Singing the travels (Prior & Tabor) (LP 3551 - 3553)

Maddy Prior & June Tabor  Silly Sisters (Vinyl, Chrysalis Records, 1976) *****  

Maddy Prior  Woman in the Wings (Vinyl, Chrysalis Records, 1978) ****  

Maddy Prior  Changing Winds (Vinyl, Chrysalis Records, 1978) *** 

Genre: Folk

Places I remember: Slow Boat Records, Chaldon Books and Records.

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: My Husband's Got No Courage In Him (Silly Sisters)

Gear costume: Gutter Geese (Woman in the Wings) 

They loom large in his legend (The Album Collection playlists): Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 5

Active compensatory factors: I love Maddy's voice, which I first heard as part of her contribution to Steeleye Span. She and June Tabor are a brilliant combination. June has a deeper, rawer vocal style and so the purity of Maddy's voice is a wonderful addition. The couple of a cappella songs really stand out for this reason. 

These two folk stars attract excellent musicians to help them out. Silly Sisters has guitarists Nic Jones and Martin Carthy, bassist Danny Thompson, and mandolinist Andy Irvine, while Woman in the Wings (her debut solo album) has all of Jethro Tull appearing on several tracks (including Gutter Geese above). 

Changing Winds is also from 1978. She tries out some more orchestral folk on this one, with her fantastic voice continuing to be her point of difference. She is a wonder!

Where do they all belong? A lot more Maddy to appreciate when we get to Steeleye Span.

And that's the 7 o'clock edition of the news (Simon and Garfunkel)

Gregarious in his seventies music blog recently wrote about the Tom Clay song What The World Needs Now/ Abraham, Martin and John and wondered aloud if it was the most emotionally charged song of all time.

It's a tear jerker – there is no doubt and the song cleverly manipulates our emotions with its collection of sound bites from the assassinations and speeches by the three Kennedy brothers and Martin Luther King, most notably Edward Kennedy's moving eulogy for Bobby.

On the plus side, I have always liked the way the ambiguous Hal David line – 'we don't need another mountain' and King's metaphoric 'I have been to the mountaintop' juxtapose.

But on the whole it's a form of middle of the road song married to sound bites shtick that doesn't really hold water. It becomes too manipulative and the little kid's bookending of the song (I don't know what segaration is) becomes cloying and redundant after repeat listens.

So what else is out there that provokes real/raw emotions in a less contrived way? And, yes, I know, we're heading into deeply subjective territory here.

Here are some other contenders:

Simon and Garfunkel's Silent Night/Seven O'Clock News is top of my list (in under two minutes we have a slow build under the hymn of the anodyne newsreader telling us about death and violence in a sixties world where Lenny Bruce has just died but where Martin Luther King is still alive. Chilling! A simple idea – not overdone and leaves us thinking rather than manipulating an emotional response like the Clay contrivance. We also get the trivialising of the news thrown in for good measure).

 

There are a few more that spring to mind as second equals:

Jim Croce Alabama Rain (probably only emotion for me as I associate the song with my maternal grandmother - like I said - it's highly subjective what works the emotions).

June Tabor And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda (I've posted on this before – a sober and unsentimental song about the ANZACs during World War 1)

Bob Dylan Idiot Wind (pretty sure I've posted on this amazingly vitriolic song before too – try the live Rolling Thunder Revue version on Hard Rain for extra venom)

Bruce Springsteen 41 Shots (you can get killed just for living in your American skin is the harrowing message from Scooter, a.k.a. The Boss).

And what about the Fabs you ask? Try George Martin's Pepperland track for The Beatles Yellow Submarine (it conjures up perfect childlike, and somehow, psychedelic swirls of emotion).

A melody is like a pretty girl (The Magnetic Fields)

I'm not a big folkie fanatic but I do love the music of Steeleye Span.

I was going to do a post on my five favourite folk songs and then I realised they'd probably all be songs by the Span or Maddy Prior (June Tabor would have snuck on with her awesome rendition of And the band played Waltzing Matilda) - so I might as well do a post on them instead.

Steeleye Span is one of those bands (like John Mayall's Bluesbreakers) that has had a revolving cast of characters but I guess that's natural given they've been at it since 1969 and don't appear to be retiring to a cottage in Hampshire any time soon.

I think it's the evocative nature of their music that wins me over - those earthy rough voices - nothing too pretty about a lot of their music. I spose there are more authentic folk outfits out there but when they get going acapella style on Rosebud in June (track two side one on Below The Salt) I don't really care how authentic or not they are. I'm transported down the eons of time via my imagination.

The jigs and reels side of their music is equally as entrancing. I can't help the toes tapping and the head bobbing along with the mandolins, fiddles, banjo and spoons. Joyous music.

My favourite Steeleye Span moments are Blackleg Miner, The Blacksmith, Thomas The Rhymer, All Around My Hat, and I love their version of John Barleycorn with Tim Hart's vocals a standout.