"My Griffin Is Gone" by HOYT AXTON – January 1969 US LP on Columbia Records in Stereo (CBS in the UK in Mono and Stereo) featuring David Cohen of Country Joe & The Fish & Elephant’s Memory on Guitar, James Burton of Elvis Presley fame on Dobro, Larry Knechtel of Bread on Keyboards (with sessionman Mike Melvoin also on keys), Jimmie Fadden of The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and Ben Benay of Delaney & Bonnie on Harmonicas with Chuck Berghofer and Gary Coleman of The Wrecking Crew on Bass and Percussion (July 2006 UK Acadia CD Reissue and Remaster) - A Review by Mark Barry...

 

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WHOLE LOTTA LOVE - 1969
Rock, Pop and Genres Thereabouts
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"...Spent It All On Comfort For His Mind..."

 

For a good few years now I've had an e-Book series on Amazon under the general umbrella of 'Sounds Good Music Books'. And one of those 30-or-so releases is entitled "I SAW THE LIGHT - Forgotten Albums 1955 to 1979" with a whopping 458 entries and nearly 1,900 e-Pages.

 

Well, Hoyt Axton's overlooked and largely forgotten Country-Folk pastoral socially conscious gem "My Griffin Is Gone" will be going in there with an unceremonious bullet come next update (which will be early 2022).

 

"My Griffin Is Gone" is not the five-star masterpiece many claim, but there are at least six or seven of the twelve tracks that I play a 'lot' - and they are good man - Nick Drake and Paul Buckmaster flute and acoustic guitar pastoral plaintive good - with a smidge of Tony Joe White and Fred Neil deep-voiced guttural cool thrown in for good measure. The lyrics too are brilliant – life, friends, religion, drugs, the counter culture, childhood lingering and more. Sometimes they can be twee for sure – all flowers and sunshine (it was 1969 after all). But mostly they're intelligent, street-insightful and in the hands of an artist able to communicate them with an unflinching eye.

 

And audio-wise, this sweet-sounding 2006 CD on England's Acadia (part of the Evangeline Records group) is licensed from Sony/BMG who own the tapes for Columbia Records, so the Remaster is genuinely clear and really good (some tiny traces of hiss but nothing that really detracts). Those strings on "Revelations" are gorgeous as are the Brass Arrangements on the brilliant "Way Before The Time Of Towns". Let's get to the babbling people brook...

 

UK released July 2006 (August 2006 in the USA) - "My Griffin Is Gone" by HOYT AXTON on Acadia ACA 8117 (Barcode 0805772811720) is a straightforward CD Reissue and Remaster of his 1969 album (in Stereo) and plays out as follows (35:47 minutes):

 

1. On The Natural [Side 1]

2. Way Before The Time Of Towns

3. Beelzebub's Laughter

4. Sunshine Fields Of Love

5. It's All Right Now

6. Gypsy Will

7. Revelations [Side 2]

8. Snow Blind Friend

9. Childhood's End

10. Sunrise

11. Kingswood Manor

12. Chase Down The Sun

Tracks 1 to 12 are his fifth studio album "My Griffin Is Gone" – released January 1969 in the USA on Columbia CS 9766 (Stereo) and in the UK on CBS Records M 63588 (Mono) and CBS S 63588 (Stereo). The Stereo mix is used for this CD. Produced by ALEX HASSILEV, players included David Cohen of Country Joe & The Fish & Elephant's Memory on Guitar, James Burton of Elvis Presley fame on Dobro, Larry Knechtel of Bread on Keyboards (with sessionman Mike Melvoin also on keys), Jimmie Fadden of The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and Ben Benay of Delaney & Bonnie on Harmonicas with Chuck Berghofer and Gary Coleman of The Wrecking Crew on Bass and Percussion. All songs written by Axton except "Kingswood Manor" with Peter Steinberg of the US group The Shambles.

 

The six-leaf foldout inlay has in-depth liner notes from ALAN ROBINSON who does a damn good job of explaining Axton and his late 60ts pretty-sounding yet acidic LP – the only real loss being the lyric insert sheet that came with original US LPs – it's not reproduced which is a mistake on an album that relies so heavily on words both hummed and snarled. Still, the Remastered Audio is lovely throughout, so that makes up for the presentation basics. To the music...

