BEATS OF LOVE
152. Bryter Layter LP by Nick Drake
THERE WAS an actual real time just prior to its studio completion when this product threatened to sell and make everyone involved in its production thrilled.
Cutting himself off from the security and safety of Cambridge to decamp in the capital, Drake's more urbanized lyrics appear to suggest he felt dwarfed rather than looming large. There's a vulnerability but determination in his voice. A drum kit changed the studio dynamic with Fairport players, amongst others adding to his distinctive finger picked guitar, creating a more upbeat sound. That said, Kirby's arrangements maintain that distinctive wispy pastoral elegance that marked out his debut.
We all recall playing tunes to amazed small pockets of folk and trying to figure out how to scale up. Forget the dark stuff. This is a careerist record and all the better for it. One that searches out pop tones and scales things up perfectly. Forget the theorized accounts of its delay and subsequent commercial failure, but bask in its breezy majesty. And let that reticent but compellingly transportive voice whisk you off.
That there's been no challenging positive political voices, cutting through to society at large since Luther King and Kennedy is truly unfortunate. That no one has bettered Drake's stab at jazz infused folk/pop isn't.
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