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Speaker 2kind of alluded to this idea of folk music having another big influence on on music in 1968 and again I see there is this kind of divide between the way that works in the UK and the way that works in the States and maybe that'll come out in our discussion but let's start with the UK for me the quintessential kind of UK folk stroke psychedelic band is the incredible string band who at the time people forget how influential the incredible string band were because I think they are a band that in some sense is are very locked in time they are also known I think because of their artwork it kind of it's locked in the era three albums this year and the funny thing is about these three albums is these are the three albums I would pick as the seminal incredible string band albums everything about this band picked in this year and was never the same ever again they are at their very very zenith this year with these three albums a lot of the songs have these very kind of whimsical illusions to mythology fables fairy tales and sometimes I don't know what the hell they're talking about but there's a fascination just with the use of language even if you don't understand
Speaker 3and there's also that kind of thing where it almost fits in with kind of Celtic yes storytellers of old there's kind of an ancient quality in what they do
Speaker 2yeah ancient that's a good word yes yeah it's yes it seems to be past present and future all at the same time and there's also very interesting there's also that kind of outside of music sensibility in the sense they're they're not afraid to attack instruments they can't play and use them as textures and colors in the music some very amateurish playing on some of the incredible string band albums but it all adds to the charm this kind of naive charm and outside of quality that these records have we tam in the big huge for me which was released simultaneously as two single albums and as a double for me is their absolute masterpiece a lot of the tracks on this record ramble on for seven eight nine ten minutes in ways that are completely alien to the idea of how you construct and I think this is what I mean by how the influence was being felt and I think it was a big influence I think
Speaker 3you know people who are around at the time do talk of how important they were you know Beatles as you say and I think that but generally folk anyway you can listen I think it's a dear prudence isn't it has the Donovan finger pick style that Donovan talked to the Beatles and so on and I think Donovan is in the mix with incredible string band both ways I think they probably listened to him he definitely listened to them yeah and then the other big band I think took on board incredible string band Tyrannosaurus Rex
Speaker 2yes of course yeah yeah
Speaker 3but you are right they're kind of preserved it's almost like incredible string band exist as this one brilliant phenomenon in one year because they seem kind of faintly absurd afterwards and they couldn't have existed beforehand despite those ancient influences then again you do see it in things like Deventora Bernhard you know there are in later years I think people have fallen in love again with that sort of magical naivety that they possess but I
Speaker 2think that's true of a lot of the music on this list it's it's very difficult to imagine the band like the Pentangle who also made a double album and a single album in the same year this year we're headlining the Royal Albert Hall in 1916 yeah I know you can't see it massive yeah and also Donovan was massive at the time yeah massive at the time and yet he is I think now regarded I think he's respected now but there was certainly a time when he was regarded as a bit of a joke you know he sort of want to be Dylan and yet very quickly from those early few early albums where he was clearly a Dylan idolater he's developed into something completely different and makes two also two records this year Hurtie Gurdie Mann and Donovan in concept I again I keep mentioning this it seems again to have this strong yearning for childhood more innocent times and I think this is a hallmarker I say I repeating myself here this does seem to be a hallmarker a lot of UK psychedelic music from this era strawberry fields forever in Chico Park most of Donovan's work the incredible string band this yearning for childhood for for the nursery for children's toys the circus the fairground and Donovan kind of you know encapsulates that in the way that you could never imagine Dylan Dylan always seemed very sort of world where he very grown up very cynical very sneering in a way this is the zapper thing is true isn't it very grown up very soon you can't imagine zapper yearning for childhood
Speaker 3no it's it's not in any of zapper's work it's not in any of Dylan's work you're entirely right and you kind of wonder is it because on one level drug culture is important rock has become true cultural capital the the future on one level they're racing to it headlong are you saying they
Speaker 2want the future now to they want the future now to call yeah they want it now we've managed to shoe home the ham into this episode folks so if you had you drink the game if
Speaker 3you had your drink how can we do this how can we get Sylvie and talk talk you know you've just done it you've just done it what I'm hoping we are going to have frittlight so with of course he actually did he was there he was there but then ham did he single was release so yeah do kind of wondering whether you know there is it's life is moving so quickly for this particular generation that's simultaneously they're wanting to rush headlong into the future while finding some kind of route in the past what is it what's driving this quest for
