Nick Drake

Bob-Dubery

I wonder if there are any other Nick Drake appreciators out there in GFSA land.

For those of you not acquainted with Drake's music, he came and went very quickly, recording 3 albums between 1969 and 1972 that sold very few copies on release. He lacked confidence and fell into the grip of severe depression. In 1974 he died by his own hand. Thus there is a huge mythology that has grown around him over the years. I say ignore the legends, the music is what remains and the music is what we're entitled to consider and to speculate about. In particular I don't buy into the legend that he foretold his own demise and his posthumous reputation in the song Fruit Tree on his first album.

When VW launched the New Beetle in the USA they couldn't secure permission for the song they had planned to use in the advertising campaign. Their second choice was Drake's Pink Moon. Radio stations and record stores started getting enquiries about "the song from the VW advert" and finally Nick Drake started selling records.

Producer/manager/discoverer Joe Boyd and record company owner Chris Blackwell always believed that Drake's music was too good to not be appreciated. When Boyd sold his Witchseason company to Blackwell he proposed, and Blackwell readily agreed, that it was on condition that Drake's albums were never to be deleted from the Island catalog.

To me this is some of the most deceptive music there is. Not deceptive in it's intent, but in that it's far deeper and there's more happening then is apparent on a casual listen. Yeah.... it's often that way, but I find it particularly so with Drake. There's this strange quality to his music - it doesn't reach out and grab you, it's just there and you have to go to it.

You won't get any videos of Drake in performance, he didn't do many live shows. However there are some Drake songs with "after the fact" videos.

One of my favourite Drake tracks - Cello Song

Here's the haunting River Man with it's fantastic string arrangement

And the beautiful Fly with John Cale on viola and harpsichord

Beware of the various compilations that have appeared over the years. If you want to explore the small body of work that Drake left behind then head for the records released in his lifetime: Five Leaves Left, Bryter Later, and the short, stark and intense Pink Moon.

Dirk

I like it Bob. There's something about it that just grabs me. It doesn't sound like the typically late 60's early 70's music. It's much more mature and well recorded, so I would think, maybe it was too "different" for the world to accept at that stage, thus the reason it didn't sell. But certainly, very unique..

AlanRatcliffe

I'll be honest, I know the name, but not the music. I'll make a point of checking him out. Thanks Bob!

Bob-Dubery

Alan Ratcliffe wrote: I'll be honest, I know the name, but not the music. I'll make a point of checking him out. Thanks Bob!

I think many people ... ermmm.... of a certain age and with in an interest in music will be aware of Drake. There were several articles in the likes of Melody Maker and NME in the 2nd half of the 70s - after he'd passed away - mostly along the lines of how he'd realised the futility of it all whilst everybody else was still burning incense and wearing flowers in their hair. This wasn't necessarily helpful or accurate, but it certainly lodged his name in my memory. It took me quite a bit longer to get round to paying his albums any kind of attention - probably Joe Boyd's book was a major prod in that direction. It was his third and last album, "Pink Moon", that got me paying serious attention.

My instinct would be to recommend his first album Five Leaves Left as the best starting place, but his third album Pink Moon as his best work - but also the starkest and most intense.

However that last album (as it turned out, nobody knew at the time that it would be his last) has turned out to be by far the biggest seller of the three. This may have something to do with it being the album that yielded the song used in the VW commercial and thus the initial connection that many later Drake fans made.

AlanRatcliffe

I got Bryter Layter from Amazon and am giving it a listen now. Interesting - I think he must have been a major influence on Donovan and his voice sometimes reminds me of David Gilmour. String and brass arrangements are sometimes a bit dated (I have the same problem with Lee Hazlewood), but so much as to make it unlistenable. Well recorded for the time and some real interesting piano work.

Anyway, enough there for me to get the other two albums.

Riaan-Combrink

Alan Ratcliffe wrote: I'll be honest, I know the name, but not the music. I'll make a point of checking him out. Thanks Bob!

Ditto here. Did like what you posted, though.

Bob-Dubery

Alan Ratcliffe wrote: I got Bryter Layter from Amazon and am giving it a listen now. Interesting - I think he must have been a major influence on Donovan and his voice sometimes reminds me of David Gilmour. String and brass arrangements are sometimes a bit dated (I have the same problem with Lee Hazlewood), but so much as to make it unlistenable. Well recorded for the time and some real interesting piano work.

The piano playing... I assume you're talking about the solo on Poor Boy. Herein lies a tale. The solo is by South African jazz player Chris McGregor, leader of The Blue Notes (Dudu Pukwana played sax for The Blue Notes). McGregor and Boyd had been working on a jazz album in the morning. In the afternoon Drake was in the studio. Boyd and McGregor were up in the control room smoking various things when McGregor got a big grin on his face. Boyd called down to Drake, who was going through that song with the rhythm section, and said "You're getting a piano player".

McGregor went down stairs. Drake wrote down the chords for him. They counted it in and McGregor delivered that performance in one take and on the first take.

Elsewhere the piano is by Paul Harris, a New York session player who was originally hired to play on a John Martyn album and then was retained to work with Drake - with whom he clicked.

