MOON
(Jones) pub Year Zero Music
One cold night in November somewhere in
Germany back in the 1970s I was carousing
with the double bass master Danny Thompson.
‘That’s called a “Poacher’s Moon”, Wizz,’ he
said looking up at the Harvest Moon which
was briefly visible between the clouds. I
misunderstood and thought that a ‘Poacher’s
Moon’ meant a dark night with no moon,
hence the lyrics in my song. He then went
on to wax lyrical on his wild times on tour
with the guitarist John Martyn - up to their
waist in freezing water at midnight, fishing
in the Scottish Highlands. I just had to write
something to keep that vision in my mind!
04 A RED PAPER ROSE
(Berryman) Copyright Control
Pete’s imagining the story from another side.
05 BEWARE OF CHARMING FRIENDS
(Jones) pub Year Zero Music
I guess sometimes my songs get too personal!
06 THE BALLAD OF THE SAD YOUNG MEN
(Landesman/Wolf) Copyright Control
Davy Graham, a great inspiration to all
acoustic guitarists in the 1960s, recorded this
Fran Landesman poem on his second album
and I’ve always wanted to sing it.
07 ANOTHER CHRISTMAS WITH YOU
(Jones) pub Year Zero Music
Not to be taken too seriously. A blues riff that
came out of one of my favourite guitar tunings
– EADEBE.
08 COME WHAT MAY
(Berryman) Copyright Control
Pete’s letter to his daughter
09 MOONSHINE
(Jansch) pub Leola Music Ltd
It was the great Bert Jansch who presented
a nine-year-old Simeon with an old wooden
flute, thus starting him off on a never ending
musical journey. When I heard Simeon’s son
Alfie playing Bert’s song, naturally I persuaded
him to come into the studio to play on this
track.
10 SEA SONG
(Berryman) Copyright Control
Some maritime musings from Pete.
11 ALONE IN MY CAR
(Jones) pub Year Zero Music
Heading for my beloved Cornwall for the
thousandth time.
BONUS TRACKS:
12 THE KING OF ROME (BONUS TRACK)
(Sudbury) pub Cloud Valley Music
13 THE NEW MOON’S ARMS (BONUS TRACK)
(Lowe/Sanders) pub Lowe Life Music
14 ALBATROSS (BONUS TRACK)
(Green) pub BMG Rights Management (UK) Ltd
MUSICIANS:
Wizz Jones: acoustic guitar, vocals
Pete Berryman: acoustic guitar, vocals
Simeon Jones: tenor saxaphone, flute, harmonica and
vocals
Guest Musicians:
Alfie Jones: acoustic guitar on track 9
Anne Sumner: vocals on tracks 8 and 11
Produced by Wizz Jones and Andy Levien
Recorded, mixed and mastered by Andy Levien at RMS
Studios, London, 2016
Track notes by Wizz Jones
Sleeve notes by Maggie Holland

Visit www.worldmusic.net to hear sound samples of all
albums on Riverboat Records.

― dow, Monday, May 1, 2017

Interesting background, Davey Graham, he was mixed race: Scottish and English, no, seriously, his mother was Guyanese and his father was Scottish. I saw him play once and he was pretty terrible, I'm sure I must have posted about it on here.

I saw John Renbourn playing with Robin Williamson too, which was much better!

Ah, here we are...

Glad to say that I saw Bert Jansch (a few times), Davy Graham (which was, er, interesting) and John Renbourn live before they died, John with Robin Williamson... don't die yet, Robin!

― Betel-chewing Equipment of East New Guinea (Tom D.), Friday, 27 March 2015 07:51 (four years ago) link

Tom, curious about Davy Graham, what was the like? From what I've read he was an intense person

― kurt kobaïan (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, 27 March 2015 12:27 (four years ago) link

Intensely fucked up on something or other - booze, pills, smack, who knows what. He basically couldn't play anymore but he couldn't play in a bewildering variety of styles and genres, Buxtehude to raga to calypso, his set must have covered about 6 centuries. At one point he brought a guy he was teaching to play guitar up on stage and, to be honest, it was a relief to have someone play without bum notes, fluffs, fumbles etc.

― Betel-chewing Equipment of East New Guinea (Tom D.), Friday, 27 March 2015 12:51 (four years ago) link

... that's all I could find but that's like 10 years after the gig and I'm sure I posted something about at the time. I remember turning up for the gig a bit early and seeing him stood on his own at the back of the venue, bolt upright and completely still, for an unnaturally long time.

See the Ken Russell thread for folk documentary.

