Five Leaves Left - Nick Drake

When we talk about the greats of music through the 60's and 70's we seem to be bogged down with mentions of bands like The Who, The Beatles and ABBA amongst others. Now whilst they all have their place in peoples memory's (yes sadly ABBA are in my memory), an understated young man is missed from most mentions, and yet is argueably the most talented musician of the time. That man is George Best *gets tapped on the shoulder and told I'm doing a CD review* oops...I mean that man is Nick Drake. Who you may ask yourself, is Nick Drake, sadly too many people are asking themselves this. Well Nick Drake was was what you could call the epitome of British folk music. ...  Read the complete review

Genius is a puzzling trait. To be sure, we all feel comfortable in our knowledge of what a genius is- but aside from a vague definition, no two observers will attribute the adjective identically. Is Andy Warhol a silkscreen maverick, or a mere forger of soup labels? Did Charlie Chaplain simply perform slap-stick routines, or did he revolutionize the medium of film forever? Indeed- the term “genius” seems to be arbitrary and problematic- almost to the point of being utterly useless as a word. Yet, in spite of these vague parameters, we seem to use the phrase quite often- especially when defining a favourite artist. It would seem that, even though we cannot ...  Read the complete review

May 1969 saw a soft and brown voiced young man recording his first album at Sound Technics Ltd., Old Church Street, SW3; Nick Drake's first darling disc, Five Leaves Left, failed to make Drake's desired impact on the fickle world of music; two albums later, the manic depressive took his own life. A sad introduction to the alluring album that I'm about to review, but necessary information if you are to fully understand and value the beauty of Drake's music. Imagine the times in which this music was being written: Imagine the halcyon days of free love; the general use of marijuana (hence the title? The small piece of cardboard you find ...  Read the complete review

'Five Leaves Left', Nick Drake's first album, released in 1970, is a brilliant first release from an artist who had yet to make his mark. Tragically, he never gained the recognition he felt he deserved in his lifetime. In fact, the tragic tale of Drake's life (a depressive, he died from an overdose after releasing his third album, 'Pink Moon') leads many to rate his final darkest work as his best. And while it has the edge on the eager-to-please 'Bryter Later', i can't help but return to this album, despite its flaws. For starters, i don't have such a problem with the charge of lyrical naïvety levelled at this ...  Read the complete review

This album is heavily orchestrated, only a handful are strings-free, and for the most part this is a good thing. Certainly songs like "River Man" and "Fruit Tree" benefit from the lush string arrangement that Robert Kirkby has provided. That said, the most grandiose track on here is probably "Three Hours" and that relies only upon Drake's guitar, a bass, and some congas. Similarly, the song "Way to Blue" suffers from a totally unnecessary pompous string arrangement. I don't know about you, but I'm not that keen on singers using only strings for accompaniment (no guitars). Neil Young's overbearing "There's a ...  Read the complete review