Taking a deep dive into Nick Drake's debut album "Five Leaves Left"

Here's an unboxing of The Making of Five Leaves Left by Nick Drake 4LP set along with a discussion of the nine-year project.

LINKS

EchoLocator Things We Already Knew About Nick Drake by Tom Moon

Producer Joe Boyd presents And The Roots Of Rhythm Remain @ The Rivoli, April 13

Music producer & author Joe Boyd is launching the paperback edition of And The Roots Of Rhythm Remain at The Rivoli. 

Here's the scoop... 

Legendary music producer, writer and record label boss Joe Boyd is something of a Leonard Zelig of 20th century popular music. He was the production manager for the 1965 Newport Folk Festival when Dylan went electric, managed European tours of Muddy Waters, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Reverend Gary Davis and Coleman Hawkins,  ran the UK office of Elektra Records and started London's pioneering psychedelic club UFO, produced the first Pink Floyd single and discovered Nick Drake while also working with Cream, Soft Machine, The Move, Arthur Brown and John Martyn. He also signed the nascent Fairport Convention and the Incredible String Band and put together the soundtracks for A Clockwork Orange and Deliverance which turned the instrumental "Dueling Banjos" into a surprise chart-topping hit 1973 and earned a Grammy for Eric Weissburg & Steve Mandell. All of that – in addition to working with Toots and the Maytals, Kate & Anna McGarrigle and R.E.M. while running Hannibal Records – he still found time to travel to travel across the planet while digging deep into the music and cultures that created it. 

Watching how the global audience for the music of Africa, India and Latin America grew and expanded, Boyd was taking notes when what came known as "world music" in the 80s became ubiquitous popular music with recordings like Paul Simon's multi-million selling Graceland album from 1986. And Boyd must've seen it coming. In fact, back in 1969 – before Fela Kuti and Tony Allen hit on Afrobeat – he'd recorded his own "township bop" experiments to update kwela music for an audience outside of South Africa with Dudu Pukwana, Chris MacGregor,  Mongezi Feza, Louis Moholo, Richard Thompson and members of Osibisa but he was unfortunately a little bit too ahead of the curve for it to be profitable (check out Dudu Pukwana & The Spears). Hey, timing is everything which Boyd knows as well as anyone having had to wait for a 1999 Volkswagen commercial for the rest of the world to recognize the magic in Nick Drake's music he'd spotted more than 30 years prior.  

Boyd's latest work, And The Roots Of Rhythm Remain (out in paperback April 1 via Ze Books) – which he half-jokingly calls "a history book disguised as a music book" – is the story of how this globalization of music happened told by someone with the uncanny ability to be in the right spot at the exactly the right time, the breadth of knowledge and historical perspective to connect the dots along with the knack for spinning a yarn to make for an engrossing read and a captivating talk. 

He'll present his findings in Toronto at The Rivoli on Sunday, April 13 from 2pm to 3:30pm (doors at 1 pm). General admission tickets are $18.50 (plus $1.50 service charge) available right here. Check out a few of Joe Boyd's recent interviews (including a discussion of global music for the Rock's Back Pages Podcast right here) followed by a list of upcoming dates on his reading tour below. 

That time "Spider" John Koerner took a rock 'n' roll detour

Minneapolis folk blues picker Spider John Koerner cut one rockin' single with Blues Project members issued by Elektra UK in '66.

Despite the initial opposition Bob Dylan faced from his folkie fans for exploring that heathen rock 'n' roll, the record buying public at large were much more welcoming of his decision to expand his horizons. The exponential increase in sales Dylan enjoyed didn't escape Elektra Records boss Jac Holzman who had a guitar-picking folk blues enthusiast of his own on the roster named Spider John Koerner which he thought might benefit from a similar bit of rock 'n' roll retooling. 

Dylan and Koerner actually had some history together back in Minnesota although you won't see any of it recreated in the recent Dylan biopic "A Complete Unknown." The gregarious Koerner is credited as being the first musician Dylan met on the Minneapolis coffeehouse scene who took the aspiring young musician under his wing, schooling Bobby Zimmerman on the pre-war blues that helped shape Dylan's musical vision. Koerner also introduced Dylan to his Dinkytown pals, 12-string ace Dave "Snaker" Ray and harp blower Tony "Little Sun" Glover who would share local bills. Later, they would band together as Koerner, Ray and Glover and release a number of records both solo and as a group starting with Blues, Rags and Hollers in 1963. 

