I think Banjiman knows I was being semi-facetious, Jim... There is a serious point in there, though. Some of the 'trad-a-like' stuff is very good, but some is such cringe-inducingly bad fake-folk-by-numbers, verily it offendeth mine ears. In such circumstances I'd much rather listen a decent contemporary singer-songwriter who isn't trying to be anything but what they are. Like this feller (listen to the song called 'Romance is Dead')

I think Shimrod has sort of hit the nail on the head though. This 'split' in the postwar folk revival scene is as old as the scene itself. Personally I can live with it, but my bottom line is that I tend to judge a song or a performance by what it tastes like rather than by what it says on the tin, to use a parallel Jim has sometimes used. To stretch it further, this means if it says beans and it is beans, I don't necessarily know till I've tried 'em whether they're succulent beans in a rich, thick sauce or hard little pellets in a thin gruel. And if the tin says beans and when I open it, it's pear halves in syrup, then sometimes that's a nice surprise and sometimes its a pain in the arse. There again, I do have obscenely catholic tastes and a blithe disregard for labels... Snail ice-cream, anyone?