This is one of my favorite albums ever, but I still need to be in the right mood to listen to it. And today was one of the days I was in that mood. It's a nice middle ground between the pastoral folk of Five Leaves Left and the starkness of Pink Moon, and none of its songs have been used in any car or phone commercials.
Anyone who calls Nick Drake's music "depressing" (because he suffered from depression?) has either not heard Bryter Later or focused on the lyrics instead of the music. It's one of the most uplifting records I own. I still don't know why "Hazey Jane II" comes before "Hazey Jane I", but the tracks flow together better than either one of Drake's other albums.
Drake made the album with Joe Boyd producing, and John Cale and 3/5ths of Fairport Convention (Richard Thompson and two Daves, Pegg and Mattacks, but not Swarbs) backing him up, and it sounds like an English version of Van Morrison's Astral Weeks. Boyd even got Doris Troy to contribute her distinctive voice to "Poor Boy", just like she did in "You Can't Always Get What You Want" and Dark Side Of The Moon.
Apparently the title refers to a BBC weather report saying it would be "rainy early and brighter later", which gives a good description of what it sounds like. Unfortunately there's no film of Nick Drake, but here's a homemade video of the greatest English love song of modern times.
2 comments:
"Great Gig" is Clare Torry...
My least favorite of the three, but still awesome (except for "Poor Boy", which is less than awesome).
I my songs and singers confused. Doris Troy did sing on DARK SIDE OF THE MOON though. On that "all you create and all you destroy" song -- "Eclipse"??
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