Speaker 2innocence well I mean bowling was just in love with childhood and he was in love with things like Lord of the Rings he was in love with you know sort of Mr Eastern mysticism in a way that was very shallow actually I don't think he ever really read a book from beginning to end but he he loved that kind of iconography that imagery and he and corporate and he was in love with the way that words sound it yeah in a way that didn't necessarily have any deep meaning but if you wanted to you could find meaning you could read meaning into it it didn't have that kind of rigor that someone had Dylan had or Joni Mitchell would have actually you know there was genuine meaning a lot of it was posturing
Speaker 3well it was a capturing an essence wasn't it as much as an
Speaker 2essence but very beautifully very beautifully you know I you know a bit like John Anderson did later on with yes you don't want to analyze the lyrics too strongly but they sound beautiful they sound they have the courage of their conviction when they're sung by the right singer and I think the incredible string band are a good example of that Donovan you know another herde-gurde man I mean yes ridiculous but is it ever had hits I mean the thing is about
Speaker 3Donovan compared to a lot of the others he had bona fide hits from sort of 65 onwards and he also you know I think he grew out of the Dylan thing really really quickly definitely by Sunny Goode Street which is might be even 65 yeah it's not fairy tales you know it's a wonderful wonderful piece of music there is definitively Donovan and definitively captures the flavor of that London folk scene I think but also with the jazz the jazz element yeah yeah very strongly which
Speaker 2again you never heard that in
Speaker 3Dylan no he's already kind of expanding as well I mean I really like herde-gurde man I really love it as well yeah both of them are great examples of Donovan at his best and again he's found his voice during this period I mean I've always felt as as you have I know that he gets a really bad deal I think partly because of his image partly because of his name he's not seen in the same way that Sandy Denny or Nick Drake or John Martin are but if you listen once more there's an incredible naturalness of vision you know I love I lay you know these songs absolutely to me could compare with some of the best of Nick Drake you know I totally and he's experienced with jazz well because you know I love Martin and Martin right flavor of all time and Martin's the tumbler is a pretty decent it's okay it's okay it's okay it's it's a little too traditional little too dull Donovan at this point he's employing people like Harold McNair yeah lots of great jazz players so the music isn't only this kind of very natural singer songwriter that has its roots in a kind of Celtic folk but also he's drawing on Mingus he's drawing on Mars Davis yeah and writing great pop songs it's part
Speaker 2of the problem with Donovan that a lot of people only really remember him for a couple of novelty singles hello yellow there is a man on tin I think a lot of people don't look past that but if they're great you know some time to see Superman is a fantastic single but it's also got a bit of a novelty vibe to it isn't it I think you're right I mean some of the songs you mentioned are sublime I mean they're up there with the Nick Drake the classic Nick Drake songs they're up there with the classic John Martin songs they are top notch but they are buried on these albums and they're not what people know Donovan for they know Donovan for the the big singles the big novelty singles and maybe that in a sense ultimately worked against him that he did have the big hits whereas John Martin credible string band Nick Drake they never had the hits so people people had to engage with the albums or not at all.
Speaker 3Yeah, and I think unfortunately that kind of lasted in '70s because he had a huge hit with Cosmic Wheels. That was a very successful album. And again, he's got a couple of absolutely beautiful timeless pieces.
Speaker 2But it's also got the intergalactic laxative on it.
Speaker 3The intergalactic laxative. And you know, I'm not quite sure I can imagine Nick Drake singing how much he can you weave when you're little and you're only three. Well, that's not intergalactic laxative. No, it's not. That's the piece song.
Speaker 2That is the piece song.
Speaker 3Yeah, what I'm trying to say is that Donovan always in a sense has that moment of stupidity. Well, it's not stupidity.
Speaker 2Again, it's that yearning for sure. He just takes it too far. He goes back, he goes back to the nursery. Yeah. Songs about doing weweas. And you know, how's that going to go down with the guy that's just been checking out in a gather to feed it by iron butterfly or, you know, probably not that one. Not that well. Yeah, it's not going to sit well, is it?
Speaker 3Because Nick Drake, Nick Drake was a Donovan fan. I think this is one of the things I think and I'm sure Martin must have been aware of them. Sure. Yeah, in a gather to feed a wheat we pass by. I quite like it. Birth of heavy rock in that riff, I think. Birth of heavy
Speaker 2rock. But pretty, but it's very sort of neanderthal, isn't it?
Speaker 3It's got the wee little equality.
Speaker 2Yeah. I mean, it's less, let's forget is basically one riff for about 18 minutes, isn't it, with adrenaline? I'm sorry. Yeah, I'm sorry.
