Sandy Denny albums poll

I don't have much besides Sandy, but Sandy is great.

hard to have the solo stuff go up against the fairport records she was on... favorite solo record is probably The North Star Grassman and the Ravens.

write in for Led Zeppelin IV

north star grassman is really fucking great

don't know if it's in print still, but the three disc Who Knows Where The Time Goes comp from the 80s is amazing, that's the Sandy thing I've listened to the most.

damn i just checked discogs and that thing used to be super expensive but there's a VG+ one that's $30 right now, i remember seeing it for like $300

worth getting -- i dunno, the "rarity" stuff has probably been spread around on various reissues now, but for a while it was the only place you could get a lot of it. something about the sequencing is just right, too.

Heyday is a more enjoyable listen than any Fairport's released albums - I wouldn't consider it a "comp" since it was all unreleased material of mostly unreleased songs. Of the "real" albums, Unhalfbricking followed by Holidays.

IIRC, Who Knows Where the Time Goes is OOP, replaced by another SD box set.

My personal favorite is the first Fotheringay record, but the first two she did with Fairport Convention and The North Star Grassman and the Ravens are not that far behind.

I wasn't aware of Heyday; gonna have to track that one down!

it's a "BBC Sessions" disc, but I swear they all sound like studio recordings

.... it catches the Unhalfbricking lineup at their absolute peak. Close call between those two for my favorite Fairport album.

Hard not to vote for Liege & Lief on any poll cos that is all-time top 5 for me.

mental notes for later contemplation:
unhalfbricking > fotheringay > what we did on our holiday > sandy > northstar grassmen > liege > like an old fashioned waltz >> the rest?

heydey is great too, but i dunno about better than the studio albums.

Sandy's one of those artists whose work I only know from comp and BBC sessions, I have no sense of one album or another.

where is an ILMer who would take sandy's solo records over the richard/linda thompson records? anyone? i can't imagine trading henry the human fly & the first three R&L records for anything..

I don't know... I probably listen to more Sandy solo than anything else she's been a part of but, if I had to choose I doubt I could choose Liege & Lief out of existence...

i would take grassman and sandy over henry the human fly and hokey pokey but much love for all these records

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Va5nznuGKw

As far as 24 months in anyone's life goes it's pretty tough to beat this run:

Fairport Convention - What We Did on Our Holidays (1969)
Fairport Convention - Unhalfbricking (1969)
Fairport Convention - Liege & Lief (1969)
Fotheringay - Fotheringay (1970)
Sandy Denny - The North Star Grassman and the Ravens (1971)

Can you still get Heyday or was it replaced by the longer BBC sessions box? & didn't that have a sampler 1cd version anyway?

I picked up the cd version which had expanded somewhat on the original tape. That was going back an age, early noughties or before?

Kinda difficult, between "Sandy" and "North Star", I don't think she ever really fulifilled her potential on the solo albums tho

She came pretty close on the first one, I think. It's a shame Fotheringay split up; they were pretty much her ideal backing band.

But they were pretty much around for the rest of her solo career tho, more or less? Maybe not Jerry Donahue.

That Bunch record has a ton of great stuff on it -- her and linda thompson harmonizing on "when will i be loved" is heavenly. too bad there's not more of them singing together. funny to read about those sessions in Electric Eden, how they were these drug and drink soaked days. not really how i imagine the fairport group (aside from Denny, I suppose), but i guess they were rockin' in the 70s.

kinda depends, orig fairport lineup with thompson and matthews probably not but by time swarbrick and pegg show up it's super boozy (look up the famous troubador bar bill story). also lucas and the other fotheringay dudes big boozers/druggies i think.
i wrote about this on another thread but denny was massively insecure and the breakup of fotheringay, due to joe boyd, was a major mistake as they were the only setting where she felt safe and supported.

yeah i think it's mainly my image of richard thompson as a muslim ascetic that makes me surprised. but according to the book, he was indulging as much as anyone at that time -- those sessions might've been what led him towards religion in the first place.

I had to google buzza's story:

TERRY: I heard a story about a time when Fairport Convention played at The Troubadour during the club's golden period in the late 60s?

RICHARD: Yes. Yes. When you'd play The Troubadour you were booked for a week. There would be two shows a night for six days. It was perfectly criminal, really. It was our first shows in LA. There was one period where we'd made $2,000.00 in a two weeks and our bar bill was $3,000.00.

btw Unhalfbricking always wins my vote in any poll that includes it

I like Sandy solo a lot, but can't vote it over the Fairport stuff, esp. "Liege".

might've been posted in another sandy thread, but this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvdr_kilrw4
too bad it's incomplete!

i think one of the fairport guys says the only time he saw richard drunk was at the troubador.

speaking of over-imbibing there was this story from dave pegg as well

"When I joined Fairport I was a big fan of The Band so Rick Danko, who unfortunately passed away last year, has to be up there as one of my all time favourite bass players. I’ve also had the great privilege of meeting him. I met him at this festival we did over in Denmark a couple of years back. I was so excited to meet Rick that I drank so much Whisky I passed out in the bar of the hotel and had to be taken to hospital and given a stomach pump. It was the first time I had ever had a stomach pump and the next day I felt absolutely fantastic. I could recommend it to people."

kinda depends, orig fairport lineup with thompson and matthews probably not but by time swarbrick and pegg show up it's super boozy

Yeah, Ashley Hutchings has never struck me as a crack open the beers and let's get stupid kinda guy

... more the type to fine band members who showed up to rehearsals smelling of booze

kind of cool, john peel interviewing sandy in 1974
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8u25vH6bno

I wasn't aware of Heyday; gonna have to track that one down!

