TalkAwhile - The Folk Corporation Forum

Ok driving down the road listening to Fairport and it suddenly struck me as I forwarded through half a CD there are songs I would rather not hear right now, so in no particular order:

Woodworm Swing
Red and Gold
Walk Awhile
Journeyman's Grace (I know I must be out of my mind)
The Hiring Fair

I may change my mind.

Any particular reason why not? Is it a case of overplay?

Never mind the Spice Girls are reforming!

Apparently part the new stage set is going to be the Spice Girls do Sloth (should this be in the rumour mill?)

Sacrilege, I know - I actually turned off Bellowhead recently because I'd had enough. Haven't listened to them for over a week now ...

But I discovered Tinariwen instead ...

I'd had enough and turned it off after track 3!

If the Full House lineup 1970 doing Walk a While on youtube doesn't change your mind, you are hopelessly lost and we can't help you back to the light.

Like BD, the first thing that came to my mind was 'what particular reason?', then also like BD, maybe Neil's just played them a lot recently.  But if it's overplaying then you have to concede that others may not feel the same way, or may not have been playing those particular tracks, therefore could very well be gagging to hear them :)   Swings and Roundabouts I think.... I'm happy to hear whatever they want to play, but I'd really, really like to see/hear Sloth live  :)

God, Sloth drives me round the bend.....

I just don't "get it", and what's more I don't care!  :-X ::)

It's the instrumental solos in it that get me Shirl  :) they just make my spine tingle  ^-^

Sorry, they do nowt for me. No dissing RT, of course, but Sloth leaves me cold. I much prefer his solo on "Autopsy".

It'd be a very boring world if we all liked the same things Shirl  ;D

There is next to no music I love like most of what you mention that I may not care to hear at various times, Beatles come closest to being immune to constant exposure personally, but of course, even they, not always.
I may change my mind. Although it now strikes me that a non Deadhead would go nuts in  my life as roughly a quarter of what gets played in my life is those guys from one year or another, so Beatles and Dead both up for immune status.



Edit: Just tidied up the formatting .... don't mind me  ;D

See, I never 'got' Autopsy myself.  I think I have an aversion to anything 'a bit jazz'.

Jules

Better get a bodygaurd for croppers Shirl :o ;D

It's the drums wot do it Shirl, "Just a roll, just a roll on your drum and the war has begun....................."

Well that's the good bit finished :-[. Don't worry Shirl, you're not the only one ;)

rachel

You offering, Mutts?  ;)

Nah!!!  Shirl is our very own Petal of the Celts, we love her to bits  :)

What ever would the Bishop say :-[
 Anyhoo  not going to be there this year

I should explain, with most of those it is a case of having heard them too often in my Cropredy preparation. Woodworm Swing and Red and Gold have never been favourites of mine and I avoid them as often as possible.

Now if Sloth descends inot the annoying over indulgent self abuse fest that it can become I'm all for going elsewhere for the time, if however it is the emotionally charged powerful ensemble playing version then there is nowhere better to be than listening.

My vote is for the Iain Mathews acoustic version though.

D'you know what Neil?

That is one of the most fantastically convoluted sentences I've ever read. ;D

Pure delight! 8)

Is that some kind of remix?

kylie vs fairport .....havnt you heard it yet?

Matty Groves - just for once I'd like him to say "eff off you posh s***" and keep his kecks on.

Or Lord Darnell to say to his servant "So what she's a w****".

I know I'm probably a heretic but the song is hundreds of years old and I've heard it many times.

Somehow WKWTTG does have that effect but it probably does for someone!

On the Cropredy Box year, Vicki Clayton missed out a verse or two which resulted in Matty and her ladyship being buried alive...

At Cornbury I filmed Martin Simpson playing his version (Little Musgrave) but the battery ran out at the wrong moment. The recording finishes with Darnell saying he wouldn't slay a naked man. So I guess Matty gets away with it some times.

Cheers

Nick

As Mr Nicol has done on more than one ocassion!

    ;D  ;D  That made me spill my capuccino laughing!   ;D  ;D

Apparently, once Simon had to ask Ric if they'd had the fight yet?!!