Speaker 3And a little bit of organ wafting. And I was going to say that was one of the only things that I was going to talk about the doors, the doors out with this year. I really like, I know it's seen as the weakest of the early doors albums, but I think it's a strong outfit again. Yeah. Couple of great singles. Once more, he really, well, I think he stretches himself vocally, the band stretches himself musically. There's some beautiful ballads on this, some of the most subtle interplay of any band during that era. And then they can really make a racket when they want to as well. But one of the things with the doors, they were huge at the time. This is the thing. They were successful at the time. They were an albums band, a singles band, totally respected. Yet you don't actually hear their influence in many bands, probably until late 70s, early 80s, when people like to hear to explode, echoing the bunny men would quote from them. It's really weird that they're like a band apart and his voice is a voice apart. I've often liked that description that, in a sense, he was like a psychedelic Frank Sinatra, because he's got that kind of old cruners, Bennet Sinatra quality. There's nobody that sounds like Jim Morrison in the rock world in 1967 or '68. You know, amazing vocalist, amazingly distinctive.
Speaker 2The two things I think about the doors, I think firstly, there's six albums. I'm talking about six albums they made with the original lineup. It's an almost perfect discography. Because every album is different, every album feels like a development from the previous album. And yet they're all brilliant. They've all got brilliant songs on. They've all got great, as you say, they've got great deep album cuts, ambitious, lengthy pieces, but also great pop songs. Lyrically, it's very strong. But the other thing was you kind of alluded to, you don't hear their influence for a long time, and you don't really hear their influence now, either. No, they are. They are kind of almost locked in their own little world and their own bubble. Maybe that time will come again.
Speaker 3It's difficult to know, isn't it? But I was saying that in a Gadot Vida, there is a bit of organ work that occasionally suggests, "Okay, they might have heard the doors." But that's like, "Sure." I'm really scrabbling to find people influenced by a band that were huge. I think it saw something like 7 million waiting for the sun. This is a popular album. You can hear Hendrix. You were totally right. You can hear Hendrix in so many albums of this year. Even albums aren't very Hendrix-like. Source of the secrets is not Hendrix, but Corporal Clegg has got that Hendrix riff at the beginning.
Speaker 2And carrying on from my riff about the influence of the doors today being very minimal, you can hear Hendrix in almost all heavy rock music, heavy metal music. A lot of mainstream rock music. He's still there. But the doors strangely are absent. It was quite an unusual group to start with. Wasn't it? No bass player. The organ is carrying a lot of the heavy lifting. And the singer is so unique that perhaps that's part of the issue that he's very difficult. I mean, there are people that have tried to emulate me in Asbury from the cult who ended actually being in the doors. The doors line up the third, I think, in the early 21st century. In the 90s he replaced in Morrison. If such a thing is even conceivably possible. So I think you did hear the influence that, you know, in. Well, I was Cooper said. You know, I was Cooper.
Speaker 3Oh, okay. Yeah, that makes sense. Maybe some of the early I was Cooper. And I know that Iggy and the Stooges, the doors. I think that Iggy was obsessed with Jim Morrison. But strangely, I think Iggy creates his own unique rock sound. I don't hear, you know, I hear beats of Morrison. But you can even hear, you know, Velvet Underground were not the most popular band of the era. Influential, yes. But even at the time you can hear those shards of guitar in certain bands around immediately afterwards. You know, Kevin Ayers did a Velvet's Tribute. Bowie did a Velvet's Tribute. So Velvet Underground are in the culture, even before Lee Reed's solo success would walk on the waside. But the door was, you know, where's the door was in in 1972. Rock or pop. I'm sure the first thing.
Speaker 2I'm sure the listeners will tell us where they are. I'm sure they are there somewhere. Yeah. But you're right. I think in terms of their commercial success and their profile at the time, their long term and short term influence seems to have been fairly limited. Certainly when you compare them to the influence Beatles or the influence of the, you know, or the influence of Hendrix or Floyd or Floyd or Velvet Underground.
Speaker 3And even in a Gada Davida, you know, you can hear that pummeling, heavy
Speaker 2rock, brainless, heavy rock, sort of, yeah. Absolutely. Lumbering, heavy rock. And you know, it's interesting that doors almost seem to span the world of that. I mean, because he was such a confrontational performer, they almost are in the middle between the sort of sneering cynicism of the Velvet and Frank's Apar. Yeah. And the more commercially, the more accessible positivity of psychedelic music, they're kind of in the middle somewhere. Maybe that's, maybe that's it. That they kind of fall between, you're not quite sure of their this or that. Like the Beach Boys. Not on the Beach Boys. Well, yeah, a bit like the Beach Boys.
Speaker 3A bit like the Beach Boys. Friends with certainly all those albums that never had an influence. But I was getting confused. It was the three Bees again. I was thinking a bit like the Beach Boys. Where that exists. Yeah. In its own bubble. Yeah. In its own quite sure what it is.