 

Axton had been punching out albums since 1964 and his songwriting prowess had not gone unnoticed - Three Dog Night making a No.1 out of "Joy To The World" - while Steppenwolf made a stunner of "The Pusher" - the subject matter of drugs and their destruction being something of a serious bugbear for Axton. In fact, Steppenwolf and their lead vocalist John Kay covered "Snow Blind Friend" off of "My Griffin Is Gone" for their 1970 LP "Steppenwolf 7" - recognizing easily with lyrics like "...did you say you saw your good friend flying low, blinded by the snow, lying on the sidewalk with a misery on his brain...spent it all on comfort for his mind..."

 

Drugs and their devastation were not far from Hoyt's mind at any given moment (as was religion) – take the Simon & Garfunkel quiet prettiness of "Kingswood Manor" which very effectively paints a nightmare picture on an addict interned - "...this jacket is tight, but I feel fine, though they say I've lost my mind...the doctor came, and in his hand, the ticket to the promised land, a trip to paradise, little pills instead of tea, he said he'd come to rescue me from the maddening saddening gloom in the paisley rubber room..."

 

In the lovely "Childhood's End", he sounds so like Fred Neil it's uncanny, while the gorgeous "Way Before The Time Of Towns" was a highlight on the Ace Records compilation "Choctaw Ridge: New Fables Of The American South 1968-1973" that they put out in July of 2021 to mucho praise (see my in-depth review).

 

Will this one eventually rise out of the ashes and be born anew (like its title)?

 

"My Griffin Is Gone" by Hoyt Axton is the kind of album that means a lot to a lot of people who were lucky enough to stumble on it in the racks of record shops in the spring of 1969. A genuine lost gem then and one you need to get mythical figures on...

"The Studio Album Collection" by JIM CROCE (March 2015 Edsel 7CD Box Set of Remasters) - A Review by Mark Barry...

"...Photographs And Memories..."

South Philly singer-songwriter JIM CROCE was a strange one in Blighty. A massive star in the USA when his first solo album proper "You Don't Mess Around With Jim" hit the racks in May 1972 on ABC Records - within a year and a half he'd had two No. 1 singles and one number one album.

Yet in England (where most of his catalogue was carried by Vertigo Records) - his music meant little and saw bugger all chart action. Even a killer single like "You Don't Mess Around With Jim" with the equally impressive and touching ballad "Photographs And Memories" on the flipside (issued August 1972 on Philips 6000 069 in the UK) did zip despite the incredibly radio-friendly hooky A-side that American DJs sent all the way to the top (and back in the days when those 45 sales figures were huge).

Tragedy struck too. In late September 1973, Croce and other band mates were on their way from Louisiana to a gig in Sherman, Texas when their light aircraft crashed on take off killing all six inside (including the pilot). Croce was only 30 and it was already over. Yet his way with a melody, his raconteur wit and his great lyrical songs stayed with people and saw a Greatest Hits set grab an impressive No. 2 spot on the Stateside Rock LP charts in October 1974 (even then there was still nothing in the UK by way of chart action). And that's where this rather cool little CD Box set comes swaggering in.

UK released 16 March 2015 - "The Studio Album Collection" by JIM CROCE [featuring Ingrid Croce] on Edsel CROCEBOX01 (Barcode 5014797891036) is a 7CD Box Set with Card Repro LP sleeves and Booklet that plays out as follows:

Disc 1 "Facets", 26:39 minutes, 11 Tracks

1. Steel Rail Blues [Side 1]

2. Coal Tattoo

3. Texas Rodeo

4. Charley Green, Play That Slide Trombone

5. The Ballad Of Gunga Din

6. Hard Hearted Hannah (The Vamp From Savannah) [Side 2]

7. Sun Come Up

8. The Blizzard

9. Running Maggie

10. Until It's Time For Me To Go

11. Big Fat Woman

Tracks 1 to 11 are the privately financed and issued "Facets" LP - released August 1966 in the USA on CROCE-101 (No Label), 500 copies only, most sold by JC at gigs

Disc 2 "Jim And Ingrid Too", 17:39 minutes, 7 Tracks

1. Child Of Midnight

2. Marianne

3. Railroads And Riverboats

4. Hard Times Are Over

5. The Railroad Song

6. Maybe Tomorrow

7. Pa (Song For A Grandfather)

Seven Studio Outtakes first issued March 2004 in the USA as Disc 2 in the 2CD Deluxe Edition reissue of "Facets" (Shout! Factory D2K 34724 - Barcode 826663472424). No recording dates or musician credits provided then or now. The recordings are probably 1967 and 1968 and are far better recorded quality than the bootleg feel of the original 1966 privately made "Facets" LP