Yeah Neil, gotta agree with you, for the most part:

Woodworm Swing - Musician's song, probably a lot funner to play than to hear.

Red & Gold - Too long!  No car chases.

Walk Awhile - Only if the rest of the album is intended to be played after it.

Journeyman's Grace - Never a GREAT song, but good enough to be overlooked and then overpraised by core fans.

Hiring Fair - Well, its a beautiful song but its also my cigarette, restroom, refill break.  The only time I'll ever look forward to this one will be when the band finally plays in East Tennessee.  When Simon makes the reference about the wench putting the guy's hand on her breast, the audience will erupt with a bunch of rebel yelling - "YEAH!"  "GO FOR IT, MAN!"  "ALL RIGHT!!"  "DO IT!!"

Simon's batteries ran out? Nah. Don't believe it.

i didnt really want to get involved in this thread as i couldnt think of a fc tune i actively dislike....................
and then someone mentioned the all time worst song ever THE BLOODY  AWFUL HIRING FAIR
i had obviously expunged it from my memory
it really is an insipid piece of ****

But Ralph McTell wrote it Jim, so maybe it aint all FC's fault... :P

(Actually I quite like it, but it is wearing a bit thin now)

I'm not a fan of the Hiring Fair, but no way is it the worse culprit...Take your pick from several on the last couple of albums..  ::)

Like Hiring Fair, also like the last couple of albums, I can't think of any that I actively dislike {:-)

I dislike "Madeleine" the opening track on XXXV. Always skip it.

Having said that I know that a whole raft of people in here dislike the entire album.  :o

I'm not too fond of Willow Creek, and Canny Capers got played a bit too much (wintour 03, Cropredy 03, poss wintour 04? Cropredy 04, wintour 05, Cropredy 05, wintour 06, Cropredy 06) I'm glad they've stopped now. I'm not saying that I don't like it, it's a great set of tunes, but it takes up a valuable instrumental spot in the set.

Only having seen FC once live (Cropredy '05) I can't claim to have got bored of any of their material but, being a Richard Thompson fan, "Sloth" would be high on my wish list. Of the tracks mentioned, I like "Red and Gold" a lot and think that it goes magnificently on that stage. I'm no fan of "Walk Awhile", though, and - here's something that is an unwise admission for one's inaugural post - I can do without "Rosie". I know that the song is held in high affection, but it leaves me rather cold.

Hiya Sordel, and welcome  :)

You're allowed to 'not like' stuff  :) So long as you don't mind someone coming along and telling you why it's the best thing since sliced bread LOL!

Rosie is one of my favouritist ones, but HEY! if we all liked the same things it would be a dull ole world  ;D

Keep posting :)

Now I love both the song and the album but that could be because it was the first FC album I bought!  (Have made up for lost time since!)

And I'm afraid I do agree with Sordel:

I'll happily do without hearing The Crowd again, but I guess it's kind of inevitable it's going to get an outing in August.

I'll be honest here, there's nothing on the last few albums I particularly want to hear again. I like Heart of the Song and Rocky Road, but that's about it...

This is bound to happen isn't it with a band that's been going for 40 years. Love The Hiring Fair - couldn't believe how wonderful it was when I heard it on their re-formed tour in nineteen eighty-whatever-it-was. Signalled a new era and a new sound. Nowadays it's what they do instrumentally with the song that's so thrilling. Last year I was at Cropredy with a few newbies who were ASTONISHED at the brilliance of the Summertime solo at the end of it. Keep it in, chaps!

Ahh, Summertime  ^-^   Wonderful, absolutely sublime  ^-^

I'd love to here that live again  ^-^

There's a few FC songs that I always I skip (Si Tu Dois Partir is awful IMHO) but most of the time it depends on my mood - I might skip all the fast ones if I want to relax, but might skip past the slowees if I'm driving somewhere. I don't really hate any of them.

BUT I really wish they'd stop piddling about with the intro to Matty. All this Suicide is Painless, reggae and Rik's pedal nonsense (step away from the pedal Rik) should stop forthwith.

