Fairport Convention came together in early 1967 in Muswell Hill, further along the same road where Kinks Ray and Dave Davies had grown up. What was needed was a rock band who’d tackle traditional folk head on someone who’d put the rock into folk as opposed to the folk into rock. So far the traffic was all one-way – folk-based artists seeking to broaden their way out into the rock scene. It gave his lyrics an intensity that a short stretch in prison did nothing to diminish. The skiffle-busking Roy Harper emerged, too, who’d foolishly enlisted himself in the Air Force until a mental breakdown intervened. But it couldn’t last…įrom Scotland there was the Incredible String Band, featuring Mike Heron and Robin Williamson who effortlessly blended Indian and African influences with their quirky Celtic folk.
He seemed to be settling down and heading towards the singer/songwriter mainstream after he married folk singer Beverly Kutner and they recorded Stormbringer together in Woodstock in 1970 with American musicians including Levon Helm from The Band.
For his second album, The Tumbler, he ruffled feathers by recruiting jazz flautist/saxophonist Harold McNair. There was maverick John Martyn whose jazz/ blues-tinged folk on London Conversation in 1968 created a tense yet urbane melange. When David Bowie heard his Fully Qualified Survivor he was so impressed he lured guitarist Mick Ronson to the Spiders From Mars. Next up was Michael Chapman, who appeared to spring out of nowhere (the Yorkshire folk club circuit, actually) in 1969 with the album Rainmaker, which featured compelling songs of melancholy and yearning. He seldom shied away from the political dimension, given half a chance, but his sense of melody was generally strong enough to subdue any hectoring overtones. Then there was Ralph McTell, whose ragtime-infused folk style gave his songs a distinctive edge. He found his mark the following year, though, with his Bedsitter Images album. Stewart’s career got off to a slower start, flopping with his first single, The Elf, in 1966 despite the presence of Jimmy Page (that man again!). He toured the folk circuit with Paul Simon until Simon got a call from America to say that his recording of Sound Of Silence with Art Garfunkel, over which some engineer had subsequently plastered a rock band, was now a big hit, and he was gone with almost indecent haste.
There was Glasgow-born/Bournemouth-raised Al Stewart who’d managed to survive the early trauma of playing in a band fronted by (soon-to-be DJ) Tony Blackburn. Behind Pentangle, a gaggle of singersongwriters were launching themselves out of the folk clubs with new albums – all thanks to the burgeoning number of record companies who were searching avidly for new talent to cash in on the musical tidal wave crashing over the late 60s. They hired a rock producer – Shel Talmy, who’d produced the first singles for The Who and The Kinks – and mixed traditional folk songs such as Let No Man Steal Your Thyme with jazz standards such as Mingus’ Goodbye Pork Pie Hat, and indulged in instrumental jams.
Thompson and Cox’s bouyant, jazz-inflected rhythms added a bounce that propelled Pentangle towards the mainstream. Jansch and Renbourn had already played together on the Bert And John album and their delicate interplay provided a light but luscious framework for McShee’s soaring vocals. Two of the brightest stars in the folk revival – Bert Jansch and John Renbourn – teamed up with the pure-voiced Jacqui McShee, double bass player Danny Thompson and drummer Terry Cox (both of who came from a jazz/blues background) to form the acoustic supergroup Pentangle. If the purists were alarmed by Donovan, they soon had something even more sinister to mutter into their beards about. 4, than the folk clubs where the hip young things looked down their noses. This would explain why his first single, Catch The Wind (muddily ‘enhanced’ by the London Philharmonic string section) did better in the pop charts, reaching No. Indeed he wasn’t even in the front line of folk singers and his demos were more pop than folk.
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The first young folk singer to break cover and cross over to the pop charts was Donovan, who landed a series of spots on ITV’s ground-breaking Ready Steady Go programme early in 1965, despite the fact he wasn’t even signed to a record label.
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