A Lark Ascending

Contemporary folk music from Norway, Sweden and Finland. Groups like Varttina, Frifot, Hedningarna, Vasen etc. I came across a little of this about 20 years ago but every time I experimented I seemed to end up with some heavy metal folk band with wailing guitar or drum'n bass 'beats.' A recommendation for some sampler albums from the Northside label (ridiculously cheap!) has opened up a marvellous world here. Great tunes, off centre rhythms, distinctive almost-medieval harmonies. A tremendous and little known area of music.

I first heard it along with some friends on a radio broadcast the week it came out. It was around 10.00 one Friday night (I was at university at the time) and we stayed in to hear it. I just recall all of us reacting 'This is crap!' I couldn't quite believe it was so bad and so bought a copy anyway and never warmed to it. It seemed to be all flash and no tunes. And I'm afraid that was what appealed to me about yes - they had an almost Beatlesque gift for melody. Relayer sounded as grey as the cover. I bought 'Going for the One' a couple of years later and although there were a few tunes there I found it very 'glued together'. Previously the different segments of their songs seemed to flow together. They seemed to lose that. I think my disinterest was also tied in with Wakeman who always struck me as completely characterless - I much preferred Tony Kaye (this may have something to do with the appearance of synths around the time of Wakeman - they're pretty industrial revolution on 'The Yes Album' but with each successive album they became more and more anonymous). ************* I'm have a pretty similar reaction to Genesis. I love Nursery Cryme and Foxtrot - great songs and that marvellous textural breadth - electric, acoustic 12 string, flute, mellotron etc. I was disappointed by 'Selling England...' when it came out. The songs were less careful, more rambling. And, once again, the anonymous synth rears its ugly head! 'The Lamb...' I did like - that was a real left turn for Genesis. It all sounds rather muddy but very distinctive with good tunes (and the synth sounds woozy, not synthetic at all). I did my university finals to 'Trick of the Tale' and really liked it's poppy tunefulness. 'Wind and Wuthering' attracted me less - again, less care over the tunes and ideas being regurgitated. After that I lost interest although I did enjoy 'Duke' (nice tunes) and 'I Can't Dance.' The real problem I always found with Genesis was their lack of an improvising soloist. Banks and Hackett were good players but played arrangements. I saw the Gabriel-era Genesis on the Foxtrot tour and although it was great fun everything was identical to the records; live recordings suggest the same. Banks also does that thing that drives me nuts in many prog-rock bands of playing a phrase and then repeating it; then another phrase and repeating it. At the end of the day I retain great affection for these bands' music up to the mid-70s but cannot summon up much interest beyond. This may be purely a case of nostalgia. I suspect it's partly a result of disliking synths and the sort of loud, stadium production that took over in the late 70s. And also a consequence of discovering jazz, folk and classical music around 1975, where things were done much more subtly. As I said before I think the music of many of the bands of the early 70s has suffered unfair press because of what it became. In the early 70s there was a real sense of musicians challenging boundaries, pushing the limits of what was pop or rock music. Perhaps their ambitions ultimately outstripped their musical abilities or imaginations. Too much attention went into the 'show' and the special effects, not enough into the music. And thus what had begun as a genuine attempt to create adventurous music set itself up to be written off as pretentious and bombastic by the punks. That, at least, is the view of someone who came to this sort of music in the early 70s. An opportunity lost.

I think with prog rock you had to be there at the time. The bloated nature of things after about '73 is what everyone remembers (mega stadiums, dry ice, ever more costly stage sets, silly capes and costumes); its hard to appreciate just how fresh and colourful all this music was when it first emerged from the swamp of plodding blues-rock. I can still remember the thrill of hearing 'The Yes Album' in early 1971. There was nothing quite like it. In an alternative universe Rick Wakeman would have fallen into that curry and drowned, Yes would have quit the stadiums and gone acoustic and then worked on developing their melodic side and that wonderful way they had with instrumental textures in the early 70s. Maybe they could have got Donal Lunny from Planxty/The Bothy Band in Wakeman's place. His marvellously propulsive bouzouki would have suited them to a tee and provided a much more interesting texture than great washes of synth. Yes as a folk club band. Now that would have had possibilities!

I still hold the 'prog rock' of the early to mid-70s in great affection...I love 'Tales of Topographic Oceans', for goodness sake! Even the band seem to be forever apologising for it! Now 'Relayer' they should apologise for.... From about 1975 my interest rapidly disappears. I did have a Yes album from the late 90s which did nothing for me. What happened to that amazing melodic gift they once had? KC are one of the few bands of that era who still consistently produce rewarding albums. I too love 'The Power to Believe'. There's alot of life in Fripp yet.

Wayne Shorter's 'Native Dancer' - without the variable tape speed that ruins the current CD version.

Sorry! Didn't read the rubric. Maybe I'm the Emelda Marcos of nostalgic music slippers!

Kind of Blue, several of the 70s ECMs like Ralph Towner's Solstice or Jarrett's Facing You. And many a 70s rock record - Fairport, Soft Machine, Pink Floyd. There's nothing like nostalgia for the 'slipper effect.'

Every Brit has one of those in their back garden. We always arise at sunrise to worship the mystic spirits in order to bring good fortune each day. Actually all is explained in 'Ashley Hutchings: The Guv'nor and the Rise of Folk Rock' by Brian Hinton and Geoff Wall: On the back cover of the vinyl edition of Liege & Lief is a carved wooden totem owned by Dave Swarbrick, impossibly ancient - like a cross between a scarecrow and a human sacrifice, next to the Witchseason logo, and surrounded by a circle of flowers and leaves, a ribbon bow no less. "Dave Swarbrick found that in a churchyard," Ashley explains. "He found it amongst leaves and things, and it was rotting away in some sacking, and it is quite clearly some magical totem of some description. And we thought that it was just very suitable, and as you well know this and Full House are absolutely shot through with magic and mystery, both albums, and so we put it on the album. But Swarb found it."

Perhaps the time is fast approaching when smoking will be banned on this board too!!! ************ If I'm in a pub listening to music smoking doesn't bother me and I've no wish to ban it. Now talking during the music...that I would ban!

4 is good on Thursdays and 6 is good on Saturdays. Unless you're Jewish.

Havn't heard this yet but I'm very taken by 'Sweet Transients', his earlier disc. Anyone with the good sense to record a Kenny Wheeler tune has got to be listened to.

Ah, but 1649 was also a year of revolution. Or was it counter-revolution? Perhaps 1647 would have been a better choice.

Clearly no golfer's here. Though they probably voted for 19!

Disqualified! ("Read the rubric, boy, read the rubric.")

Strange. I favour 1649 for much the same reason, tonym.

Never mind! Thanks for checking.

Ghost of Miles, What do you know about the Schneider? I've just checked Amazon and CD Universe and they both have a CD called Allegresse coming out in June...but that's the name of her last one of a few years back! Hope there is something new.

Sorry. It's number 11.

The world awaits your verdict...

Ah, JSngry, that one holds a special place in the hearts of us Brits for other reasons!

I was always very selective about who I'd play such games with. It helped if they were four years younger, girls etc!

If you can find a way of selecting 4th July, 1776 as opposed to 3rd July 1776 from the ten choices on offer please be my guest!

Absolutely no deviation tolerated! [Answers along the lines of 'Norah Jones' get instant disqualification]

Well, that certainly proves you're not he!

You didn't used to play bass with the Pink Floyd did you, Ed?