FOND/SOUND

Brian Eno: Discreet Music (1975)

2014/12/14

Pour down like silver. What an apropos name for whatever the hell was going on in classic English folk and folk-rock music in 1975. Nothing you’ll find this year from overground artists like Richard and Linda Thompson, Steeleye Span, Sandy Denny and more would truly be as valuable as the stuff that poured for from…
Mike Oldfield: Ommadawn (1975)

2014/12/12

Mike Oldfield – 1974 “The end of the first side of Ommadawn is the sound of me exploding from my mother’s vagina.” — Mike Oldfield. Although said with tongue planted firmly in cheek, no truer words have been spoken to describe a sound such as found at the end of Ommadawn, than the words spoken/written…
Mike Oldfield: Hergest Ridge (1974)

2014/12/11

Mike Oldfield The exploration and deconstruction of English folk music seemed to be the path needed to be taken by new neo-folk artists. One unlikely champion of this became one that you’d least expect to be one. Now known as one of New Age and World music’s pioneers with albums like Tubular Bells, Incantations, and…
Gryphon: Checkmate (1974)

2014/12/10

Gryphon – 1974 The further we head down this neo-folk decade the more strained the strands holding it to the base become. It had to be that way. Nearly a decade into its creation, advances in technology, and a growing influence of outside musics started to gild the lily of what most considered English folk…
Richard and Linda Thompson: I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight (1974)

2014/12/09

Richard and Linda Thompson There’s something about the year 1974 that will trigger a sea change in the English musical landscape. A year before the rise of Thatcher and near the beginning of Labour’s inept descent into centrism, musicians were starting to feel the pangs of rebellion again. Before punk existed, there was one man…
Shirley Collins: Adieu to Old England (1974)

2014/12/08

What a weird time its must have been for England in 1974. It was during this year that the IRA started to launch an all-out offensive to rid Northern Ireland from England’s grasp, rampant energy blackouts forced the reintroduction of Three-Day Weeks to conserve electricity, Monty Python was ending, and the government itself was having…
Bert Jansch: Fresh As A Sweet Sunday Morning (1974)

2014/12/07

Bert Jansch – 1974 Sometimes you need a bit o’ change to right a trajectory. By 1974, many of the great English folk-rock artists of past had been either disbanding or watering down. One steady man had always been Bert Jansch. Maybe because of it, he’d always find ways to keep his group, the Pentangle,…
Alan Stivell: Brezhoneg Raok (1973)

2014/12/06

Alan Stivell and bombard. Finishing off what he hinted at in his previous album, yesterday’s A L’Olympia, Alan decided to commit to tape his idea of a brand new European music. Chamins de Terre, translates to Songs of the Earth, tried to combine everything from his background. His background in Celtic roots music, new influences…
Alan Stivell: Tri Martolod (1972)

2014/12/05

Alan Stivell – 1972 When we last left off Alan Stivell he was breathing new life into a genre threatened to be left in the dustbin of musical history. Breton folk music, and modern Celtic music as a whole experienced a revival of sorts due to his groundbreaking Renaissance de la Harpe Celtique. One year…
Clannad: Siúbhán Ní Dhuibhir (1973)

2014/12/04

Clannad In this brief sojourn to Ireland, for some neo-folk goodies, lets not forget a true behemoth of Celtic music: Clannad. Now famously known for giving us oodles of egregiously bad tin-whistle and keyboard-laden approximations of Irish new age music, and introducing the world to the wonderful Enya (who I’ll defend to no end!)…before, there…