Speaker 2Yeah. What are we supposed to be, you know, are we supposed to be taking the seriously underground music? Or are we supposed to be looking at it as a sort of, you know, very commercial, populist group? And you're not quite sure. Maybe the doors suffered from that a little bit too. Although I think now in retrospect, they're very much seen as rock royalty, aren't they? But maybe at the time. But then a song like Touch Me, which is not on this out. It's on the soft parade the following year. Is it the following year, soft parade? Yeah. It's very sort of, it's very commercial, isn't it? Almost cynically so. And I think Jim Morrison wasn't very keen on it for that reason. Was it? So maybe there is a sense that the fans at the time and historically speaking, never quite sure. I'm not sure. Talking about them now. I'm not quite sure. Were they careerists or were they actually genuinely trying to do something in the underground? Well, of course, the reality is probably there was somewhere in between. And we like a lot of those artists, don't we? We've always said we like artists that are kind of on the cusp.
Speaker 3You know, it's all this conversation we're going from genres to genre, band to band, almost in a psychedelic way. If you're not a native of this, we could go back to incredible string band in Donovan, Tyranas or so.
Speaker 2And then the stooges and then the studio. But that's part, that's part of what this year is about in a way, isn't it? It's very hard. I mean, I juggle, we have these categories just to explain to listeners. We have these categories and we kind of group albums together in categories. It was hard this year. Some albums could have gone in any number of categories. Everyone's listening to the Beatles. Everyone's listening to Hendrix. And it's kind of manifesting in different ways.
Speaker 3Well, even Elvis this year, you know, he's got his comeback special. Tell us about the obvious album. Well, the Elvis one. Now, Elvis has his comeback special, which is where people suddenly think Elvis. It's cool. It's cool. It has returns. It's cool again. And he looks great. He sounds great. And the special is really good. I recommend people watch it. He's very funny. I mean, people have often sort of portrayed him as a puppet, but he's actually naturally spontaneously witty. He's got incredible charisma, but he was also still doing his films. And he did one this year called "Liver Little", "Love a Little", which is almost kind of, it's a psychedelic sex comedy. You know, it's almost carry on American stuff. Sounds great. That's great. Yeah. But it has one of his most amazing, almost psychedelic Elvis pieces, which is called "Edge of Reality". And it's the closest Presley comes to almost a Bond film soundtrack. But with the scope of a MacArthur Park, I'm slightly bigging it up here. I admit. Well, you have to sound very pretty. I love it. I mean, "Edge of Reality" is brilliant. It could have been a great Bond soundtrack at the very least, but it has that kind of strange psychedelic ovenus. And in the film, everything becomes blurred and colourful, almost like the monkey's head. So you're even seeing, you know, these bastions of then conformity, somehow yielding to the age, somehow blurring with the age.
Speaker 2Well, you're making it sound interesting. I can't say I've ever really been that interested in Elvis. I've never heard anything that particularly made me want to investigate the catalogue further, But you're doing a good job, you're doing good. - Yeah. - Good job again. -
Speaker 3Blue Moon from the first album, according to 1954. -
Speaker 2I mean, those old Sunsites, you know, from a production point of phenomenal. Yeah, obviously. But it's interesting, we're talking about this idea of where the things fit. Where does the birds fit? The notorious bird brothers. I mean, I can hear the beetles, but I can also hear the beach boys and the use of harmonies. I can hear the influence of country music. I can hear the music of, I can hear the influence of folk music. - Yeah. - I can hear, obviously, the Dylan influence is very impressive too. - Of course, yeah. But that whole kind of, you know, harmony singing thing comes from, guess comes from the beach boys, doesn't it? - Oh. - It does,
Speaker 3but then the beach boys got it from the four-fresh, four-fresh menu. - And I think if you listen, there's stuff in the 50s and early 60s that was enormous. You look now. People won't know who the four-freshmen are, but they were selling millions upon millions. - I only know them, I only know them
Speaker 2because the beach boys apparently said. -
Speaker 3And this is it, like you. I kind of only knew them, but then I sort of listened. 'Cause the four-freshmen did the inevitable thing of a, you know, mom and pot band doing Beatles covers, you know, by the mid to late 60s, they're covering the Beatles, but they're still selling millions. And some of this stuff is gorgeous. Some of this stuff, there's amazing harmonies and amazing death ballads, folk ballads or whatever you say. Some of these bands are quite ambitious, but they're kind of lost to history. They were enormous between maybe, let's say, mid 50s to mid 60s, a lot of these sort of artists, but they're forgotten to our generation and the generation after us. But they were huge. And they had an immediate impact on the beach boys, for example. So, you know, we're getting a lot of these influences, second hand in this. - So yeah, yeah. - It's possible that the birds were first generation fans of that stuff. - You could do it. - Certainly Crosby, you know. But Crosby, you know, one of the great vocalists of all time. -