Disc 3 "Croce" by Jim and Ingrid Croce, 27:23 minutes, 11 Tracks

1. Age [Side 1]

2. Spin, Spin, Spin

3. I Am Who I Am

4. What Do People Do

5. Another Day, Another Town

6. Vespers

7. Big Wheel [Side 2]

8. Just Another Day

9. The Next Man I Marry

10. What The Hell

11. The Man That Is Me

Tracks 1 to 11 are the US LP "Croce" originally issued September 1969 on Capitol ST-315 in Stereo and credited to JIM and INGRID CROCE. It was reissued 1974 in the USA and Canada as "Another Day, Another Town" on Pickwick SPC-3332 in different LP artwork (railway tracks sleeve) with nine rearranged tracks (the two dropped were "The Next Man That I Marry" and "I Am Who I Am"). That 1974 LP variant can be sequenced by using the following CD tracks – Side 1: 5, 6, 7, 4 and 2 / Side 2: 1, 8, 10 and 11. It was reissued yet again by Pickwick with the same catalogue number and nine tracks sometime in 1976 (Pickwick SPC-3332), but again with different artwork (painting/cartoon side profile face sleeve).

Disc 4 "You Don't Mess Around With Jim", 33:12 minutes, 12 Tracks

1. You Don't Mess Around With Jim [Side 1]

2. Tomorrow's Gonna Be A Brighter Day

3. New York's Not My Home

4. Hard Time Losin' Man

5. Photographs And Memories

6. Walkin' Back To Georgia

7. Operator (That's Not The Way It Feels) [Side 2]

8. Time In A Bottle

9. Rapid Roy (The Stock Car Boy)

10. Box No. 10

11. A Long Time Ago

12. Hey Tomorrow

Tracks 1 to 12 are the US LP "You Don't Mess Around With Jim" issued May 1972 in the USA on ABC Records ABCX-756 - July 1972 in the UK on Vertigo Records 6360 700 (peaked at No. 1 on the US LP charts, didn't chart UK)

Disc 5 "Life And Times", 29:51 minutes, 11 Tracks

1. One Less Set Of Footsteps [Side 1]

2. Roller Derby Queen

3. Dreamin' Again

4. Careful Man

5. Alabama Rain

6. A Good Time Man Like Me Ain't Got No Business (Singin' The Blues)

7. Next Time, This Time [Side 2]

8. Bad, Bad Leroy Brown

9. These Dreams

10. Speedball Tucker

11. It Doesn’t Have To Be That Way

Tracks 1 to 11 are the LP "Life And Times" - released January 1973 in the USA on ABC Records ABCX-769 - June 1973 UK LP on Vertigo Records 6360 7011 (peaked at No. 7 on the US LP charts, didn't chart UK)

Disc 6 "I Got A Name" , 31:47 minutes, 11 Tracks

1. I Got A Name [Side 1]

2. Lover's Cross

3. Five Short Minutes

4. Age

5. Workin' At The Car Wash Blues

6. I'll Have To Say I Love You In A Song [Side 2]

7. Salon And Saloon

8. Thursday

9. Top Hat Bar And Grille

10. Recently

11. The Hard Way Every Time

Tracks 1 to 11 are the LP "I Got A Name" - released December 1973 in the USA on ABC Records ABCX-797 - April 1974 UK LP on Vertigo Records 6360 702 (peaked at No. 2 in the US LP charts, didn't chart UK)

Disc 7 "The Lost Recordings", 31:46 minutes, 12 Tracks

1. You Don't Mess Around With Jim

2. New York's Not My Home

3. Tomorrow's Gonna Be A Brighter Day

5. Walkin' Back To Georgia

6. Operator

7. Time In A Bottle

8. Seems Like Such A Long Time Ago

9. Mississippi Lady

10. These Dreams

11. A Good Time Man Like Me Ain't Got No Business (Singin' The Blues)

12. Lover's Cross

Tracks 1 to 12 are early home studio recordings for the 1972 LP "You Don't Mess Around With Jim". Edsel have reissued that 1972 album as a standalone CD in 2015 on Edsel EDSA 5025 (Barcode 740155502539) with the above 12 tracks - 1972 Home Demo Recordings for the "You Don't Mess Around With jim" Album added on as Bonuses.