Oh dear!   Ric's pedal does cause some fuss doesn't it?  ::)
Pedal away Ric, some of us love it  ;D ;)

Swarb always did loads of pedalling on live shows, especially with the Nine/Live line-ups. It's a great Fairport tradition  ;)

Oh no!! There's that moment on a Saturday evening in August when 'Hiring Fair'/'Red & Gold'/'Slip Jigs' are just perfect and I start to go weepy, I love them lots of other times too, but just as the sunset is doing its best to distract me is THE time.
 - Sloth... funnily enough I replayed the original recently and realised I DO like it after all, -its just all those over-indulgent versions since that I would rather not repeat. (I'll mind your back Shirl...   ;) )

There are songs that don't fit my mood at any particular moment but I know I'll enjoy them at another time and place EXCEPT for "Diamonds and Gold" and "Home is Where the Heart Is".I always skip these if at all possible.

I don't care for "Home is Where the Heart Is" either, and I can't stand "Book Song".

 :o :o :o

 It's far better sung by Ralph, having said that as the sun is setting over the Cropredy field it creates a wonderful atmosphere.....

Seeing it posted in the More Please.... compelled me to add Suzanne here

Was there ever a more dreary dirge than this ?

I'd rather have Ralph singing Hiring Fair and Steve Tilston's wonderful guitar on Slipjigs, but FC's is the guv'nor version of Red and Gold.

But there's rather too much of the most recent two albums I could do without.

I agree with you there David, but inevitably, I think we will probably hear a substantial number of tracks from the currrent album.

Still, there's always the Liege and Lief session. 8)

I'm not sure about that...they don't have much time to get through everything (and let's not forget the hour long Sloth we all pray for daily) so I'd be surprised to see more than a couple of toilet breaks, er, I mean, new tracks in the set.  Please.

Totally with you Polly.  
 I think Hiring Fair in that setting is terrific, it's not the words but the overall sound which is so appropriate to the time and place and feeling.....  (rather too much to drink, possibly getting cold & wet, certainly tired, a bit dirty and wishing it wasn't going to end for another year....)

Similarly for Matty with another different intro... it always catches me out .. "this is interesting ... oh, of course it's going to be Matty".... and that final bit of energy.  

These may no longer be songs to be played on the HiFi and critically appraised ... they ARE Cropredy (For me anyway!)Please don't stop!

Roger

NO NO NO  NO NO ...... that's just wrong :-[

Perhaps in a future year when RT comes to Cropredy we could have a Friday set just devoted to Sloth - then we could all choose whether to go to the stage or the village.
Would that please everybody?

Only if they repeat it on Saturday.  :)

Are we heading towards the idea of a Sloth Festival?

Nah...nobody could be arsed to organise it...

Oh yes!!!!  :D ;D ;D SLOTHFEST!!!

ooh I don't know - it might just take a long time!

As a teacher I have a lot of 'clients' who would be very interested (if they could be bothered)

....... sorry not just topic drift but forum drift .... I'll go away again!

... wipes brow...

Phew!

I nearly went off on one there....

Electric Shock Therapy WORKS! (Ask Lou Reed)

Say what?  The BBC Ian and Sandy vocal version was a virtuoso performance, and the song itself is a true classic.

If that's a dreary dirge then call me a fan of dreary dirges!

Jules

And there I was thinking you'd forgotten me JoD  ::)    Ooh, such nostalgia  ;)

So Fan of Dreary Dirges....

Have never. ever liked the song.. get as much pleasure out of that song as I do out of toothache

Nice words, lousy tune

Sadly, when I'm singing all tunes sound like that...  :-[

I think it's beautiful myself, but there you go.....

Jules

No its not, its a dreary dirge, Stu said so  ;)

Ditto

It was always a stunning song to sing especially with the arrangement that Fairport worked out.

It was forgetting to breathe stuff.

(Well not by me really as I needed to breathe to sing it. ;D)

Hi Jude,

Is it true that the band used to go into a long outro jam after the lyrics, like you all did with Reno?

I don't think we did, not on Suzanne, but maybe when Sandy sang it they might have done.