Speaker 2This album, I think, might be my favorite birds album. - And again, it's got some of the trappings of psychedelic music on it, but it's also got some very traditional, you know, country influence folk music on it as well. And they're a very, very odd band, because as I say, I could have put them in any number of categories on our list here. Could have put them in psychedelic. Could have put them in country rock. Could have put them in folk rock. Could have put them in underground rock. Could have put them in big hitters. They were having big hits at the time as well. So you want to be a rocker. And they're also cynical in the way the zapper was, but at the same time, they're not, because song like so, you want to be a rock and roll star, is very cynical. But then there are these gorgeous songs going back, a carol king song about nostalgia again for childhood. - Yeah. - So it's kind of all there. In some ways, the notorious bourbon,
Speaker 3this is the album that has all of these things. - It's definitely my favorite. And obviously, my favorite story about that is that they got on so badly in the studio that Crosby had been sacked by the time of the release. And they replaced his face with that of a horse on the cover. -
Speaker 2Yes, there's a horse that's where Crosby should be on the cover, yeah. It wasn't the most popular individual opponent. -
Speaker 3And actually, when you listen to some of the tapes, you can understand it. -
Speaker 2Yeah. - But his songs on this album are. - Oh, he's an amazing talent, just amazing. I mean, that's the one thing about Crosby is he was never that prolific. But like if you look at the Crosby's still songs, he's usually only got two, three songs on each record. - But they're usually the best. - Well, Stephen Stills is rattling them off. I mean, Stephen Stills songs are amazing too.
Speaker 3And that's just some gorgeous tracks. -
Speaker 2Crosby, but the Crosby ones usually end up being, you know, my mind. - I wouldn't have here on the debut. - Yeah, or the title track of "Day Javout," which is basically Crosby. Although I think it gets a collaborative credit with Stills on that. But you can tell it's a Crosby song, you know. And it's the same with the bird's amps. I mean, Dolphin's smile on this record.
Speaker 3Well, I guess the reason why some of these bands could turn out as much as they did is unlike, say, Simon and Garfunkel, where they had one visionary, one writer. Like the Beatles, these bands had two or three great writers.
Speaker 2So let's talk about the American. We've talked about the British or the UK scene for singer-songwriters and psychedelic folk and traditional folk. Let's talk about the US side. So, Joni Mitchell's first down. What, I mean, what is the left to say about Joni Mitchell? I think she's incredible right out of the gate. I don't know about you, Tim. I mean, yeah, which apparently she's not such a big fan of this debut record. I mean, it is a little bit naive by her standards. But it's worth noting that she's already been writing songs for several years and had some hits with other artists, notably Judy Collins, covering her songs. But her first song, her first down right out of the gate,
Speaker 3is brilliant. Is it wonderful? Well, I think the first two, you know, are fantastic and clouds, that kind of succeeded because it had the hit. So cool game. Yeah, this is all that's lacking from this album. It's as good as any of her albums. It maybe doesn't have anything that's as memorable as a Chelsea morning. Chelsea morning again, yeah, you know. But it's a great album, gorgeous album. And once more, you know, such an intensity of poetic vision.
Speaker 2If, here's a hypothetical situation, if she had only made this one record, would we still consider it to be a brilliant classic master? Yeah, I think yes.
Speaker 3She comes into my, you know, my Academy of the Underrated, which is where I take certain bands, I say, right, if they'd have done- Bill A.C. D.C. Underrated. A.C. D.C., really underrated, sorry for them. Dude, I really do. But yeah, if Johnny Mitchell had ended with this, if the Floyd had ended with Piper at the Gates of Dawn, if Thin Lizzie had ended on their first album, even Bowie with his diabolically mad 1967 album, I think we'd still be talking about these people. There's enough talent enough that's unusual. Actually, their genius was there. And so I think this album is superb. Of course, she's done better.
Speaker 2Yes, yeah. I think that's the point, isn't it? Yes, yeah. If you see it as part of her continuum of work, it's brilliant. If you look at it alone, as just if she'd only made this one record, it's still brilliant. It would have been, it would have been, considered alongside the Linda Perhax albums. Yeah, exactly. It's all the Vassity Bun, you know, as a sort of lost, you know, female singer-songwriter from it, very much locked in the era, but making one of the pinnacle classics of the genre at the time. The fact she went on to make so many other records, more mature records, and created this incredible continuum of work, doesn't necessarily mean that we should look on this album, and in any lesser in her catalog, it's absolutely stunning, phenomenal.