I'm interested in your comments about the recording. I always thought that the Drake albums sounded pretty good - and especially so for the time. One of the secrets, I think, was that there wasn't a lot of overdubbing going on. Drake was a very precise and consistent performer, and Boyd surrounded him with good session players, so a lot of the recordings were done live in the studio - even the tracks with the big string sections. River Man was done absolutely live in the studio.

I've no idea if they were 8 or 16 track recordings. Boyd used the Sound Techniques studio whenever possible (and the same engineer - John Wood). Sound Techniques also built desks for other studios so I'd imagine they were pretty up to date. When did 16 track come in? Sgt Pepper's was recorded in the 8-track era - though EMI hadn't actually got round to 8-track at the time and so a pair of 4-track systems were used.

Donovan pre-dated Drake. Some Drake students have suggested that, in fact, Drake was influenced by Donovan and particularly by the Mellow Yellow album. Boyd's production/management/publishing company was named "Witchseason" after a Donovan hit, and Drake was signed to Witchseason.

The Boyd/Wood combination were involved in a lot of recordings - including the first Pink Floyd single - and, I think, delivered some of the best recordings from that era. Wood moved into a duel production/engineering chair after Boyd sold Witchseason to Island records and returned to the USA, and he worked on some key John Martyn recordings, including the much lauded Solid Air.

He was an old-school engineer whose motto was "records get the sound they deserve" and was notoriously grumpy. When Fairport Convention went into the studio to record their classic Liege and Lief Dave Mattacks, in the studio for the first time, said that he wanted a drum sound like that that Levon Helm had on The Band's Music From Big Pink. Wood replied "well you'd better play like Levon Helm then."

Riaan-Combrink

Bob Dubery wrote: He was an old-school engineer whose motto was "records get the sound they deserve" and was notoriously grumpy. When Fairport Convention went into the studio to record their classic Liege and Lief Dave Mattacks, in the studio for the first time, said that he wanted a drum sound like that that Levon Helm had on The Band's Music From Big Pink. Wood replied "well you'd better play like Levon Helm then."

LoL! Gotta love that ?

AlanRatcliffe

The piano playing... I assume you're talking about the solo on Poor Boy.

That's the standout, but there's some other nice rolling playing on One of These Things First. I like a lot of the bass playing and drumming too. Mostly very supportive of the music.

I'm interested in your comments about the recording. I always thought that the Drake albums sounded pretty good - and especially so for the time. One of the secrets, I think, was that there wasn't a lot of overdubbing going on.

For me, I think it's as much the production as the engineering, both are stripped back, leaving the music to speak for itself. The voice and acoustic guitar are upfront and personal - in an era when everyone was going nuts with reverb and phasing.

Bob-Dubery

Alan Ratcliffe wrote:
I'm interested in your comments about the recording. I always thought that the Drake albums sounded pretty good - and especially so for the time. One of the secrets, I think, was that there wasn't a lot of overdubbing going on.
For me, I think it's as much the production as the engineering, both are stripped back, leaving the music to speak for itself. The voice and acoustic guitar are upfront and personal - in an era when everyone was going nuts with reverb and phasing.

This was Boyd's production style - and, I think, Wood's engineering style. It was about capturing a performance. Literally making a "record" of that artist at that time.

Wood was one of these guys who would move musicians around to different parts of the studio or try a different mike or combination of mikes until he got a good sound.

I think it's an interesting style - or non-style - because it doesn't carry the hallmarks of a particular era and thus it ages well. A lot of albums that Boyd produced have aged very well. Same with some of Wood's recordings.

In his book White Bicycles Boyd notes that Wood tried various mikes with Drake's vocals before settling on a Neumann U67.

Bob-Dubery

Alan Ratcliffe wrote:
I'm interested in your comments about the recording. I always thought that the Drake albums sounded pretty good - and especially so for the time. One of the secrets, I think, was that there wasn't a lot of overdubbing going on.
For me, I think it's as much the production as the engineering, both are stripped back, leaving the music to speak for itself. The voice and acoustic guitar are upfront and personal - in an era when everyone was going nuts with reverb and phasing.

+1 on that.

I was listening to Drake on the way to work yesterday, and I was suddenly struck by the recording of the voice and guitar. Both very dry and sound really close up. The voice in particular sounds intimate, very close to the listener, and it has a lot of depth and 3-dimensionality. The guitar isn't some wispy thing; it's solid, sounds like a wooden instrument. Maybe something clever done with the miking.

Thanks for the insight.

Squonk

@ Bob

Wasn't John Martyn's solid air album, a tribute to Nick Drake.
When I saw John Martyn in his 2007 Solid Air tour, I am sure after much deciphering (Difficult to understand what he said, because he talks like he sings) I picked up that he mentioned Nick Drake.

AlanRatcliffe

Just started listening to Five Leaves Left - so far so good...

Spyke

I just listened to Cello Song and immediately I thought of a 'local' artist I love, Wayne Pauli.

I'll send Wayne a mail and see if there's some way I can share his stuff with you guys. (very limited stuff, not on the net anywhere)

Gonna give Drake more of a listen.

