Well I think a lot of people felt they had corners to fight.

Ordinary folks who liked Five penny Piece or Peter Paul and Mary and thought they liked folk music were completely confused when they came to a club with a traddy policy, and many of them left never to return.

The The traddie clubs were fiercely protective of the advances they felt they had made.

The contemporary pro acts - many of them before long were having to eek a living gigging the continent. they cast envious eyes over to what contemporary acts like James Taylor and gordon Lightfoot were achieving over in the states.   Plus, hey saw that material going down well in many UK clubs.

Dallas and Irwin wielded enormous power. Their estimations of Carthy as the new English Bob Dylan, and Peter Bellamy as a genius meant that when the US started asking for our acts; it was from the sages of Melody Maker they turned to for recommendations.

As many English people couldn't comprehend these artistes, they could only guess what the Americans would make of it. So whether brilliant uncritical reviews, instead of simple factual reporting, did anyone any favours   - i think the jury is still out. Certainly it put an unrealistic burden on some fragile shoulders.

It was a rough time. When I was teenager in the 1960's , there were two or three folk clubs in most towns. By the end of 1970's things were pretty much as they are now.