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My
Birfday
Present
It Was, Precious -- On My Birfday It Come To Me...
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My own history
with Fairport goes back thirty of their thirty-five years -- or even
thirty-one if you count my being turned off by the cover of "Full
House" in the Navy Exchange in 1971 and not buying it (though i
corrected that mistake a
little later, see my "Full
House" review for more of that
story)...
Now, many Fairport albums and two trips to Cropredy, Oxfordshire for
their annual music festival/reunion gig (one of which was 1992, their
25th anniversary, memorialised in its own 2-CD set, as was the 30th
anniversary, with a 3-disc box.)
Anyway, there i was browsing something somewhere on-line, and i came
across reference to this set, which i immediately looked up on Amazon
to see if what i had read was true; as it happened, Amazon told me that
there was Even More than what i had read suggested.
Kate happened to look over when i began whimpering over the thought
that i really couldn't afford it, and asked me why i sounded as if i
were in pain. I pointed her to the description of the album, and to the
price.
She pointed out that my birthday was coming up soon.
And two days before my birthday, there it was in the mailbox.
My birfday present it was, precious -- on my birfday {well, almost}
it come to me... My Precioussss...
[EXIT, pursued by an orc]
This is one of the most incredible boxed sets i've had the good fortune
to own; Free Reed look rather like a British Bear Family on the basis
of this set and of others listed in the catalog that came with it.
The 180-page book, which covers Fairport's history from beginning to
present (well, presstime; given the band's background, there's always
the nervous feeling that any listing of personnel more than about a day
old could be seriously out of date), including commentary on each album
at the appropriate points. While certainly respectful of the band's
history and influential position, and obviously friendly with the
members, author Nigel Schofield doesn't fall into the trap of being
overly reverential, and is not above more-or-less gently twitting them
when it is obvious that they don their trousers unipedally in a manner
similar to the rest of us.
The Cropredy memories book is a nice touch; having been there in '90
and '92, i can attest that it is A Lot Of Fun, even in a downpour (and
didn't we have one in '90).
Pete Frame's "Fairport Family Tree" is an expansion of the one he did
entitled "Resolving the Fairport Confusion", which is reprinted in his
first
"Family Trees" book (and, in a streamlined form, on the
cover/inlay of the "History of Fairport Convention" compilation) and
followed the band up till their breakup in '79. In order, presumably,
to get in all of the most- directly-related data on Fairport's lineups
and its members' other projects, and related bands and projects, some
of the more peripheral material included on the original tree is MIA --
i find a minor mention in a note of "The Bunch", but they do not appear
on the chart as such, and he doesn't number the various incarnations of
Fairport and Steeleye Span referenced. All the same, a fantastic piece
of work (you have to see it to appreciate how densely packed it is with
information); Pete's original seems to have been about four feet by
three feet, and he packed every inch of that twelve square feet with
beautifully-lettered hand-printed information, wisecracks and
historical sidelights. Even reduced as it is here, it's readable and
informative. He remarks at the end that it's current as of when he did
it -- and says "...if you change the lineup one more time, you can find
yourself another f***in' genealogist!"
And the first 5000 (mine was three-thousand-something) included a
coupon for another disc, featuring guest stars from Cropredy.
(Hope it includes the long long version of "John Barleycorn" they once
did with Ian Anderson...)
Great package. Seems as if there ought to be something else, though...
Oh, yeah -- the music!
Disc 1 -- "Fairport -- A History"; a chronological overview
Disc 2 -- "Rareport Convention"; hard to find and unreleased material
form many sources, including private collections and radio and TV
sessions.
Disc 3 -- "A Fairport History"; sixteen folk tracks that take us back
to various key moments in British history
Disc 4 -- "Classic Convention"; which is rare and non-standard versions
of what is described as the "core Fairport reportoire", including a
completely outrageous version of "Matty Groves", which was created by
editing together a whole bunch of versions in chronological order.
The sound quality on some the cuts on this set is less-than-pristine (i
noticed this particularly on at least one cut which seemed likely to
have been recorded from an AM radio broadcast, with severe peak
distortion). This can be a bit off-putting, but, since at least one
reason to have this collection is for the historical/completist value
of the performances it documents, many people (i confess to tending
that way) will be happy merely to have these 72 tracks in any form at
all.
That said, most of the cuts are at least decent-sounding, ranging
upward to pristine.
I, like any Fairport fan, can list a number of items i would like to
have seen included on these discs, if only to have them all in one
place, but many or even most of them -- Simon's practical joke on
Swarb, which appears on the 30th Anniversary box set, for instance --
are already available in more-or-less accessible form, somewhere.
This set is, mostly, The Other Stuff... and i'm glad to see it.
Now i can hardly wait for my bonus disc. |
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