Although Koerner, Ray and Glover's releases sold well with the coffeehouse crowd and like minded musicians such as Bonnie Raitt, by 1966, the times were a changin' and the teen garage band explosion touched off by The Beatles and Rolling Stones was in full-effect. Holzman saw the writing on the wall and Koerner was dispatched to a New York recording studio with the Blues Project's guitarist Al Kooper & drummer Roy Blumenfeld along with future Mountain bassist Felix Pappalardi deputized as his backing band. The rollicking results, "Won't You Give Me Some Love" and "Don't Stop" were coupled together as a single for Elektra which was released in the U.K. to coincide with Koerner's brief overseas tour. 

Unfortunately, due to the glut of similar sounding rave-ups at the time, Koerner's promising release failed to raise a ruckus with the Brits and was quickly forgotten. In fact, Elektra's man in London Joe Boyd – who typically has a remarkable facility to remember events which occurred five or six decades earlier in minute detail – had no recollection about about Koerner's lone Elektra UK single which wasn't issued in the U.S. or Canada at the time.

Writes Joe Boyd: "I remember Spider John's visit to the UK, but nothing about a single. I think there was an idea that Britain was more receptive to singles - that it would be good publicity to coincide with his UK tour. No point in releasing singles in the US of folk music unless it was far more commercial than Koerner's music." 

To be fair, when the single was in the works in 1966, Boyd had one foot out the door of the Elektra office, soon moving on to bigger and better things with the UFO Club, Pink Floyd, Fairport Convention and Nick Drake. He's a great storyteller and you should definitely read  his excellent memoir White Bicycles: Making Music In The 1960s and check out his latest book, And The Roots Of Rhythm Remain which he'll be launching in Canada at The Rivoli (334 Queen St. West) on April 13. 

Since Koerner sadly passed away in 2024 – and the bassist on the session Felix Pappalardi was shot dead by his wife, Gail Collins in 1983 – any attempt to glean more information about the recording from the original participants has been made that much more difficult. There was a chance that Blues Project drummer, Roy Blumenfeld might be able to fill in some of the details about how the recording initially came together... but maybe not.  

When I mentioned the Elektra UK single to Blumenfeld, he responded: "That was quite awhile ago. I kind of remember the session, but I don't recall where or much about the recording. Spider John must have been playing at the Gaslight Cafe or the Cafe Au Go Go. Felix was backing up different folk artists and producing Cream before he played bass with the band Mountain. That's possibly when the session was created. That's about all I remember."

For now, the story behind "Spider" John Koerner's elusive Elektra UK single will remain a mystery. Both sides of the single were compiled on the "Spider John" LP issued in a limited edtion of 500 copies by the Nero's Neptune label available via Forced Exposure right here. 

If Jac Holzman, Al Kooper or anyone else who has some pertinent information about the recording they'd care to share, feel free to drop me a line here or on Facebook. In the meantime, you can listen to the enjoyable top side "Won't You Give Me Some Love" followed by some Spider John interview clips and a few performances.    

Remembering Syd Barrett on his birthday

Here's producer Joe Boyd's recollection of working in the studio with Syd Barrett along with a couple of early clips.

Joe Boyd chats about his new book, Little Richard and more

Producer Joe Boyd's new book And The Roots Of Rhythm Remain traces the origins of popular music which he discusses below.

Here's the scoop...

Legendary producer and record label boss Joe Boyd has spent a lifetime travelling the globe and immersing himself in music. He has witnessed first-hand the growing popularity of music from Africa, India, Latin America, the Caribbean and Eastern Europe since the 1960s and was one of the protagonists of the 'world music' movement of the 1980s. 

In this sweeping history, Boyd sets out to explore the fascinating backstories to these sounds and documents a decade of encounters with the most extraordinary musicians and producers who have altered the course of music for us all. 

