| This Week's Highlights |
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analysis w/e 14.5.11 |
DVDs out 9.5.11 |
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@ DVDfever Youtube |
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May 11 2011 
DVDfever co uk
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Whether you’re a folk fan or not, this is esssential listening. It’s more of a jangle-strings driven thing than trad folk, so there’s huge crossover appeal. Having played it so much recently, it’s become one of my all-time favourites. Baltimore born Robert Neale Lind aka Bob Lind, was an American folk singer-songwriter who became a one hit wonder in the UK with hit Elusive Butterfly, which peaked at five in '66. The other, Chicago-born Bernard Alfred ‘Jack’ Nitzsche was originally an aspiring jazz saxophonist who eventually went on to become Phil Spector’s right hand man in the production room, who effectively created the ‘Wall Of Sound.’ So, their collaboartion was something of an enigma, a sort of accidental marriage of convenience, though Nitzshe did branch out working with mid-60s Rolling Stones, contributing keyboard textures to their Paint It Black and Ruby Tuesday, then later with Neil Young.
Here the pair come together to create another ‘genre’ - orchestarted folk-rock. It works to perfection as it happens. They first met in Lenny Waronker’s office in Metric Music Publishing in 1965. Waronker didn’t think Lind’s music carried enough impact. Lind had just signed with Metric. Nitzsche was looking for material for some of the groups he was producing. The seed was sown. Lind played some tunes on acoustic guitar, with Nitzsche suitably impressed, that was it. Nitzsche became his producer. For a songwriter who couldn’t read music or even name the chords he played, Lind wrote some incredible music, aided by Nitsche’s immaculate production techiques. The nest results are creamy string drenched marvels which were a precursor to the late '60s/early '70s simple country/folk exploits of Young, John Denver and peers.
The whopping 25-track listing has a dream-like quality where appropriate, principally
due to Nitzsche’s orchestration. There are moments, when it sounds dated, not
that it matters. Choosing a best of list is difficult, but as I’m often compelled
to, they are Mr.Zero, Drifter’s Sunrise, It Wasn’t Just The Morning, Eleanor,
I Can’t Walk Roads Of Anger, due to their Byrds-like quality.
Funnily enough, other than Elusive Butterfly itself, previously unreleased
demos of Whose Is The Funeral and Bring It All Down, done in
acoustic format, prove Lind could hack it on his own, and are amongst the main
highlights, of which there are many.
The full list of tracks included are :
As of April 2009, Blu-rays and DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TH-37PX80B
37" Plasma TV with a Sony BDP-1500 Blu-ray player and played through a Yamaha DSP-AX820 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
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Review & concert pics copyright © Elly Roberts, 2004-2010.