I'm devastated by the death of my friend and collaborator Celia Ford Drummond, formerly Humphris, singer for folk band Trees. I was honoured to have her beautiful voice on my Dodson and Fogg albums, to share vinyl space with her, and to know her. A kind, caring lady. RIP xxx pic.twitter.com/ap1kyrrmPU

— Chris Wade (@dodsonandfogg) January 11, 2021

RIP! Been on a major Trees kick since that box set came out. Great voice / vibe.

i missed out on the box, but catching up on all the extra tracks now via spotify. such a lovely band, horrible sad news this

more of a reminder to myself, but there's a big 1991 terrascope interview with celia here that i need to sit down and read:

http://terrascope.co.uk/MyBackPages/The_Trees.htm

gosh, her voice still sounds great on those 2018 live cuts

jesus christ, that bit where they come back in after the fake-out ending on murdoch *always* gets every hair in my brain standing on end

Sad top hear about her passing.
I'm hoping that a copy of the box set is actually going to arrive having now been told taht it was on its way to me as an Xmas present.

I've been listening to a lot of Davy Graham in the last few days and god I'd forgotten how transcendent he can be. Midnight Man in particular is sending me to all sorts of places. Anyone have any experience with the recent Bread & Wine reissues? I can't find much in the way of information about them anywhere (even the Hoffman forums seem empty of news or opinion!).

Been on a Spotify kick of Scottish travelers and some English stuff:

Belle Stewart
Davie Stewart
Jeannie Robertson
Fred Jordan
Sam Larner

Way upthread, I reposted my from one of the post-Fahey threads about xpost Davey Graham re Renbourn's early 60s-travelling The Attic Tapes, and no lime tangier provided me with some Graham tips:

(in the notes, Renbourn) also talks about finding traces of the UK songster Davey Graham in various cities, ideas that lodged in the heads of musos who may well have had no reel-to-reels, or anyway didn't need one to summon the bits that JR puts together here. Mind you, he does give Graham the writer's credit for the opening tightly loose bedsit version of "Anji"(that's from the box marked "1962").
...the grand finale teams JR with Graham himself, on "Nobody Knows You When You're Down And Out": jazzy-bluesy, duh, and rawther magical. What other Graham should I check out?
Oh yeah, audio and more info here:
http://www.worldmusic.net/store/item/TUG1089/
Wantin those Graham tips yall.

― dow, Tuesday, September 8, 2015 6:11 PM (four years ago) bookmarkflaglink

lots of davy graham releases i've yet to hear but...

the comp that came out on see for miles is a great place to start, picks and chooses from most of his decca albums. not sure if this has been superseded by a more recent collection or not.

favourite dg lp of mine: large as life & twice as natural. stretched out folk blues jazz raga (love the joni both sides now cover that kicks it off), cd reissue has good notes from john renbourn himself.
& if you don't want to hear him sing (i like his voice personally) the collaboration with shirley collins is a+

― no lime tangier, Tuesday, September 8, 2015

I'd not heard Large As Life - brilliant. The Joni cover is magnificent. Davy's magic aside, Danny Thompson is in imperious form, Jon Hiseman too.

The live set from Hull University is pretty great. Or athat is to say the dorms after I think an earlier gig.
ITs called After hours at Hull or something

I could really do with getting Caedmon but i think the current release had no cd version.

Thought would be about next week’s release of Beeswing.

Next week?
Right time flies by.
There was an extract in the last Uncut the VU covered one.
Seemed to fly through some time that I would have hoped was more thoroughly covered so hope it was more of an intro.
But yeah do think it is pretty essential

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/jan/13/carthy-folk-dynasty-appeals-for-financial-support-after-income-dried-up-during-pandemic Also, Martin and Eliza Carthy are due to play live throughout the UK this winter, with an intermittent run of dates kicking off in Durham on 27 January. Eliza wrote that she had recorded a new album during the pandemic, proceeds from which would also help the family. No mention of Norma's participation; hope she's okay.

Sad to read that story, will definitely bung them a few quid as soon as I can

Eliza posted that Norma passed away yesterday. RIP.

;_; RIP Norma

Tragic news. I'd gone to the record shop to buy a copy of For Pence and Spicy Ale, and was informed of her death by the shop owner.