Can't remember -  sorry :-[

I've always thought it was a beautiful song.  :)
Lovely lyrics, beautiful tune, what more can you ask from a song?  :)

When they went off on these big instrumentals, did you ever get bored?

Bored? No... how could I be bored? I know I used to sit and knit while they were off with the solos, but that was really just a something to do, because
a) I can't knit, never could, never wanted to (except dishcloths and scarves for puppies to try and hang themselves with) and
b) I had to listen to be ready to come in again with the vocals and
c) they were great solos, always different, and often with little musical jokes in. :D

That's where Yoko got the idea from Jude  :)

Did she knit too?

Well I always wanted to be a trendsetter....... :D

If you ever see the Top Of The Pops footage of John singing Instant Karma, you'll see Yoko blindfolded and knitting.  That was 1970.  I think we can safely say that you got there first!

Jules

Gosh! Coo!

There's another fulfilled ambition that I didn't know I had, to be copied by Yoko Ono 8)

Yes, and from what could be seen and the way you describe your knitting, in much the same way  ;)

As I mentioned once before, Jude, you really need to find some of your knitting work from this period.  You could sell the items to The Hard Rock Cafe chain and make a mint!!! ;D

Well if you've got an old holey floorcloth around that bears a distinct resemblance to an Eiffel tower, that'll be it... ;D

Sorry I've gone majorly off topic here. As usual ::)

I think the topic was seriously heading toward Peanut-Texas, before we started the knittin' talkin', Jude!  

Nope, it wouldn't do if we were all the same would it ?

Maybe it would sound better with a bit of banjo in it  ;D

Hey now we can agree - most songs sound better with a bit of banjo!

Jules

...and harmony was restored  ;D

Harmony - with a banjo?? Shurely shome mishtake ;)

Banjo?  Disharmony me thinks.  ;D

Bl**dy Heathens...

For your cheek you must watch this three times and tell me, hand on heart that you failed to enjoy the marvellous Mr Hunt's superb banjo playing (supported by Michael McGoldrick amongst others)

Leon Hunt: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehSTssRUTRk

Did you watch it ?

Are you still saying No More Please ?

Sure did :D



It would've sounded really nice on a decent guitar ;D :P :-X

Or mando/bouzoki

i like a bit of banjo
earl scruggs and bela fleck do it for me
i dont know howanyone can hear foggy mountain breakdown and not marvel at the great mans dexterity and sheer brilliance
 thers probably loads of bluegrass blokes who can play like that as well but i dont know their names

Now it is a well known fact that the banjo is a much respected folk instrument if you have been sheltered from the horrors of Pete Seeger gurning with his:

Now get back on topic or I shall be forced to post more ridiculous pictures of Mr Seeger happily plucking the tool of his trade.

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Ohhhh!  You could do much worse than that, Neil.......MUCH WORSE!!!

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I'm with Nuthouse - to paraphrase Bruce Springsteen , "A man turn his back on the banjo, well, he ain't no friend of mine"  ;D

Its not that banjos are all that bad......pluck one myself, from time to time.  Its just that they can lead to the harder stuff.......like CLOGGIN'!  And that's a pitiful state to behold!  



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I take your point wileytown, families, nay, communities have been ruined by such behaviour, it's the thin edge of the wedge right enough.

Thank goodness Fairport haven't been ruined by clogging  ;) soo.....

No more clogging in Fairport!

That was rather good, even if I say so myself

Ollie you are mistaken there is the legendary Swarbrick, Thompson, Pegg clogging trinity managed by young Simon they toured the USA in 1970. In certain US states this threesome viewed with fear and trepidation in case they come back and once again take the blue ribbon at the Tennessee clogging championship.

Now enough of this and lets get back to discussing how wonderful Gottle O' Geer really is.

Right, and if you listen to Gottle o' Geer very closely......backwards......in a very damp place......you'll find that the album actually chronicles this very event in '70!  Of which, we still have a pretty bad taste in our mouths over here!  Richard's backflips were highly unoxthadox, but it was the Swarb "cheeze cake" pose at the finish that got the blue ribbon.  