And the Roots of Rhythm Remain shows how personalities, events and politics in places such as Havana, Lagos, Budapest, Kingston and Rio are as colourful and momentous as anything that took place in New Orleans, Harlem, Laurel Canyon or Liverpool. And, moreover, how jazz, rhythm and blues and rock 'n' roll would never have happened if it weren't for the notes and rhythms emanating from over the horizon. 

"I doubt I'll ever read a better account of the history and sociology of popular music than this one." – Brian Eno

"Profound and beyond." – Robert Plant

"'One only hopes that this will be taught in schools." – Ry Cooder

Joe Boyd's "And The Roots Of Rhythm Remain" will be on shelves in Canada on October 4th. You can pre-order it via Amazon right here but try to get it from your local bookseller instead. 

 

Joe Boyd remembers pioneering music promoter George Wein

Sadly, Newport Jazz/Folk Fest founder George Wein passed away in September at the age of 95. Producer Joe Boyd pays tribute. 

"I enjoyed playing a lick on the guitar that Bob Dylan used when he went electric at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. I had no idea how significant a concert that was to be at the time, but it has proved to be one of the most influential moments in the history popular music." - GTW

George Wein: October 3rd, 1925 to September 13th, 2021

On a cold January day in 1964, I walked into George Wein’s office on Central Park West. He was looking for a tour manager for the Blues and Gospel Caravan featuring Muddy Waters, Sister Rosetta Tharpe and Rev Gary Davis that was booked for a UK tour that April. I was about to complete my undergraduate credits at Harvard and was itching to go to Europe where people seemed to appreciate the music I loved far more than in America. When I asked Boston promoter Manny Greenhill if he had any suggestions about what I could do over there to earn some money, he made a phone call, then told me to be at Wein’s office in New York the next morning. 

George listened to me talk about blues for perhaps fifteen minutes, then motioned to a desk with a telephone and told me to get started finding a bass player for the tour. That moment was the beginning of my life in the music business; he made a quick decision, handed me responsibility for the tour and let me get on with it. George repeated that process again and again; an astonishing number of America’s best promoters, presenters and festival programmers have learned their trade working for him or with him. His influence goes far beyond the graduates of the George Wein school of concert promotion; Coachella, Glastonbury, Hardly-Strictly Bluegrass, WOMAD, Bonnaroo, before COVID hit us, music festivals seemed close to becoming the defining events in our musical culture. George invented the form. 

The year and half I spent working for George on tours and at Newport was one of the most intense and enjoyable periods of my life. I talked about those adventures on a recent radio show; it’s more fun to hear those stories with a great musical soundtrack, so I won’t repeat them here, but you can click on this link to Johnny Fewings’ Jazz Blues and Beyond and have a listen right here. 

* * * 

George Wein was a doctor’s son from Newton, Massachusetts who started taking piano lessons at 8; by the time he reached high-school in the late 1930s, he was jazz crazy. After military service in WW2, he attended Boston University, then started a jazz club called Storyville in nearby Kenmore Square. One of the regulars was Elaine Lorillard, a tobacco heiress with a mansion in Newport, Rhode Island; a casual conversation one night at the club led to her backing the Jazz Festival there in 1954. 

The Newport Festivals had a huge effect on the music of 1950s America, showing, for one thing, that there was a far broader audience for jazz than anyone had previously imagined. George was criticized sometimes for his mainstream tastes, but during those staid years, Ray Charles, Muddy Waters, Mahalia Jackson, Chuck Berry and Pete Seeger all appeared at Newport alongside the greatest jazz artists of the era. Charles’s set is immortalized on the great ‘Ray Charles at Newport’ lp and Mahalia’s is the centrepiece of the film ‘Jazz on a Summer’s Day’. (Stream them both if you haven’t already!) Newport had a powerful influence in the jazz world; Miles Davis got his deal with Columbia Records after a storming set at the 1955 event and the following year Duke Ellington emerged from his decade-long decline with an extraordinary performance of ‘Diminuendo and Crescendo’ in which saxophonist Paul Gonzalves took a 27-chorus solo as the crowd roared him on (Watch it here). One can probably identify the Gonzalves moment and Ray Charles’ set as key hinges that helped jazz turn funkier and more blues-inflected following the death of Charlie Parker in 1955. 

