Subject: RE: Bright Phoebus reissued
From:
punkfolkrocker
Date: 05 Dec 18 - 01:34 PM
According to a Financial Times review I read yesterday, Domino had bought the rights to Bright Phoebus...???????
Sorry about the long copy n paste,
but the review may or may not be hidden under a pay wall...
sometimes the link works, sometimes it don't...
Relevant bit near the end highlighted in BOLD...
https://www.ft.com/content/b99de558-6dff-11e7-b9c7-15af748b60d0
"Bright Phoebus: rebirth of a magical vision of Britain
A classic folk-rock album is finally being re-released after decades in limbo
From left, Lal Waterson, John Harrison, Mike and Norma Waterson in Hull in 1966 “It’s illuminating, like the sun,” says singer-songwriter Richard Hawley about Bright Phoebus, the 1972 album by Lal and Mike Waterson. They instinctively knew, says Hawley, that “simplicity is where the magic is”.
Bright Phoebus has been compared to Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band for its originality, variety, cast of strange imaginary characters and evocation of a magical Britain. It features a supporting cast of the biggest names in British folk, including Norma Waterson, Martin Carthy, Richard Thompson, Ashley Hutchings and Maddy Prior — yet it has never been widely available. Lal died in 1998 and Mike in 2011. But now, with renewed interest from a new generation of music fans, Bright Phoebus is at last being reissued.
Yorkshire siblings Elaine (“Lal”), Mike and Norma Waterson, along with their cousin John Harrison, made up The Watersons, who were celebrated in 1960s folk circles for their close-harmony singing, often unaccompanied, of traditional songs. But Bright Phoebus was a radical departure for the group. These were original compositions rather than their previous fare of traditional songs, and they were accompanied by a backing band. There was also a broad range of styles: “Rubber Band” is a raucous singalong; the title track has a country feel; “Danny Rose” is a rockabilly shuffle; even musique concrète, with siren sounds closing “Winifer Odd”.
“They listened to all sorts of things,” says Lal’s daughter, Marry Waterson. “They weren’t just drawing on traditional music. My mum had all the Rolling Stones albums. There’s classical in there, all sorts of stuff.”
The Watersons had ceased performing in 1968, but Lal and Mike continued making music for their own enjoyment. “It was a house full of music,” says Marry of her childhood home. “They’d sit in front of the fire with their ciggies and their cups of tea, just singing and playing.” Lal and Mike had also begun writing their own songs, which drew on the rituals, tragedies and mysteries of everyday life that The Watersons had sung about on albums such as Frost and Fire. “Winifer Odd” was named after Mike’s daughter Sarah’s imaginary friend; “The Scarecrow” was a chilling tale of human sacrifice; and the stillbirth of one of Lal’s twins inspired “Child Among the Weeds”.
In 1971, Lal played her songs to guitarist Martin Carthy. “I was really intrigued,” he says. Carthy alerted bassist Ashley Hutchings, his then-bandmate in Steeleye Span, who immediately began organising sessions for an album. While Hutchings recruited guitarist Richard Thompson, drummer Dave Mattacks and producer Bill Leader, Carthy was painstakingly learning Lal’s songs. She did not understand musical theory and did not play recognisable guitar chords. “Lal had a very odd way of playing the guitar,” says Carthy. “What she played made no sense. I was really picking my way through this jungle of what she was playing. But she had a really clear idea of what she wanted.”
Bright Phoebus was recorded in just a week in a makeshift studio at Cecil Sharp House, the folk arts centre in Camden, north London. “They made it on a shoestring,” says Hawley. “The scope of their ideas was far beyond the recording techniques or the budget that they had to make the record on.”
“‘Child Among the Weeds’ was one of the highlights for me,” says Carthy. “We only did one take. We got to the end of it, and we just looked at each other. And everybody knew that this was an extraordinary moment.” The sessions were alive with experimentation, he says. “This bloke turned up to deliver something. We said, just join in with this song. And he stood there with us and he sang. He forgot to leave his name, left his parcel and disappeared. So there’s a mystery person on the album!” But, he adds: “There was tremendous discipline in the studio. It could easily have descended into chaos, but it never did.”
Norma Waterson sings “Red Wine Promises”, Lal’s tale of a drunken night out. Her return to the UK after working in Montserrat heightened the joyous atmosphere of the sessions — especially for her and Carthy. “We got married about three weeks afterwards,” says Carthy. “It was a special week in every possible sense.”
However, Bright Phoebus was greeted with dismay from many Watersons fans. “It really upset people,” says Carthy. “Because The Watersons had been off the road for four years and their first comeback record was this stuff, people were furious. They just did not get it.”
“It was a bit like that Bob Dylan electric thing,” says Marry. “The fans had got used to Frost and Fire and all that, and that’s what they wanted to hear.” She says The Watersons found the purists’ reaction “utterly dismaying”. “It was ridiculous, what they did. Hull folk club museum even formed a committee to ‘protect The Watersons’ legacy’.”
Carthy says the Watersons themselves were never folk “diehards”. “Tradition isn’t an edifice, it’s a process,” he says. “They understood that better than anybody.” But they were still shaken by the negative reaction. “I think the way it was received is probably the reason that Mike never sang any of his songs,” says Carthy.
Just 2,000 copies were manufactured in 1972, half of them unplayable because the hole was pressed off-centre. With lukewarm support from fans, the album went out of print. Financial problems forced Leader to sell his record labels. The new owner, Highway, sold the rights to a third company, Celtic Music, which focused on Leader’s recordings of Irish traditional music. Bright Phoebus remained unreleased.
But its reputation grew. In 2013 the Bright Phoebus Revisited Tour, featuring a band that included Marry, Carthy and Hawley with Jarvis Cocker, along with a BBC Radio 4 documentary, provided clear evidence of strong interest in the album. “It was ahead of its time,” says Marry. With demand for its release from a growing number of fervent fans unswayed by arcane arguments about folk music purity, Domino Records has bought the rights and remastered it. “It feels bloody great,” says Marry.
Hawley says he continues to be inspired by the integrity of Bright Phoebus. “One of the hardest things is to be yourself when you’re getting pushed and pulled and marketed,” he says. “It’s a great success if you can manage to achieve that lofty high.”
‘Bright Phoebus’ is released on August 4, dominorecordco.com"
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