That version of Hal-An-Tow on Frost and Fire, I don't even know what half of it means tbh, but that to me is one of the most joyful and life-affirming songs I can think of, that song basically banishes death and that is how I will always think of her. RIP Norma

oh :(

coming at it from the opposite direction to Nick, I feel like every word of Red Wine & Promises off of Bright Phoebus is seared into my brain and I feel as though I understand what she meant exactly, down to the last nuance, and it is one of the saddest and most beautiful songs I've ever heard. one of those rare songs i've listened to repeatedly at moments of crisis in my life, just poured my soul into it and internalised it and made it all about me and my parents. a fucking wonder of a song.

but yes, Hal-An-Tow is joyful, A Souling Song is terrifying.

my Dad got me hooked, he used to play this track in the car when I was quite young and still utterly obsessed with the Libertines (and through them the Smiths, the Clash, the Jam and all of that). this, along with Poor Old Horse by the Albion Band and Penguin Eggs, showed me a completely different vision of what constituted "distinctly British music" and i'll always be grateful for that

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9qlI6hQYy0

RIP

on his invaluable doomandgloomfromthetomb tumblr, ilxor tylerw sez:
...check out this fantastic 1960s documentary on the Watersons, capturing the group very early on in their folk club days. The inky black-and-white style of the film could easily fit in with those classic British kitchen sink realist films of the era — you almost expect Tom Courtenay to be lurking in the background (Instead, there’s Anne Briggs, which is even better). It’s a beautiful time capsule.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Vrszb4w318

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOFsJLQZpcM

Is this book good? Hadn't heard of it.

Enjoying this book called Dazzling Stranger by Colin Harper. Connecting a lot of dots for me. Recommended if you’re into this sort of thing—British folk, Bert Jansch, blues, what have you. pic.twitter.com/8Ehg2hZMK6

— Shane Parish (@shaneparishgtr) July 1, 2022

Was out a long time ago? I read it but I can't remember much about beyond Bert saying he was never interested in the Beatles.

yeah thought it pretty great. Also looks at the Edinburgh and i think London folk scenes as they tie in with the narrative.
There is a companion cd in 2 versions one either side of the Atlantic. They change a couple of tracks presumably tie din with rights etc.
Unexpected appearance of Bruce Loose of Flipper whose dad was a promoter on the folk scene in the late 70s and also put Bert up a few times when he was drinking way too much. & Loose apparently started mimicking his behaviour.

I thought it was a good book as are the other couple of books by Harper I've read. Irish Folk, Trad & Blues: A Secret History and Bathed In Lightning: John McLaughlin, the 60s and the emerald beyond

.. Archie Fisher jumping out of a window to avoid Licorice McKechnie's dad is in there I think? Also Licorice and Bert almost getting married?

Hell yes. https://t.co/q2F50kLxBZ pic.twitter.com/Ulc1FuKKRW

— Tyler Wilcox (@tywilc) July 14, 2022

I love when a UK folk band expands their horizons to adopt the propulsive electric bass grooves and backbeat that characterized US folk-rock of the era. This LP is a great example, but Shirley Collins’ otherworldly voice and the song choices keep the vibeS trending traditional pic.twitter.com/q8v8E5zAiD

— the modern folk (@themodernfolk) August 1, 2022

Keep meaning to buy Show of Hands' Singled Out, but I'm little puzzled by what it's meant to be exactly. A compilation of assorted post-2001 songs(?), with two rare recordings from the early 90s Columbus EP and "Crazy Boy" from 1997's Dark Fields. But why? What's it for?

since the season is officially here and there has been a lot of “brit folk = chilly weather” discourse lately, here’s that uk folk mix i did for @aquadrunkard a while back https://t.co/NPzE7kYLlW

— jocelyn romo (@theeroamer) September 25, 2022

Lankum album (despite the album art) is really as good as they say

heavy, droney, druidic trad
https://lankum.bandcamp.com/album/false-lankum

Lankum are not British! And there's already a thread for them!

lol true on both counts, sorry!

Oops.

have been spinning shearwater multiple times this last week so seeing this was a nice surprise today: https://thequietus.com/articles/33584-martin-carthy-bakers-dozen-favourite-albums-jon-wilks

Lovely Martin Carthy. My grandfather played and sang with him in Bath and Sidmouth. I'm reliably informed their singing voices were very similar too.

I saw Martin Simpson at a local church last weekend. He was great as ever, and just as pissed off. He played mostly stuff off his new album; Deportee, a Woody Guthrie cover, was probably the highlight. It's a predominantly conservative area, so some of his barbed comments about Rwanda and Gaza were met with a mixture of soft applause and awkward silence.

American here and I don't know Martin Simpson at all except that I have ardently loved his cover of "Boots of Spanish Leather" for many years, just the most beautiful guitar figures. I don't even remember how I first came across it but I throw it on not infrequently. Nice to see his name pop up :)

He's an extraordinary guitar player. I've never really fallen for a record of his, which is strange given how many albums he has. He makes sense in a live setting: along with his mesmerising playing, he's a brilliant storyteller and his rage is palpable.