Each of the 7CDs listed above are in individual singular card sleeves that repro the front and rear of their original vinyl albums - excepting of course the two specially created compilations - "Jim and Ingrid Too" and "The Lost Recordings" (both with newly made up artwork). All seven slide into a hard card slipcase box sided by a very tastefully laid out 36-page accompanying booklet featuring lyrics, recording credits (if known) and a new essay on Croce's life and legacy by ALAN ROBINSON written in December 2014. As with so many Edsel reissues, although the titles are licensed from the majors, there is precious little by way of Remastering credits except that their long-time Audio Engineer - PHIL KINRADE – has mastered this compilation.

The "Facets" album from 1966 reflects its privately pressed and recorded origins and has what can generously be described as bootleg quality - good but never great. The rest are thankfully a whole lot better - especially the core trio of solo LPs "You Don't Mess Around With Jim", "Life And Times" and the album that was recorded before he was tragically taken and released after his passing "I Got A Name". And I'd swear they're the Rhino Remasters. All the instruments are clear and clean. The second CD called "Jim & Ingrid Too" (Disc 2 in the Shout! Factory 2004 Deluxe Edition reissue of "Facets") has shockingly good audio for all of its seven cuts. But that 2004 Shout! Factory reissue unfortunately gives absolutely no indication of when, where or who played on these songs (not elaborated on here either). But given their audio, it might be enough to surmise that they were recorded circa 1967 to 1968 in a professional studio – put down no doubt before the husband and wife "Croce" set on Capitol Records in 1969. Although neither the booklet nor the rear sleeve of the other rarities set here (CD7 entitled "The Lost Recordings") gives any info on those 12 tracks - they're 1972 home demos for the "You Don't Mess Around With Jim" album and their audio quality reflects that. The real studio albums however sound great.

The first bare bones album is OK, the outtakes second CD far, far better despite its short playing time, but whilst the husband and wife Sonny & Cher routine of "Croce" has some pretty and funny moments – mostly it comes over as twee 60ts and is terribly dated (Ingrid hasn’t the best of voices either). The leap to May 1972 and the first solo album proper "You Don't Mess Around With Jim" on ABC Records in terms of audio and quality songs is enormous. It's as if Croce had been crafting and saving up for years because the songs on "You Don't Mess Around With Jim" are fantastic. While the radio-grabber title track gets all the hooky plaudits, to this day there are people who can’t listen to the emotive ballad "Time In A Bottle" without getting soppy. It’s a truly affecting song and the great audio feels like that of Steve Hoffman when DCC reissued and remastered his material. Terry Cashman and Tommy West (trading as Cashman and West on ABC Records in the USA and Probe Records in the UK) aided and abetted on all three of the proper solo albums and with smashes like "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown", "Operator (That's Not The Way It Feels)", "One Less Set Of Footsteps" and "I'll Have To Say I Love You In A Song)"– Croce found himself up there with the likes of Don McLean, Gordon Lightfoot and even James Taylor as being beloved by the public and admired by music critics at one and the same time.

This is a nice set and a reminder of his sad loss – a legacy that shows (some say) that Jim Croce might have taken on the singer-songwriter big boys had his wit and charm been given a chance. In the meantime, try to seek this out rather elusive box set and enjoy those musical photographs of simpler times...

"Be Glad For The Song Has No Ending/Liquid Acrobat As Regards The Air" by THE INCREDIBLE STRING BAND (2004 Beat Goes On 2CD Remasters) - A Review by Mark Barry...

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                                                                  "...Evolution Rag..." 

I've reviewed the earlier catalogue of THE INCREDIBLE STRING BAND from 1967 to 1970 on other superlative Beat Goes On CD Reissues - but have been avoiding this release because I can't abide the hippy claptrap of "Be Glad For The Sing Has No Ending" - especially its associations with the destructive and appalling Scientology Cult that is imbedded into the lyric-songs on Side 1. The album is partially saved by some interesting and eclectic passages on Side 2's nine-part instrumental "The Song Has No Ending" - music from the 1970 limited-release film "Be Glad For The Song Has No Ending". That 26-minute opus is similar to the 20-minute Side1 suite on Amazing Blondel's "Fantasia Lindum" LP on Island Records in 1971 - but not as good or as pretty (see separate review for "Evensong/Fantasia Lindum" also on BGO Records, 2004).