Bob-Dubery

Squonk wrote: @ Bob

Wasn't John Martyn's solid air album, a tribute to Nick Drake.

Not the whole album, but certainly that song. Though it was "about" rather than a tribute to Drake - Drake was still alive when the album was released.

Martyn and his then-wife Beverley were friends of Drake's and were very kind to him.

The image is an interesting one. "Solid Air". The very breath of life weighing you down, something you have to fight through.

Bob-Dubery

Alan Ratcliffe wrote: Just started listening to Five Leaves Left - so far so good...

How are you getting these things so fast? Do you buy the "digital album"? Or there is a special Ratcliffe-express delivery option that Amazon do not make available to mere mortals?

Bob-Dubery

Bob Dubery wrote: For those of you not acquainted with Drake's music, he came and went very quickly, recording 3 albums between 1969 and 1972 that sold very few copies on release. He lacked confidence and fell into the grip of severe depression. In 1974 he died by his own hand. Thus there is a huge mythology that has grown around him over the years. I say ignore the legends, the music is what remains and the music is what we're entitled to consider and to speculate about. In particular I don't buy into the legend that he foretold his own demise and his posthumous reputation in the song Fruit Tree on his first album.

...SNIP....

Beware of the various compilations that have appeared over the years. If you want to explore the small body of work that Drake left behind then head for the records released in his lifetime: Five Leaves Left, Bryter Later, and the short, stark and intense Pink Moon.

There was an abortive start at a 4th album. This was in 1974 when Drake was in the grip of severe depression. Joe Boyd has said that he arranged the sessions because it was the only therapy that he could offer to Drake. A few cuts were laid down but the sessions were chaotic and also unnerving for Boyd and engineer John Wood.

When they first worked with Drake in 69 or so he'd never been in a recording studio and so they kept an eye on him - but soon relaxed because he was a very consistent performer, note perfect take after take. They'd recorded complex tracks with him singing and playing live in the studio with the backing musicians. Now he couldn't even play and sing at the same time and his playing was riddled with errors.

Four survived - incomplete with just vocals and guitar. Mostly angry songs. The most (in)famous of these is Black Eye Dog commonly interpreted as being about his nervous breakdown and the despair and fear it instilled in him. These have made it onto most of the boxed sets, bootlegs and retrospectives.

In 2004 Island commissioned a new retrospective entitled Made To Love Magic. When they were doing the research for that they stumbled on a forgotten about fifth track from the 1974 sessions which had been left on a tape but never documented - Tow The Line. One of the previously released/bootlegged tracks Time Of No Reply was given an after the fact string arrangement by Drake's friend and arranger Robert Kirby.

For me Time Of No Reply is the only one of those songs that gets close to Drake's earlier form. I don't even find them as disturbing and intense as legend has it, though it may be a very different matter if you knew him or had worked with him in the studio.

Drake compilations tend to be fleshed out with either outtakes that never made it onto the original discs because they were considered inferior, some recordings (several of them covers) that he made at home and, in one case, recordings of a pre-teen Drake, mother Molly and sister Gabrielle having sing songs around the family piano.

Bob-Dubery

Bob Dubery wrote:
In 2004 Island commissioned a new retrospective entitled Made To Love Magic. When they were doing the research for that they stumbled on a forgotten about fifth track from the 1974 sessions which had been left on a tape but never documented - Tow The Line. One of the previously released/bootlegged tracks Time Of No Reply was given an after the fact string arrangement by Drake's friend and arranger Robert Kirby.

For me Time Of No Reply is the only one of those songs that gets close to Drake's earlier form. I don't even find them as disturbing and intense as legend has it, though it may be a very different matter if you knew him or had worked with him in the studio.

Ermmm.... ja.... turns out Time Of No Reply was NOT one of the 1974 tracks. It dates back to the late 60s. There was a false start to the first album with a different string arranger involved initially. The sessions didn't work, the arrangements weren't good, and so they started all over again. Time Of No Reply, though not this particular version, was recorded during those aborted sessions.

Other than that my post was pretty accurate ☹

Bob-Dubery

I have a copy of Trevor Dann's biography of Drake which is currently sitting in my pile of books to be taken to 2nd hand shops or given to charity. It's been read through once and occasionally referenced, but is in good condition.

Anybody want it? PM me. If you're not in Jo'burg then provide a postal address and I'll stick it in the mail next time I get to a post office or PostNet. If you're in Jo'burg then we can arrange a hand over.

racman

Yeh, Yeh, I know I'm a bit slow ....

Picked up the "Digitally Remastered" Pink Moon CD yesterday and giving it a listen. At first listen it seems rather stark and, dare I say boring, but after a while it becomes interesting and has a certain appeal in its raw feel and lyrical content. It will saty in the CD player for a few days now as I get to grips with it ?

I absolutely love music that becomes more accessible with each listen rather than the instant "take away" kind - I guess that's why it's called POPular music 'cause if it doesn't catch you with the first listen it aint POP!!

Again, my apologies for the revival of an old thread but this thread led me to try and fin a Drake CD so it is apt to post my first impression here.

(Of course Alan was much quicker in getting a CD! ? ?)