1968 UK Debut Album on Transatlantic Records (Reprise USA)
Inside "The Albums" 7CD UK Cherry Red Box Set
Remastered, Bonus Tracks, Repro Card Sleeve Artwork
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"...Way Beyond The Sun..."
I'm struck with a thought as
I wade through this boatload of musical brilliance - why aren't PENTANGLE
monster - I mean absolutely friggin' huge?
Celebrating 50 years in 2017 since
their formation in 1967 - Cherry Red's "The Albums" Box Set is a
gorgeous thing to have and hold for sure. Superlative brick block presentation
with Mini LP Repro sleeves for all six titles, best-ever sound (a new audio
source for 1972's magical "Solomon's Seal") and extras galore (22 Previously
Unreleased).
Chronologically you get five
albums (1968 to 1972) from their initial productive blitz at the UK's home for
all things Folk and Weird - Transatlantic Records - along with their sixth and final on
Reprise Records – a supposed comeback that cruelly turned out to be a false new
dawn before the horrid and acrimonious split in the spring of 1973 (drunken
phonecalls ahoy). Alongside all that reissue-sexiness is a 20,000-word essay by
MICK HOUGHTON (long-time associate with the band and Bert Jansch) in a
beautifully laid out 88-page book (concert tickets, UK and US trade adverts and
flyers etc).
"The Albums" also
includes a COLIN HARPER month-by-month band history timeline (worrying amounts
of details and tour dates), NICK WATSON Remasters that breath new life into
these largely Acoustic songs and a quantity of repro'd memorabilia that would
make Bear Family of Germany twitchy in the lederhosen area.
But more than that, as you
re-visit record after record here - you're filled with admiration at their
originality – musical soundscapes and philosophical themes that still have a
lingering influence in Folk-Rock, Acid-Folk, Acoustic Blues and even World
Music. And all of it achieved without ever really getting the blue-plaque
credit Pentangle so obviously deserve. There's a huge amount of info to slaver
over, so let's get to those Reflections and Baskets of Light and that "Pentangle" beginning...
UK released Friday, 6
October 2017 (13 October 2017 in the USA) - "The Albums" by PENTANGLE
on Cherry Red Records CRCDBOX41 (Barcode 5013929104105) is a 6-Album/7-Disc Box
Set with an Extensive 88-Page Booklet, 22 Previously Unreleased Tracks and Mini
LP Repro Artwork Card Sleeves. The debut album "The Pentangle" is Disc 1 and plays out as follows:
Disc 1 "The
Pentangle" 1968 Debut Album (72:12 minutes):
1. Let No Man Steal Away
Your Thyme [Side 1]
2. Bells
3. Hear My Call
4. Pentangling
5. Mirage [Side 2]
6. Way Behind The Sun
7. Bruton Town
8. Waltz
Tracks 1 to 8 are their
debut album "The Pentangle" - released May 1968 in the UK on
Transatlantic Records TRA 162 and November 1968 in the USA on Reprise Records
RS 6315.
BONUS TRACKS:
9. Koan (Take 2)
10. The Wheel
11. The Casbah
12. Bruton Town (Take 3)
13. Hear My Call (Alternate
Take)
14. Way Behind The Sun
(Alternate Take)
15. Way Behind The Sun
(Instrumental)
Tracks 9 to 15 are outtakes
from the 1968 sessions and first appeared on the 2001 CD Reissue of "The
Pentangle" on Castle Music CMRCD 131
16. Bruton Town (Take 5) -
PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED Session Outtake
17. Koan (Take 1) - 1968
Session outtake first appeared on the December 2007 4CD Box Set "The Time
Has Come 1967-1973" on Castle Music CMXBX664
18. Travellin' Song - a
non-album UK 7" single A-side released May 1968 on Big T Records BIG T 109
(the album track "Mirage" was the B-side)
19. Poison
20. I've Got A Feeling
21. Market Song
Tracks 19 to 21 are from
their first sessions in August 1967 - "Poison" was issued on the 2007
Box Set "The Time Has Come 1967-1973" - the other two are PREVIOUSLY
UNRELEASED. A re-recording of "Market Song" opens the "Sweet
Child" double-album
PENTANGLE was:
JACQUI McSHEE – Lead Vocals
BERT JANSCH – Lead Vocals
and Guitars
JOHN RENBOURN – Lead and
Backing Vocals and Guitars
DANNY THOMPSON – Double Bass
TERRY COX – Drums and
Percussion
A drawn-out gut-string double-bass
note eases in the Traditional "Let No Man Steal Your Thyme" - the
Side 1 opener for their groundbreaking 1968 debut album "The
Pentangle". Reprise Records of the USA was want to tell its sceptical US
public not to fret at such audio audaciousness – oh no – because "...it is
necessary to talk of fusions of
traditional folk forms..." And that's what Pentangle and their cool
music has always been – a fusion of Folk and Rock and maybe even a few Jazz
licks thrown in too.
First up, the audio on this
forgotten beginning of Pentangle is fantastic - the instrumental
"Bells" sounding positively cathedral-like. The cover of The Staple
Singers secular classic "Hear My Call" is given that Pentangle
shuffle (no voices sounding). But little prepared May 1968 listeners for the sneakily
clever twister "Pentangling" - seven minutes of go-go 60ts Folk with
Jacqui McShee's vocals lovely and soothing at first only to be replaced with
acoustic-guitar battles, a Double Bass solo and a Bert Jansch counter vocal
that underpins the whole mad brilliant thing. Wow - is it any wonder the Ling
became such a concert showstopper. Other highlights include the Trad Blues of
"Way Behind The Sun" - a song associated with Barbara Dane and her
1964 US Folkways album "Sings The Blues With 6 & 12-String
Guitar" (The Byrds recorded a version during the "Sweethearts Of The
Rodeo" sessions in 1968).
Amazing audio too on the
finisher instrumental "Waltz" which is more Guitars-Go-Dancing than
Strauss with Thompson's Double Bass solo likely to kick her your speaker's
teeth in. Of the Disc 1 Bonus Material my raves are the duo of "The
Wheel" and "The Casbah" which sound like Jimmy Page goofing off
on an Acoustic Guitar during the recordings of Roy Harper's 1971 Harvest
masterpiece "Stormcock". The unreleased Take 5 of "Bruton Town"
is getting close to the released version and is beautifully rendered here -
while the alarmingly poppy "I've Got A Feeling" and "Market
Song" make their debut here (what a blast).
"...My own darling
jewel sat smiling by me..." - Jacqui McShee sang wistfully on "Once I
Had A Sweetheart". I'm going to be smiling and dipping into this amazing
box set for years to come – I know it. Well done to John Reed, Adam Velasco,
Dave Timperley and all the other good eggs at Cherry Red Records for giving PENTANGLE
the send off they deserved instead of the 'whimpering' one they got back in
1973.
You can get the "Pentangle"
debut on an individual CD remaster fairly easily, but this is one group and one
release I urge you to spend a few more bob on. They didn’t just begin well, they
continued as such and grew more.
"...Sit thee down and
put them on..." we're advised in the receive-thy-soul song "Lyke-Wake
Dirge". Amen to that acid advice baby...
