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Debut Albums 1956 to 1986
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"...Whisper Fairy Tales Until They're Real..."
Prior to its decades long absence and first reissue
in December 2000 by Spinney Records of the UK – this was a Record Collector
beast – spoken of in hushed tones by earnest men with a longing in their
arthritic bones. "Just Another Diamond Day" was a one-thousand-pound-plus
Folk LP listed rarity that would genuinely create bidding frenzy when (or ever)
it turned up for sale on auction sites. Hell, even after that 2000 reissue, the Spinney
Records VINYL LP was listed in the RC Price Guide and remains so up to the 2022
issue (see below for details of the LP variant).
Funny now that in the spring of 2022, the Spinney CD
reissue of this uber-rarity is available for sums like a fiver or less at times
(never more than a tenner). Time has cheapened its mystery, period allure and
availability maybe (the album will not be for everyone) - but make no mistake -
"Just Another Diamond Day" is still a truly lovely thing – delicate
in all the best ways.
The liner notes inform us that the master tape lay
dormant in some warehouse for 30-years or more, then were unwisely transported
on a London Tube only to emerge to a thunderstorm of rain where it got wet. But
not that you would notice from this gorgeously transferred album – Restored and
Remastered by PIERS. Here are the jog-along details...
UK released December 2000 - "Just Another
Diamond Day" by VASHTI BUNYAN on Spinney Records SPINNEY001CD (Barcode
06666017012124) is an Expanded Edition CD Reissue and Remaster of her lone 1970
Debut Album with Four Bonus Tracks and plays out as follows (40:03 minutes):
1. Diamond Day [Side 1]
2. Glow Worms
3. Lily Pond
4. Timothy Grub
5. Where I Like To Stand
6. Swallow Song
7. Window Over The Day
8. Rose Hip November [Side 2]
9. Come Wind Come Rain
10. Hebridean Sun
11. Rainbow River
12. Trawlerman's Song
13. Jog Along Bess
14. Iris's Song For Us
Tracks 1 to 14 are her Debut and Lone Album
"Just Another Diamond Day" – released November 1970 in the UK on
Philips Records 6308 019. Produced by JOE BOYD – It didn't chart.
All songs written by Vashti Bunyan, except five -
"Window Over The Bay", "Hebridean Sun" and
"Trawlerman's Song" were co-written with Robert Lewis, "Where I
Like To Stand" co-written with John James and "Iris's Song For
Us" - written by Iris McFarlane and Wally Dix.
NOTE: There is also a Year-2000-pressed VINYL LP
reissue of "Just Another Diamond Day" on Spinney Records SPINNEY 001
(Barcode 0666017012117) that reproduces the original British Sleeve with the
John James front cover painting and Steve Thurlby gatefold artwork and adds in
a lyric insert.
BONUS TRACKS:
15. Love Song (Non-LP 45-single B-side to "Train
Song", released 20 May 1966 on Columbia DB 7917 in the UK, Produced by Peter
Snell with her name credited as VASHTI)
16. I'd Like To Walk Around In Your Mind
(Unreleased Acetate Produced by Mike Hurst for Immediate Records in 1967)
17. Winter Is Blue (Unreleased Acetate 1966)
18. Iris's Song (Version Two) – John Bunyan's Tape
1969
MUSICIANS (Album):
VASHTI BUNYAN – Lead Vocals and Guitar
CHRISTOPHER SYKES – Piano and Organ
JOHN JAMES – Dulcimer
ROBIN WILLIAMSON (of The Incredible String Band) –
Fiddle, Mandolin and Irish Harp on Tracks 3, 8 and 13
DAVE SWARBRICK (of Fairport Convention) – Fiddle
and Mandolin on Tracks 5, 9 and 14
SIMON NICOL (of Fairport Convention and The Albion
Band) – Banjo on Tracks 5, 9 and 14
ROBERT KIRBY – String Arrangements on Tracks 1, 6
and 11
MIKE CROWTHER (Extras) – Guitar on Track 17 only
You have to get used to a few things – her breathy
almost fey-sounding voice – all hippy-dippy – like a seriously girly version of
Donovan. The music reflected her nomad life in a caravan escaping the big choke
of London for the Hebridean Islands with horse and dog (Bess and Blue) and
co-songwriter Robert Lewis. So the songs are mostly stripped down acoustic and
vocal ditties – tales of wooden wheels and gypsies and trees and meadows and
peat and fairies and fishermen on trawlers and farmers counting cows in
drizzling open fields until they can go home to their love cooking something
warm by the hearth.
Producer Joe Boyd (of Nick Drake and Incredible
String Band fame) had heard Vashti Bunyan three years earlier reading poetry
and doing her embryonic songs for small audiences in the city, and had been
smitten. But she wouldn't lay any tracks down. So when she did phone to record,
Boyd jumped up and roped in genre sympathetic friends. His original LP liner notes are
reproduced in the lovely 12-page booklet that also adds in very pretty paintings,
backdrops, lyrics and new 2000-penned liner notes from PAUL LAMBDON. The
paintings by Jenny Richardson are particularly lovely. To the tunes...
Almost too delicate – it is easy to hear now why
the album elicited no interest from the Hard Rock months that ending 1970. But
take her gorgeous vocal opening to "Window To The Day" – Acapella for
a few hair-raising moments only to be joined by a quietly plucked Acoustic
Guitar. Put simply – "Window To The Day" is beautiful – like
discovering the original Bon Iver influence. The same applies to the impossibly
lovely far-across-the-sea wee-wifey dirge - "Trawlerman's
Song".
Robin Williamson of The Incredible String Band
outdoes himself with his fabulous and melodic contributions to the Side 2
opener "Rose Hip November" – all three instruments (Fiddle, Mandolin
and Irish Harp) giving the delicacy a teeny uplift where needed. His
left-speaker Fiddle playing adds a jaunt to "Jog Along Bess" (make us
all some tea) – her little green wagon trundling along with a painting by John.
Three of the tracks feature Dave Swarbrick and
Simon Nicol of Fairport Convention – "Where I Like To Stand",
"Come Wind, Come Rain" and "Iris's Song For Us" – each
benefiting from the extra instruments. Arrangements hero Robert Kirby does
typically delicate and beautiful work on "Swallow Song" and a slew of
instruments on "Rainbow River" (see my review on Amazon and Sounds
Good Looks Good Blog Site of his work on the February 2018 Ace Records CD
compilation "When
The Day Is Done - The Orchestrations of Robert Kirby" – that compilation
highlighting "Rainbow River").
The four bonuses are from Acetates, Demo Recordings
and a lone 45-single, so there are traces of clicks and pops, but the
Unreleased "Winter Is Blue" is lovely even despite the audio
drop. It does seem odd that the A-side to her May 1966 debut single "Love
Train" is not here, when there obviously was room and would have made
collectors very happy bunnies indeed. Still – four extras like this are to be
welcomed.
Musical truth be told, Vashti Bunyan's lone
Folklore LP "Just Another Diamond Day" from November 1970 is the kind
of album that elicits joy and derision in equal measure. Some will call it a
relic of a bygone hippy-idealism that no longer warrants a place in our post
Covid-19 War-ridden world of 2022.
But there are those who will wallow in its delicacy
for precisely that reason. I choose the latter and suggest you do the same my horse-whinnying
caravan (serai) travelers of life...
PS: Her biography "Wayward: Just Another Life
To Live" is due 7 April 2022, printed by White Rabbit Books...