He lived in the States for about 10 years, I think. He's back in the UK now - living in Sheffield; Richard Hawley is a neighbour. If he tours anywhere nearby, go see!

will do!

Seriously in love with this song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEL7rw3iDEA

Question about british folk from 60s/70s vs the last few decades: does the eerie/mythic/mystical side still have a lot of presence or has that mostly migrated into rock and metal? Whenever I'm in the folk section the new cds never seem to have much of that in their presentation.

The traditional songs haven't changed.

feels like it comes up sometimes, like Candidate and Woodcraft Folk, but recently people that way inclined seem to go straight to Hauntology

Not her main thing, but you do pass through some of that when Hull's Katie Spencer pauses in the olde walls with members of John Martyn's band, principally on Hurt In Your Heart. She sounds like she's learned a lot from Martyn, but doesn't imitate him. The Edge of the Land was my gateway, still a particular fave, but it's all good on her Bandcamp---kinda reminds me of (an unmistakably British) youngblood Bonnie Raitt, just showing up knowing how to do all this stuff: https://katiespencerofficial.bandcamp.com/

Anyone going to see Martin Carthy on his US tour? Sadly not coming very close to me.

https://transformmethenintoafish.com/

Martin's quite frail and forgetful these days, which might be uncomfortable to witness; a good friend of mine saw him in March, and wrote at length about it towards the end of this blog post: https://www.davidbelbin.com/blog/2025/03/the-old-guys-martin-carthy-john-cale-van-morrison/

I was reminded last week that I got Steve Roud's Folksong In England a while back and never got around to reading it.
So need to get into that and a couple of other books on the subject in the near future.

Question about british folk from 60s/70s vs the last few decades: does the eerie/mythic/mystical side still have a lot of presence or has that mostly migrated into rock and metal? Whenever I'm in the folk section the new cds never seem to have much of that in their presentation.

Can't speak for the last few decades, but there's definitely been a few acts like that in the last few years. Angeline Morrison has an incredible voice, low and resonant or still and piercing, and has albums of traditional tunes and original songs, including one project (The Sorrow Songs) putting the stories of several Black Britons through history into song. It's incredible, the best album of the 2020s so far. The new Shovel Dance Collective album is on that same level, it's quite sparse most of the time but then bursts into these waves of noise. Goblin Band are a little sillier but their version of The Brisk Lad is discordant and sinister in all the right ways.

And a little older, but Alasdair Roberts' 2005 album No Earthly Man is stunning if you're interested in Scottish folk. The instrumentals and his voice are almost unbearably light.

If you're interested in the eerie and mythic side you'll have the most luck with current Irish folk. Lankum (who have their own thread somewhere here) draw out old folk tunes into these gorgeous bleak drones, and their side project ØXN is also worth listening to. Eoghan Ó Ceannabháin and Lisa O'Neill are more singer-songwriter-y but share some of that sublime bleakness, the latter's All You Need Is Chance is my 2nd favourite album of the 2020s so far.

Other acts that I haven't checked out as much but also lean in that direction: Burd Ellen, The 15th Day of May

Would that be The Eighteenth Day of May or has someone come up with a similar name?

Yes it's the 18th! Got the days mixed up lol

Seeing Carthy on Sunday. His daughter (who iirc is very good) will be with him.

Folk is one of the genres in the 20% off feature with Cherry Red this month alongside country and reggae.

OK, following up on mike t-diva, Carthy is indeed pretty frail and occasionally forgets lyrics (there are a lot to rememeber!), and he divided his time between sitting and standing. But his playing was good and accurate, and while I can't imagine seeing him without Eliza as (literal) support at his side, she did a great job keeping him and the show on track. And tbh when Martin told a couple of stories or played a few songs by himself, he was funny and engaging. What's wild is that I saw Bruce Cockburn the night before (#onethread), and Cockburn is just around 80, so only three years younger than Carthy. But despite Cockburn's own physical ailments, he seemed much less frail than Carthy.

Glad to hear it was an enjoyable show, Josh.

Listening to What Love Is, this year's album by Katie Spencer, who I posted about upthread in March: thee early UK folk-rock spareness is still her template for self-expression. a bit more consistently than on some previous releases--voice and reverby finger-picking, double bass, occasional clarinet, drum, with "juno" (synth, I take it) and/or pedal steel, blending with or backing her guitar---occasionally, yeah--it's on her bandcamp with the others I mentioned. Just now: vocal authority in "Stranger," with no need to use power.

Oh sorry, that was the finale, "Carry It All," with her whole little band in there.