Wein was balding and round and looked (and sometimes talked) as if he should be smoking a cynical, tough-guy cigar. But not only was he a sweet and open-hearted man, but for his entire life he remained supportive of music that he may not have always enjoyed and which may not have commanded a large following, but which he believed should be heard. When folk music surged in the late ‘50s, he added a folk festival to the Newport summer but soon realized the folk world was politically complicated and he wasn’t the one to create a great festival single-handed. Following a 3-year hiatus, the Newport Folk Festival returned as a non-profit event, run by Pete Seeger’s committee. George’s company provided the infrastructure, but the profits went to a foundation that supported traditional music, while creative decisions were in the hands of Seeger’s board. I attended the 1963 event and seeing Mississippi John Hurt and Doc Watson for the first time with the fog rolling in off Narragansett Bay remains an indelible memory. To say that the Folk Festival had an even greater effect on popular culture in the ‘60s than the Jazz Festival had in the ‘50s would be an understatement. (Events at the notorious ’65 festival, where I was production manager, are addressed in the radio show…) 

In the early ‘70s, as changing conditions (in both the American cultural landscape and in ever-more-touristy Newport) were making it impossible for the Folk Festival to continue, George turned his attention to New Orleans. The background to the Jazz and Heritage Fair (now, as you know, an immense annual event) is instructive about George. He was approached in the early ‘60s by the mayor, who wanted to bring a jazz festival to the city. When it became clear that such an event could not be fully integrated – onstage, backstage and in the audience – George walked away and turned down repeated efforts by the city fathers to engage with him. When, in 1968, New Orleans finally felt ready to have a racially mixed event, George agreed, only to have the deal cancelled when the city discovered that Joyce, George’s wife (and invaluable cohort), was African-American. They went ahead with another promoter and for two years had money-losing, unimpressive festivals. 

 These failures drove the city back once again to George in 1971, with no caveats this time, and giving him full control. (Culture seemed to shift a lot faster then than it does now…) George took the Folk Foundation approach, forming a non-profit organization with local presenters Quint Davis and Alison Miner and blurring the boundaries between jazz, r&b, cajun and the unique cultural traditions of New Orleans. In the most recent pre-Covid Festival, half a million people attended over two April weekends. An endless list of great artists, obscure and famous, from James Booker to Wynton Marsalis to Aretha Franklin and the Rolling Stones have played the festival, while the Foundation continues to support cultural initiatives across the region including the great local radio station, WWOZ (which you can get online). The New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Fair is one of the great commercial and philosophical success stories of American culture. 

Over the years, George launched many festivals around the world in collaboration with local promoters. Many artists came to rely on him to fill their dwindling datebooks during jazz’s lean years. Though he loved doing the occasional turn at the keyboard as part of a band, his comfort zone was behind the scenes, doing what he loved – producing. There has never been anyone better. 

* * *

My favourite personal memory is from Paris, in August, 1964. I had stayed on in London after the ‘Blues and Gospel Caravan’ that spring and was broke and eager to go back on the payroll, helping George get ready for the autumn ‘Newport in Europe’ tour. I crossed the channel by motorcycle and ferry while George arrived straight from a gastronomic trip up the Rhône. On the agenda that first day was lunch at Fouquet’s on the Champs Elysees with the editor of Jazz Hot magazine and George insisted I come along. As I ordered ‘bifsteak bien cuit avec pommes frites’, I noticed a frown out of the corner of my eye. When the lunch was over and we were walking back to the hotel, he put an avuncular arm on my shoulder and said, gruffly, ‘listen, kid, if you’re going to work for me, you gotta learn how to eat!’ Over the next three evenings, he took me to some of the best restaurants in Paris, ordering instructive and delicious courses and wine. I never ate a well-done steak again. – Joe Boyd

Producer Joe Boyd recalls hearing Nick Drake for the first time

Following up a tip from Fairport Convention's Ashley Hutchings, Joe Boyd rang up Nick Drake and asked him to drop off a demo. 

Excavated Shellac documents the global origins of recorded music

Archivist Jonathan Ward offers a guided tour of the early world of music you've never heard with his new Excavated Shellac collection.  

Here's the scoop...