And then there's "Liquid Acrobat As Regards The Air" - coming at the tail end of 1971 - an underground album that fascinates to this day (spoken of in hushed tones by some). There are unfortunately still traces of Hubbard’s reality-bending cosmic psychobabble (indoctrinating young impressionable minds for momentary gain) – but the music was better and for its time – a bit out there. Let's get to the Cosmic Boys and their Evolution Rags...

UK released June 2004 (reissued October 2010) - "Be Glad For The Song Has No Ending/Liquid Acrobat As Regards The Air" by THE INCREDIBLE STRING BAND on Beat Goes On BGOCD 627 (Barcode 5017261206275) offers 2LPs from 1971 (March and October) - Remastered onto 2CDs and plays out as follows:

Disc 1 (50:54 minutes):

1. Come With Me [Side 1]

2. All Writ Down

3. Veshengro

4. See All The People

5. Waiting For You

6. The Song Has No Ending (A Selection Of Instrumental Pieces - 26:45 minutes) [Side 2]

Tracks 1 to 6 are the album "Be Glad For The Song Has No Ending" - released March 1971 in the UK on Island Records ILPS 9140 (No US release). "Save All The People" recorded live March 1968 at The Royal Festival Hall - all other tracks studio.

Disc 2 (48:44 minutes):

1. Talking Of The End [Side 1]

2. Dear Old Battlefield

3. Cosmic Boy

4. Worlds They Rise And Fall

5. Evolution Rag

6. Painted Chariot

7. Adam And Eve [Side 2]

8. Red Hair

9. Here Till Here Is There

10. Tree

11. Jigs: Eyes Like Leaves/Sunday is My Wedding Day/Drops Of Whiskey/Grumbling Old Men

12. Darling Belle

Tracks 1 to 12 are the album "Liquid Acrobat As Regards The Air" - released October 1971 in the UK on Island Records ILPS 9172 and February 1972 in the USA on Elektra EKS-74112

The card slipcase always lends these BGO releases a feel of class. ALAN ROBINSON provides the very informative and entertaining liner notes in the tastefully laid out 16-page booklet – a lot of which is taken from/in collusion with Adrian Whittaker – author of the 2003 Book "Be Glad: An Incredible String Band Compendium" published by Helter Skelter. Adorning both sides of the text pages are small black and white period photos of the mad ensemble doing their flowers & cosmos thing – whilst the rest of the pages provide you with original recording credits and lyrics for both 1971 LPs.

Audio-wise - it doesn't say who or where these were Remastered - but I'm presuming it's the work of ANDREW THOMPSON because it sure sounds like it. Anyway - the Audio is superb throughout - most of the Acoustic-based songs benefitting from that extra oomph the transfer has given them. With John Woods as the original Engineer (Nick Drake etc) – it’s hardly surprising that these CDs sound so sweet. But the music for me is very much a tale of two cities - good and bad...

"Be Glad For The Song Has No Ending" feels like an odds and sods record - whatever was left in the can - thrown into one lump and issued regardless. Side 1 has the five lyric-based studio songs (One live in 1968) - while Side 2 is the 26-minute-plus Instrumental in nine different parts. The 'ha ha ha' chorus of the live track "See All The People" is insufferable hippy chanting and like most of Side 1 - I find it unlistenable now. There are pretty acoustic passages around the six-minute mark in the Side 2 instrumental that suddenly locate that ISB magic again - and later in the sitar break - but mostly it feels disorganised and rambling for the sake of it. Best track is the slightly vaudeville singing/talking more-tea-vicar song - "Waiting For You".

The harpsichord, the monastic voices and the clever Hari Krishna chanting percussion of "Talking Of The End" make it an extraordinarily odd yet intoxicating opening track. And just when you think you know where the song is going - it suddenly goes into a Sitar break that's both cool and eerie. "...Death is unreal...there's more to be revealed..." they sing on "Dear Old Battlefield" - the most Liege & Lief track on the LP. Mike Heron plays the Randy Newman piano while Likky handles the girly vocals on the pretty yet weird "Cosmic Boy" where the ISB of old is almost unrecognisable. Back to Folk-Prog business with "Worlds They Rise And Fall" - quite possibly the best melody on the album and beautifully played too.