After listening to "Unhalfbricking" again recently I have to say I really don't get "A Sailors Life".  It's the only track on the album I have to skip. Anyone else feel the same way?

 

 With you all the way! It's so-called importance as a signpost to the development of British folk-rock seems to blind people to the fact that it drags on interminably - meaningless west-coast style guitar noodling gratuitously tagged onto a simple folk tune   :P

Interesting that it is the guitar noodling that you focus on. I'm not fond of the track myself but I infinitely prefer the alternative take on RTs Watching The Dark anthology which has no Swarb but the guitar remains. It is less dirge like somehow.

Well...I think it's great - RT's guitar tone is superb and he doesn't noodle to my ears - but then again I simply adore West coast style guitar 'noodling'. OK old beans?! ::) ::)

I've always thought that the anthology outtake benefited from the great mix for Martin.  Its so upfront and hypnotic.  It shows his brilliance throughout! 

Taking the lead by himself, Richard's guitar work is a wide open assault, instead of the weaving (or "noodling" if you'd rather) approach he used to accommodate Swarb's part on the album version.

I much prefer the outtake as well.

Aaah....  A Sailor's Life....One of the best things they ever did in my book. And, for the record, that which you calls a noodle is nothing like a noodle- practically invented Television's art-rock patent ten years before the event, that did. ;) Mmm....maybe stretching it a bit there, but a definite resemblence to TV's Marquee Moon, particularly in the outtake version.

If I had to lose anything off Unhalfbricking it would be Si Tu Dois Partir...and actually would prefer never to hear Ashley Hutchings sing Million Dollar Bash again :-[ . Sorry, it really makes me cringe.

I picked out the Watching the Dark set for in-car listening this morning, but put disc 2 in.  Reading this thread, I really must replace it with disc 1 & listen again to A Sailor's Life (the Unhalfbricking version I have to admit I tend to skip, although its not as hard to listen to as the version sung by June Tabor with FC at Cropredy years ago - must have been an off-night for the monitors, as singer & band just don't gel).

aha!  a mention of ms tuneless and it has to be inconjunction with her devastingly bad rendition of a song that towers above all in the fairport canon, at least the chaps were in splendid form that night

 noodling! effing NOODLING!!! you really want to get your heads out of your arses

You can say he noodles........barbed wired noodles maybe, but.......... ;)

When DM was in the band, I used to always cringe when I saw get up from his drum kit - I knew The Hiring Fair was coming up, and it's one of those songs that sounds like nails grating on a blackboard. In fact, I'd spent the whole concert willing DM to not stand up and walk over to the keyboard. Sometimes, I was tempted to take an air pistol and shoot him in the hand just to stop him.

It's funny you should say this about Hiring Fair as the first version I heard was on In Real Time with DM playing keyboards, and I really miss it.


I think my least favourite FC track is Reynardine (I shall probably be lynched for this) but I know I'm going to hear as part of the L&L set so I'm over it.

Funny you should say that Bridgwit - I've just put on L&L on the CD player (I've not played for 6 months or so) and Reynardine sounds, well,  'strained' - it doesn't seem to go anywhere (musically that is!)

As for Hiring Fair - I just sail away up to the heavens when Ric's starts playing after "...and the moon rose...".

Brilliant!

PS: Funny how Monday starts as 'Cropredy Holiday Week' even thought I'm not leaving until Thursday! ;D

For me Reynardine is one of the most beautiful things ever recorded by anyone. It's an awesome interpretation of a very dark and brooding song. I think Chris While might change a few minds on Friday night.

Yeah...does it for me too ;). Reynardine is a definite favourite but then I guess I like all the really dirgey, bleak stuff...Poor Will, Sailors Life, Doctor Monk, Nottamun Town, North Star Grassman et al.  Keep all those happy-clappy jigs and sing-along songs in their place, I say.  ;)

Ben (not a killjoy in the least)

well she wont be changing my mind,i hope cos ive always loved it as i have the lp
you know, i really cant wait for friday night

But don't let that spoil your enjoyment of what's coming before.

Amen to that... Some people were clearly born (a) deaf and (b) for hanging...