Speaker 3I mean, compared to most of her albums, I suppose, the first couple that's only similar throughout, you know, very, very quickly, she starts to broaden your palate. Yeah, but it's not really a criticism, 'cause she does it so well, you know.
Speaker 2Lyrically and musically, it's still on a higher level, too. Oh, yeah. 99% of what's coming up. Well, she was, I think, you know,
Speaker 3isn't she close to "Crosby at the States"? Does "Crosby" produce this, or sort of produce it? I think you're right, yeah. He gets a credit for producing it, but I believe he's just kind of in the studio, and she records it in effect. There's not much production work going on, but "Crosby" was in awe of her talent, and was continually introducing her to people around that time. And nothing Judy Collins also, you know, she deserves an awful lot of credit for being a huge folk star, who's got a massive commercial mainstream appeal, and she brings the songs of Leonard Cohen. Well, that's the thing. She's not a rainy midge. But yeah, she's not, she's basically having the hits with the "Jony Mitchell" songs.
Speaker 2Well, the title track of this album, her this year, is the "Sandy Doni" song, who knows where the time goes, yeah, yeah. And we'll come on to talk about her. In fact, we should have talked about fear, but we should have in the UK. The debut album this year, not a masterpiece by their standards. In fact, we're going to have a little discussion in a minute about tentative beginnings. Artists that made their debut into that.
Speaker 3I think that would fit it. But the Judy album's great. You know, the Judy album from this year, beyond the covers, she writes something of value herself, but it's in the arrangements. There's beautiful, beautiful arrangements on this. Again, some of it is kind of echoing that baroque-sing a songwriter of the period, but some of it is really fresh and unusual. I think the last track is "A Murder Ballad" and has this amazing guitar harmonics that would still sound interesting now. And this is an album that's kind of top 30 in every country in the world at that stage.
Speaker 2Talking of which book ends, Simon and Garfunkel. Oh, yeah. The fourth album, I think, this is this year. This is another album that's got a conceptual kind of flow. I think just on the one side, isn't there, with this idea of the old, elderly people.
Speaker 3It is bookended they do another version of old friends
Speaker 2at the very end as well, I think, of the album. Right, right. I didn't listen back to this album for this episode. I mean, you know, this whole body of work that Simon and Garfunkel produced, I love all of it. This is, I remember this being probably my favourite of their albums. I'm just trying to remind myself of something.
Speaker 3Yeah, I am as well, actually. I did listen to it, even though I'm trying to remind myself. It is, no, it's definitely my favourite of their studio albums because I think that the next album is great. Bridge Over Trouble Waters. It's a fantastic album, but it's almost pulling back. These are strong songs. They're rooted songs. They're spiritual songs. You know, this is Simon and Garfunkel. There are some amazing sonic adventures on this record. You know, this is as close as Paul Simon gets to Psychodelia on occasion because he's really playing with the studio. And then you've, as you say, you've got this theme, this old friends that kind of bookends the album in a way where you've got the instrumental start of the album, then the end of side one. And I think it might be the end of side two as well. But then you've also got this bit, which is absolutely enchanting where it's the voices of old people in a home. Yeah. But there's some gorgeous pieces, utterly timeless things.
Speaker 2Old friends, old friends is such a beautiful song. But also, I. I mean, there are standards on this record. There are songs that have become standards. America, Mrs. Robinson, Hazy Shade of Winter. And then there's a song at the end about a kid's song, at the zoo. Well, America's possibly my favorite. - What a lyric. - What a lyric, yeah. -
Speaker 3Well, he has, I mean, you know you talk about this kind of absence of, you know, whereas in the British work, there's a kind of naivety and a yearning for childhood. A lot of the American songwriters, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, it's like they've already lived six lives. Randy Newman, I'd throw into that as well. Very sophisticated use of language. Absolutely pitch, perfect story tellers as well. You know, it's almost like they've been on literary courses. It's a great record. And as you say, it yields the huge hit single, Mrs. Robinson. Again, it almost kind of has everything. In the way that the Beatles had everything that they had, the hits, they had the deep
Speaker 2cuts, they had the experiments. But you're right, again, this is just, this is all pretty much on the shoulders of one songwriter. Unlike the Beatles, who had three great songwriters. This is all Paul Simon. And yet the whole career of Simon and Garfunkel compacted into this very relatively short period of time.
