Light Flight

Andy Bell has a new single out to further promote his solo album Flicker, much played round these parts since it came out earlier this year. The B-side to Lifeline is a cover of Light Flight by Pentangle. 

Light Flight has some lovely cascading guitar riffs and a sweetly sung lyric about getting away from it all, getting your head together in the countryside, 'Let's get away... find a better place/Miles and miles away from the city's race'. Andy throws in a superb little backwards guitar part in the middle before the pace picks up again in the second half, the jazzy time signatures and acid- folk pastoralism collapsing the timespan of the half century between Pentangle's original recording and Andy's cover. Along with his recent cover of Arthur Russell's Our Last Night Together Andy is putting some superb and unexpected cover versions out into the world. 

I'm not an expert on late 60s folk rock by any means and find some of it an acquired taste I've not fully acquired- I've got Nick Drake's LPs, a smattering of Bert Jansch albums, a Sandy Denny compilation, Vashti Bunyan's Another Diamond Day, some Fairport Convention and a Bob Stanley compiled CD called Gather In The Mushrooms: The British Acid Folk Underground 1968- 1974. That album has this Pentangle song on it...

Lyke Wake Dirge

An eerie, traditional English folk song, choral voices and a picked acoustic guitar. A dirge is a funeral song and a wake, obviously, is a ceremony for the dead. The song describes a soul's journey from earth to purgatory and the hazards faced making that trip. It features lots of Christian references but some think it pre- dates Christianity. Pentangle were a five piece, fusing folk, jazz and folk rock- Bert Jansch, John Renbourn, Danny Thompson, Jacqui McShee and Terry Cox. Jansch and Renbourn shared a house and were the rising stars of British folk rock, their guitar parts interlocking and complex. I have to be in the right mood for this and maybe I appreciate it more than I enjoy it. 

It reminds me though that I did and do really enjoy this record, also out earlier this year- Richard Norris' superb Lore Of The Land album, recorded by the Lewes, West Sussex based acid- folk trio he formed called The Order Of The 12. This is the title track...

Against The Tide

I wasn't expecting one of the most impressive and one of my favourite records of 2022 to be some psyche- folk from East Sussex but things are unpredictable all round at the moment and given Richard Norris' involvement I should have known it would be good. Lore Of The Land by The Order Of The 12 is a ten song album, an album reflecting the folk scene of the late 60s and early 70s. I read Rob Young's  Electric Eden a few years ago and have a rough working knowledge of some of that sound- Fairport Convention, Sandy Denny, Vashti Bunyan and so on- but I'm far from an expert. Richard writes and produces on the album, plays keys and percussion with singer Rachel Thomas and guitarist Stuart Carter. The guitars, from beguiling circular folk finger picking to a couple of acid rock lines, are superb throughout and Richard's production, in his studio on the banks of  Lewes Castle, gives the album space and depth. Album opener Against The Tide is a perfect introduction to the record- layers of guitars, Rachel's voice and the subtle FX playing in the background. 

The East Sussex area is famous for its folk tradition and for its weird, English folklore. The nearby Chanctonbury Ring, a prehistoric hill fort, is connected with all sorts of ancient stories about the devil, rituals and mystic power. Alastair Crowley used to live nearby. Folk singer Shirley Collins still does.  The Order Of The 12 have tapped into this, an album combining The Wicker Man style popular culture with 17th century magick and late 60s folk. As I said, unexpected, but highly recommended.