Dust-to-Digital is making available Jonathan Ward's mammoth 100-track survey of rare early regional music from 89 countries in six continents drawn from his vast personal stash of 78s. The new collection Excavated Shellac: An Alternate History of the World's Music – following Ward's two prior Excavated Shellac sets "Strings" and "Reeds" – highlights music that is often invisible in today’s world — the incredible world of global recordings that aren’t jazz, blues, country, rock ‘n roll, R&B, or “classical.”

Excavated Shellac: An Alternate History of the World’s Music includes 100 recordings and 100 stories in an extensive, well-illustrated PDF with detailed, contextual mini-histories about both musical origins and the beginnings of the recording industry, touching on the complexities of colonialism, economic agendas, and cultural tourism.

With almost all of the tracks never before reissued, this collection expands upon and acts as a companion to Jonathan Ward’s Excavated Shellac website (https://excavatedshellac.com), a unique repository of music, history, and data on 78 rpm recordings from around the world, rarely heard and seldom seen.

You can order Excavated Shellac as 100 MP3 files + a 186-page PDF with essays and annotations by Jonathan Ward via Dust-to-Digital right here or from Bandcamp over there. 

Check out the preview clip and Du Feu Prix en Tête Man Nordé by Martinique's Orchestre Créole Delvi below followed by the complete track listing. You can also read Dust-to-Digital fan Joe Boyd's recent think piece about the Excavated Shellac set right here. 

Dudu Pukwana's debut with The Spears being reissued by Matsuli Music

Dudu Pukwana's rare 1968 album with The Spears is being packaged with a previously unreleased 1969 session featuring Richard Thompson & Simon Nicol! 

This just in from Matsuli Music...
In addition to this 1968 Dudu Pukwana And the Spears album (listen below), there was a second record made in 1969, after Dudu had visited South Africa with Joe Boyd. The second recording has never been released, and it has some important musicians featured. Double LP in production. Our research indicates the following personnel for this second unreleased recording:

Unreleased recordings confirmed line-up
Dudu Pukwana – Tenor sax
Richard Thompson – guitar
Simon Nicol – guitar
Harry Miller – bass
Louis Moholo – drums
Mongezi Feza – trumpet
Joe Mogotsi – vocals
Bob Stuckey – organ and bass pedals

Likely
Mamsie (Mthombeni) Gwangwa - vocals
Chris McGregor – piano
Phil Lee – guitar
Teddy Osei – tenor sax

Possible
Jonas Gwangwa – trombone
Remi Kabaka – drums or percussion
Jimmy Scott – percussion
Tunji Oyelana – drums or percussion

Watch the documentary Fairport Convention: Folk Heroes

Directed by Charlie Thomas with Mark Rivers, the film was released to coincide with the iconic British folk-rock group's 50th anniversary in 2017. 

Paul Weller vs. Nick Drake

Nick Drake's River Man is already quite unsettling but Paul Weller tries to make it a bit darker.

Joe Boyd remembers Kate McGarrigle

Kate McGarrigle grew up in the Laurentians outside Montreal. She and her two sisters joined their father and mother around a piano in the evenings and sang. Parental praise was earned by finding a good harmony part. There was no tv. Their father was born in the 19th century.

In their teens, she and Anna joined various folk groups and Kate travelled a small circuit of coffee houses before returning to Montreal to complete a chemical engineering degree at McGill University. She went back on the road after graduation, met Loudon Wainwright III, started writing songs, married him, gave birth to Rufus and settled in New York City.

I met her in the mid-Seventies because Maria Muldaur, whose first album I was producing, wanted to sing Kate’s “Work Song”. The album included “Midnight At the Oasis” so Kate earned something from the song-writing royalties. When Maria was ready to make her next album, Kate sent her a demo of songs. We picked one called “Cool River”, with delicious, earthy-but-ethereal harmonies I assumed were Kate double-tracked. We invited her out to Los Angeles to add them to Maria’s version and she asked if she could bring Anna. I approved the extra ticket thinking she needed help with the baby. But that unforgettable day in the studio they all turned up, Kate and Anna stood around the piano with Maria and sang while Rufus kept quiet in a basket in the corner.