Speaker 3And you're right, it's the conceptual side as the first song. But weirdly enough, I was listening to it on my iPhone. So I got the extra tracks, which ends in old friends again. Oh, okay. Which actually works quite nicely. Because it's a very short album. I mean, this is a thing. Although it's an era of excessive double albums that is being ushered in, you know, the Beatles most famously. There are a lot of albums this year that are 28 to 34 minutes long that are just perfectly balanced. And they travel a lot. So this is an example of an album, incredibly short. But by God, the place that it goes to in that short duration.
Speaker 2So a couple of other American singer songwriters this year, that were very active. Two of our favorites on the album years. Although I'm not sure we've ever talked about Richie Havens before, have we?
Speaker 3I think we discussed him in 2001. He gets it on the Peter Gabriel album. Oh, that's right,
Speaker 2I thought we talked about him. And the other one is Nilsson, who we have talked about on the show. He's a big favorite of us. Both incredible voices, aren't they? Yeah. And I would say one of them is a great singer. One of them is a great songwriter too. The other one not so much. Richie Havens is a great songwriter, but he was a great interpreter of material. And he's another artist that made two albums this year. Again, one of them is a double, 1983, which is the one I'm familiar with. I'm not so familiar with Mixed Bag, the other one. But the interesting thing about the double album 1993 is half the songs on it are covers. If a four of them are Beatles covers, he must be one of the first artists to cover things like Strawberry Fields and Lady Madonna, which had only just, you know, relatively recent history at this point, although I think probably everyone was out to cover the Beatles. Well, as soon as anything landed, they was covered, wasn't it?
Speaker 3Yeah, I mean, Rock is such, of such importance that they're already starting to know if it's not just doing Beatles, G-Connors is doing Johnny Mitchell and then I came before, they've even got their record contract. Right. These things are international. Dylan's the basement tapes, has given people hits even without being released, yeah? Exactly, so this stuff was around. He said, "I really like, I mean, it's the one I know." I was like, "I think actually he did something else again." I think Mixed Bag might have been slightly earlier, but released in 68 different territories, then he did something else again, and then he did this one that we're referring to. 1983. 1983. 1983, Richard P. Haven was 1983, I think, isn't it? And it's once more where it fits into some of the '68 releases. It's a sprawling double album. There's one side that's live. So there's a lot that's wasted, but there's a lot that's brilliant. If I were to do my own single album version of this, be one of my favorites of the year, certainly my favorite voice of the year. His voice is all there, super, but actually a few of his own songs are amongst the best songs on it.
Speaker 2I agree, yeah.
Speaker 3He's a great writer, he relies.
Speaker 2Yeah, I don't have his great writer. They're interesting songs. They're not the most memorable melodies on the album. This is my opinion. The most memorable melodies on the album are the ones that come from the Beatles songs, the Leonard Cohen song. Priests, I think, is my favorite song, the record is the Leonard Cohen cover. So I think his voice is so good, he can sing anyone's song. And there's almost a sense that this record is a little bit. I mean, I listened to it yesterday. It's a little bit under-produced. It sounds like they could have spent a bit more time on the arrangements, a bit more time on the Sonics. And I think that lets it down slightly. But the other thing I love about this record is again, where does it fit? It's jazz, it's pop, it's folk, it's rock, it's soul. You know, he's got very soulful voice as well. Of course, famously, it was big influence on the Gabriel sort of approach to singing. It's all over the place, isn't it? It's very hard to pitch in whole. And he's covering the Beatles, he's covering. Who else does he cover on this record? I forget now, he's covering the Beatles, he's covering Leonard Cohen. You're looking at up, are you? Donovan. He covers the Don. The Don. He covers the Don. Which Don's song does he do again, I think?
Speaker 3Where are you in love, Mike?
Speaker 2Yeah. So, he's doing a lot of interpreters. And to me, the songs that melodically the strongest are the covers. But his own songs are very interesting.
Speaker 3Well, the opening two tracks are here, and I love them. I think one that has got here on Wikipedia, maybe if this is it, I always thought it's heaven's sake, I haven't said it, but for havens. Fantastic, beautiful melody. I think. It's not a great song, but it's a lovely melody and a brilliant performance. And the first two tracks have also got this thing that he could have been an R&B star. Yeah. He could have been a psychedelic star, because actually he really kind of delves into psychedelic rock on this album, more so than on the previous releases. And he does it completely convincingly. And then he does these almost straight, mom-and-pop versions of Lady Madonna with a little help. Then it's my least favorite, but priest, as you say, his version of the Land of Cohen's song.
Speaker 2Yeah. So, but this is what comes back to what you were saying earlier about how, you know, how you could have made a great single record from this album. But, you know, the voice kind of, it makes you almost forgive everything, doesn't it?