The very Richard and Linda Thompson guitar vibe of "Painted Chariot" got picked as a representative of the band on the "Strangely Strange But Oddly Normal" 3CD Box Set for Island Records in 2005. The English Traditional "Here Till Here Is There" is almost Acapella - Heron and Likky sharing the microphone initially with Recorders thereafter providing the plaintive backing. But the sophisticated story-telling, cod-faced funny, World War sad and beautiful "Darling Belle" dominates the LP – an elongated finisher about life and loss that is all flutes and hissing swans and glockenspiels giving it some banjo yearning. I don't know about them getting their 'heads together in the country' like so many bands tried to do in the wake of Traffic - but the song is so typically ISB and a great way to end the record - mad as a dingbat on some very potent mushrooms - stoner rural music with an accent and a certain charming innocence...

As a group and listening experience - The Incredible String Band has always divided listeners - they're a Marmite band - love or loathe them. Those silly youthful indoctrinations aside - "Liquid Acrobat As Regards The Air" is still pretty much unlike anything you've ever heard - then or since. And for that they have our thanks and admiration.

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Put succinctly - this is keep the home fires burning music - while the leaves fall with whispers and the foggy dew is wet with aura daffodil love (know what I'm saying pal)...

"Evensong/Fantasia Lindum" by (THE) AMAZING BLONDEL (2004 Beat Goes On Reissue - 2LPs Remastered onto 1CD) - A Review by Mark Barry...

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"...Shine On Your Celestial Light..."

Imagine The Incredible String Band had a three-way with Tir na n'Og and Gryphon and the offspring produced was Steeleye's Span's awkward child.

AMAZING BLONDEL will not be for everyone - ye old English rhymes about buxom wenches beneath willow wood - celestial lights up on Old Moot Hill and lute-wielding hairy men dancing Lady Marion's Galliard at the Siege of Yaddlethorpe (if you get my pint of mead).

UK released on the very adventurous Island Records in 1970 and 1971 (on both sides of the pond no less) – The Amazing Blondel and these two brilliant albums was part of the Fairport Convention/Fotheringay/Pentangle led Folk Revival sweeping the country and student campuses at the time. But our minstrel heroes veered away from the new hybrid of Folk Rock and went back to very ancient roots indeed. Theirs was a mission to tap into the deeply distant past - airs and tunes and instruments gathering dust in unloved Elizabethan museum spaces.

But I hear you say - that's all very nice and historically tickety-boo - but isn't most of that stuff unlistenable pigeon doo-dah. Well no - because amidst all the madrigals, pipe organs, harmoniums, tabor pipes and lutes - lurk pretty melodies - and a trio of enthusiastic Englishmen ready to glockenspiel your sorry city ass. At the time it was fresh and even daring. It’s dated now of course and does suffer from some serious hippy overtones laced with mushrooms and dodgy real ale choices. But there’s so much to love here too and this BGO Remaster is audibly fabulous (2 full albums for the price of one – how very trade union of them).

Here are the lullabies, galliards and merry dances on St. Crispin's Day...

UK released 14 June 2004 - "Evensong/Fantasia Lindum" by (THE) AMAZING BLONDEL on Beat Goes On BGOCD 626 (Barcode 5017261206268) offers 2LPs Remastered onto 1CD and plays out as follows (70:28 minutes):

1. Pavan

2. St. Crispin's Day

3. Spring Season

4. Willowood

5. Evensong

6. Queen Of Scots

7. The Ploughman [Side 2]

8. Old Moot Hill

9. Lady Marion's Galliard

10. Under The Greenwood Tree

11. Anthem

Tracks 1 to 11 are their 2nd studio album "Evensong" (as THE AMAZING BLONDEL) - released December 1970 in the UK on Island ILPS 9136 and February 1971 in the USA on Island SMAS-9302. Produced by PAUL SAMWELL-SMITH.

12. Fantasia Lindum [Side 1, 20:25 minutes]

Prelude and Theme

Song "Swifts, Swains and Leafy Lanes"

Dance "Jig Upon Jig"

Theme (Lutes and Recorder)

Dance Galliard "God Must Doubt"

Song "Lincolnshire Lullaby"

Dance "Basse Danse"

Theme (Lute Duet)

Dance "Quatre Bras Pavan"

Song "Celestial Light" (For Lincoln Cathedral)

Dance "Coranto"

Them (Lutes and Recorders)

End

13. To Ye [Side 2]

14. Safety In God Alone

15. Two Dances

(a) Almaine (b) Bransie "For My Ladys' Delight"

16. Three Seasons Almaine

17. Siege Of Yaddlethorpe

Tracks 12 to 17 are their 3rd studio album "Fantasia Lindum" (as AMAZING BLONDEL) - released November 1971 in the UK on Island ILPS 9156 and December 1971 in the USA on Island SW-9310. Produced by PAUL SAMWELL-SMITH.