The sound of those voices together was one of the most astounding things I had heard in my musical life to that date. I persuaded Warner Brothers give us studio time to make a demo. Kate & Anna signed a contract and with engineer John Wood and co-producer Greg Prestopino we embarked on one of the richest – and proudest – recording experiences of my life. I have always loved recording and mixing harmonies; memories of blending those voices into the stereo master of the first McGarrigle album still give me a thrill. We mixed “Heart Like A Wheel” in short snippets cut together; in those pre-automation days the balances were so tricky we could never get more than a few lines right at a time.

Between demo and recording Kate split up with Loudon, but they got back together before the album was released so Kate was too pregnant with Martha to go on tour promoting it. I thought the Warner Brothers art department let us down with the cover. The album didn’t sell – one of the great disappointments of my life. A second album didn’t do any better.

Over the years, Kate & Anna began touring and slowly built an audience. Eventually, everyone realized how much they loved the first album. The British embraced them, so they came to London every few years. Kate and I argued about the touring band – they wanted a Hammond B3 player and a drummer, the cost of which meant tours were rarely profitable. They hated being pigeon-holed as folkies.

Linda Ronstadt and Emmy Lou Harris recorded their songs, their children began to grow and to sing, I licensed their records for my Hannibal label and they had a reunion with me and John Wood for The McGarrigle Hour. Rufus and Martha recorded two of their earliest compositions for it. Loudon came up for a couple of days and sang “What’ll I Do?” with Kate and their two kids. Not a dry eye in the studio.

I visited Montreal and St Sauveur from time to time. Kate turned me on to her favourite historian, Francis Parkman, and I turned her onto mine, Lesley Blanch. She and Anna and Rufus and Martha sang at my 60th Birthday party (cleverly located next door to their concert at the Newport Folk Festival). I shared her pride in her two remarkable kids and their growing success – which brought her through London more and more often. She was the proudest of mothers at the premiere of Rufus’ opera Prima Donna last summer at the Manchester International Festival.

By then she had been diagnosed with cancer and had had multiple operations; I rang her about a week after the last one and she was out of breath. I asked her if she felt OK, she said she felt great, having just walked in the door from a 3-hour cross-country skiing trek.

The family asked me to produce the annual Christmas concert, in London last year at the Royal Albert Hall instead of the usual Carnegie Hall in New York; there was an unspoken understanding that this might be her last. When Martha came to town for her Piaf shows in November, seven months pregnant, she went into pre-mature labour and a tiny son, Arcangelo, was born (now doing fine). Kate flew over, brought food and grandmotherly affection to the hospital and in her spare time worked with us preparing the concert. She wrote a new song, “Proserpina”, about the goddess the Greeks called Persephone and how she created winter because her daughter was far away and not coming home.

The week before the concert, Kate flew to Montreal for a scan and discovered things had gotten worse. She underwent exhausting treatment and travelled back to London in time to rehearse. She was at her shining best that night; everyone I spoke to said it was one of the most remarkable evenings of music they had experienced. (YouTube has some clips from the show filed under “Not So Silent Night”.)

Back in Montreal, Kate held court on the sofa, then in her bedroom. I visited her in early January; she was as witty and sardonic as ever. She died on January 18, surrounded by her family, everyone singing. There was a cathedral funeral in Old Montreal with lots more singing; she was buried behind the church in St Sauveur-des-Monts, near the start of her favourite cross-country skiing trail.

Kate occupied a central place in my personal Pantheon of the greatest musicians I have known. Her songs are smart, romantic, cynical, tuneful and deeply rooted in the traditions she loved. She was demanding, determined, fierce, gentle, loving and never, ever dull. We could start a conversation about a recording or a concert and end up talking for an hour about the Ottoman Empire. I miss her terribly.

* * *

On June 12, I am organizing a tribute concert to Kate as part of Richard Thompson’s Meltdown at London’s Royal Festival Hall. Her family and other well-known guests will sing her songs. I know, it’s the day England plays the USA in the World Cup, so we’ll start it at 4:30 so someone’s iPhone doesn’t reveal an England (or American! – it’s possible) goal while Emmy Lou Harris is singing “Mendocino”, Linda Thompson performs “Go Leave” or Martha does “First Born Son”.

This link will take you straight to the South Bank ticket site – seats go on sale today (Thursday, April 15). I gather tickets are expected to go fast, so if you want to go, I advise buying immediately!

Joe Boyd