Speaker 3It does, and again, it makes you wonder why he's not better known. You know, I know that he's known, and I know that there's an audience, and I know that he had some kind of international acclaim, but he just kind of feels as if he has been under the radar for many, many years. He's never been a particularly fashionable figure, you know, Otis Redding, who had a sort of similarly gritty voice, didn't have anywhere near the career, arguably anywhere near the success. But he's still remembered, and he's still remembered fondly. I think Haven's is kind of a forgotten artist of this year.
Speaker 2It's funny, because I think most people would probably know him as the person who opened Woodstock. That's the sort of grace notes version of Richie Havens, isn't he? He opened Woodstock. And is the same perhaps a little bit true of Harry Nielsen? I mean, we're big Nielsen fans. I remember we talked about his album with Randy Newman. We talked about, I think we talked about the Point album, didn't we? Another concerto. We talked about, also I think we talked about the album Harry. This is his second album release this year, Aerial Ballet. And again, there's songs on this record, at least one song on this record that everyone would know. I say everyone, this is in my world, every one would know. Anyway, everybody's talking, which was the theme. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It later uses a theme to Midnight Cowboy. But also songs like One and Daddy Song, which was also covered by the monkeys and also in the head movie. This kind of comes back to what you were saying earlier. There's this very fast turnover in terms of people covering songs at this era. Nielsen releases Daddy Song on his record, the monkeys have almost covered it within a few days. And it's on their record. This is just a phenomenally unique artist that had this incredibly self-destructive streak and kind of famously destroyed his own voice by drinking. Yeah. With John Lennon. And most people would probably only know him ironically for a cover, which is his cover of Bad Fingers Without You, which everyone does know, even if it's the Mariah Carey version, they know the Mariah Carey version is a pretty much note for no copy of the Nielsen cover of Bad Fingers Without You. But of course, he was a brilliant songwriter and his lyrics have this very much in this world of psychedelic music, but his music sounds a song sound like they're made by a very old soul.
Speaker 3Don't know. Yeah, yeah. And as we said before, I think one of the brilliant factors about Nielsen is that he can be both McCartney and Lennon. He's got the grit to be a Lennon. He's then got the sweetness and sense of melody to be a McCartney. And arguably, he's got a much better voice technically than either of them. And this is why it's the tragedy that he absolutely messed his voice up in the sort of early 70s due to drink. And you're right. And it's all isn't it? Because he made his reputation as much for classic songs that he'd written as for covers. In the early 70s, he does the Schmillson in the Night, the whole kind of American songs.
Speaker 2Well, the Croner album, yeah. Great. And he does it pretty well.
Speaker 3Absolutely. You know, there was a certain point. And his version of Newman's songs is an exquisite album full stock. Yeah. But he brings them alive with his voice. So yeah, phenomenal talent. And I guess, you know, aside from a few songs being used in films these days or as a backdrop to signify an era, he does seem to be lost. Because I think the thing is, he's a complex, multifaceted talent. Yeah. And that's what we don't necessarily see.
Speaker 2And lyrically, so melancholic and so, one is the loneliest number, you know. So I think he had this kind of tortured soul, didn't he? It seems to me, tortured soul, very self-destructive, and of course that just makes us love him. Even more on the show, doesn't it? Because we love artists like that. But what a voice. What a voice. I mean, a silky, smooth voice that, as you say, could just as easily turn to, to, you know, like a rock holler. But I personally prefer the more so you can talk.
Speaker 3Yeah, yeah. But this was the year I'm going back to voices, I think, that it must have been frustrating for Paul Simon, because he has got the most delicious, smooth, beautiful voice. And he's in a band with somebody who doesn't write the material, who has an arguably better voice. Yes, the only person
Speaker 2in the whole country you could find that's got a sweet voice than
Speaker 3you. Yeah. And he's in your band. Yeah. But again, it's that album, you know, bookends. This is memorable just for the way in which every song is beautifully sung. And as we say, you know, when we were doing the Richie Havens and the Nilsson, you know, these are still singers to die for. Yeah. And this is in the era pre-melodyne.
Speaker 2Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. And also it's worth pointing out that we talk about Nilsson being a maverick. The first ever remix album was based on this album, Aerial Ballet. He did the following, he released an album called Aerial Pandemonium Ballet, I think, which was a remix, a mashup of this album and the previous album. And he was doing things like changing the tempo, re-recording, you know, taking out instruments, adding other instruments, re-recording the vocal, very, very early, you know, example of the notion of the remix album, the re-construction, you know.
Speaker 3Well, these are great imagination as well as a great pop sensibility.
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