(THE) AMAZING BLONDEL was:

JOHN DAVID GLADWIN - Lead Vocals, Lute, Theorboe, Cittern and Double Bass

TERENCE ALAN WINCOTT - Crumhorn, Recorders, Pipe-Organ, Tabor Pipe, Tabor, Flute, Harmonium, Lute, Harpsichord, Woodwinds, Percussion and Vocals

EDWARD BAIRD - Lute, Cittern, Glockenspiel, Dulcimer and Vocals

Other Musicians:

Chris Karan - Percussions

Adam Skeaping - Viola de Gamba and Violone

Jim Capaldi (of Traffic) - Drums on "Siege Of Yaddlethorpe"

The 12-page booklet features the lyrics to both LPs in that old English typeface - some black and white live photos of the trio and new highly entertaining liner notes from noted writer ALAN ROBINSON (dated January 2004). There are no credits for the Remaster but it sounds like Andrew Thompson's work. As both records are largely acoustic instruments - this is the kind of transfer that benefits from a delicate touch. Take the beautiful instrumental passage at the title track "Evensong" plays out which is followed by the short instrumental "Queen Of Scots" - both sparkling with clarity and full of presence - a very sweet job done.

Their debut "The Amazing Blondel And A Few Faces" had surfaced in May 1970 on Bell SBLL 131 in the UK (now a £300 rarity) and has been reissued separately. But their 2nd studio album "Evensong" from December 1970 was a giant leap forward and the UK issue came in a typically lovely Gatefold Sleeve courtesy of Island Records (repro'd in the booklet). Let's get to their unique type of new old-music...

Just what kind of instrument a Trumhorn, a Tabor or a Theorboe actually is remains an ecclesiastical mystery - but we're "...off to the Holy Wars to fight the Saracen..." on the opener "Pavan". Ladies of pleasure are mentioned in both "Pavan" and St. Crispin's Day" (using their ye old name beginning with 'w' and I don’t mean wenches) - but it's the impossibly pretty "Spring Season" that really catches the ear. This tale of 'courting' on dark nights that are dwindling and fires that need less kindling is properly lovely and featured as an example of excellence on the stunning 2009 "Meet On The Ledge" 3CD Box Set covering Island's Folk-Rock output (see separate review). "The Ploughman" is another gushing love song with a Harmonium anchoring a light but sweet melody. It spins its lovely way into your heart with yearning words like "...If I were a Weaver...I'd weave the tresses in your hair...Plait them with ribbons of gold...and bless each ringlet, curl and fold..."

Years of untold pain continue and are sung by all three in the strangely jolly "Old Moot Hill" - another air where a hurting soul wishes he was the lucky suitor come calling as she sits "...combing auburn hair before retiring to bed..." Our players ask another lady to come discreetly and meet "Under The Greenwood Tree" where he dreams of more nights of shameless love – if only her dowry wasn’t promised to another. The album ends with the huge Harmonium sound of "Anthem" where you half expect someone to walk down the aisle in a countryside church wedding at dusk as the boys (all dressed as Will Scarlett) sing like a choir "...your guiding light shines clear...through the twilight till the dawn..."

"Fantasia Lindum" goes for broke with the whole of Side 1 being one long 20-minute mishmash of 13-segments – and it’s frankly brilliant, brave and musically beautiful Suite with certain instruments a shoe-in for an album in 1973 called "Tubular Bells". The playing on this side-long opus is magical and the Remaster really brings the beauty of pinging acoustic strings, Dulcimers and Harpsichords into your living room. As they sing “...Crimsoned fragrance expounding...adorn your dreamfields tonight...” – you get lost in the voices and that unique sound they make and you also can’t help but feel that £30 as a Record Collector Price Guide quote is too low for these rare Pastoral Folk masterpieces.

For sure this music isn’t going to be everyone’s idea of Newcastle Brown Ale – but I urge you to seek out The Amazing Blondel in all its old-world diversity and unique British beauty. Shine on your celestial light indeed. And eh by gum but them were the days...