― cwkiii, Wednesday, August 22, 2012 2:39 PM

No need - all of the tracks from the original release (late '80s, of recordings from '68-'69) are on the 4-disc Live at the BBC set (which I somehow missed, and may well have voted for over Unhalfbricking).

Can you still get Heyday or was it replaced by the longer BBC sessions box? & didn't that have a sampler 1cd version anyway?

I picked up the cd version which had expanded somewhat on the original tape. That was going back an age, early noughties or before?

― Stevolende, Thursday, August 23, 2012 6:11 AM

I have the original release of Heyday (from 1987) - on an early CD, before it was expanded with additional songs on the 2002 reissue. The one-disc BBC sessions sampler does not include any of the original Heyday recordings (and thus, little from the Holidays/Unhalfbricking lineup), and was likely intended more for fans who already had Heyday - despite what the cover claims, it's not really the best of the box set. Not sure of the current availability of either version of Heyday, but I'd probably opt for the 4-disc box set anyway now that it's available. Even though I prefer the Heyday song sequencing.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

reasonable.

Pretty interesting. Who voted for The Bunch?

Long time SD fan.

Relistening to some of her stuff on Spotify.

Pretty amazing

Pretty amazing

― ∞, Monday, June 9, 2014 11:45 AM

otm

(fotheringay is not on spotify, btw. shame. that's her best work.)

if someone sold a sandy denny shirt with her Zep IV symbol i would scoop that up in a heartbeat.

https://i.imgur.com/SxBbKnu.jpg

Hadn't seen this thread before. My blogged Nashville Scene ballot comments on Related in

Richard Thompson is an ever-riveting, never-showboating
featured team player ("Sloth" gets really dead-to-zombstring
strange: is it about wages of sloth, of a sloth? Both?) on
Fairport Convention's roiling, autumn-leaves-shanking
What We Did On Our Saturday, documenting a sometimes
alarmingly energetic hive of all surviving Conventioneers
who came to play
--- which is most, incl. the founding line-up entire, I think
---their 50th Anniversary Concert
(taking things a little easier on Disc 2, but understandably
so, given the earlier waves).
...Aye, the fearless geezers of 50th Anniversary Fairport
tromp ever forward into the highways and byways and
lanes and thickets and buildings and moats along the
deep ledge of their catalogue
---emerging at times into bare wide spaces with no visible obstruction,
though some may be felt (just go around ‘em
when it’s time). Now that’s what I call Related to country,
in terms of old scores, the occupations and preoccupations
that keep some folks young and old
----not forever, nobody lives or otherwise hangs around
that long, but can seem like it.
Also in this (‘18) 50th year of FC, and released right before
said Anniversary concert
(just headlining at the Cropedy festival, as usual),
we got Fairport and Friends’ (Fotheringay, Sandy Denny solo)
A Tree With Roots, gathering their Dylan covers, suitably
knotty and smooth enough when called for, even adding
a few kinks
----kicking off with their translation of “If You Gotta Go,
Go Now” into French language and cajun (?) music,
the latter pretty unusual on non-cajun radio in the 1960s,
but a UK hit nonetheless, their biggest ever, I think. They
(orig line-up, so sung by Judy Dyble, even covered “Jack O’ Diamonds." From the folk
song of that title, Bob Dylan took "Jack o' Diamonds is a hard
card to play, " for a long poem
on the back or sleeve of Another Side of Bob Dylan, but
apparently never recorded any musical application;
Ben Carruthers did, and gave D. a co-write credit.
Good discussion here, with links to both Fairport tracks and
Carruthers’
https://bob-dylan.org.uk/archives/8280
“Percy’s Song” is a rousing anti-anthem, like “Blowin in the Wind”:
both sway and march all ye right up through the brink
of unknowing. Percy’s friend bravely goes to confront the
mean ol’ judge who slams the book on P.: he’s the
reckless driver, killed people, case closed. Narrator goes
right into the Headline News True Crime trope
---how can this be, he was always such a nice boy
--- refrain:”Turn, turn to the wind and the rain”
---so familiar, this mystery, so Related, so off-the-record relatable,
but somehow never in a country (or other) song?

Related reissues of 2018, that is (that long ago? Still seem like recent musical experiences, those two)

I listen to Sandy solo more than Fairport these days, esp “Sandy”, her finest work IMO.

(fotheringay is not on spotify, btw. shame. that's her best work.)

― I'm ANTIFA and I vote. (Austin), Sunday, June 12, 2022 11:56 AM (four hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

Yeah this is annoying, though a few Fotheringay tracks are on Spotify on the 1987 The Best Of Sandy Denny comp, including their version of "Banks of the Nile" which blows my mind every time I hear it.

I would have voted for Like An Old Fashioned Waltz here--an album of profound, world-weary melancholy. The rich orchestral arrangements on it seem to be controversial, but I think they suit the material perfectly. When I hear it I always picture her standing in front of an orchestra wearing a luxe fur coat, smoking a cigarette (and if you listen closely to "No End" after the second verse about two minutes in, you can actually hear her strike a match, light a cig and take a drag).

Came across this beautiful synch of "no end" w/ a scene from Solaris: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V377v6BAbOE