Welcome to the Mid Summer edition of the RPM Record Club Seven Day Soundtrack. It's the Glastonbury Festival this weekend, but more importantly, it's the Folk In A Field Festival next weekend (30 June to 2nd July)....which means we are having our annual break, as we'll be in a field in the heart of rural Norfolk with no internet connection....get your ticket here https://www.folkinafield.co.uk/ 

Meanwhile, here's your Mid Summer sounds...over to....

Jean -

"I’ve enjoyed a lot of the Isle of Wight Festival this week, so these are my picks. There were some great musicians in the bands."

"Have a good week everyone. Cheers."

Tony -

"Here's my 3 for the week. With best wishes to all as ever."

Alan -

"Gotta agree (well, almost) with Piers regarding 'Who knows where the time goes' by the Fairports, but there is another version which (well, almost!) reaches the same levels of perfection in my opinion: Here 'tis along with two songs featuring Sandy's lovely voice from the vinyl vaults here in Saham."

Judy Collins- 'Who knows where the time goes' (from 'Who knows....'  US issue LP released November 1968. Elektra label)

"Taken from Judy's seventh album which features a plethora of famous names backing her including her then current beau Steve Stills, Rick Nelson/Elvis Presley guitarist James Burton, respected pedal steel guitarist Buddy Emmons and arranger/composer/ musician Van Dyke Parks on piano. There's a scarce Judy composition ('My Father') and covers of songs by Dylan, Cohen (2) and, surprisingly, one from the pen of the Incredible String Bands Robin Williamson. Even stranger is that the opening track, Rolf Kempfs 'Hello, Hooray' cropped up on Alice Coopers 'Billion Dollar Babies' LP!! The album peaked at number 29 on the Billboard chart and sold over 500,000 copies, achieving gold record status. Collins was born in 1939 in Seattle to a musical (blind) father and studied piano under Antonia Brico and made her public debut at age 13 performing 'Mozart's Concerto for Two Pianos'. However, despite Brico's disapproval, Collins developed an interest in the folk music of Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger and began appearing in the folk clubs in Denver and Boulder Colorado before moving to NYC where she was signed by Elektra after appearing regularly at Gerde's Folk City and other Greenwich folk clubs. Judy was never a prolific songwriter and, initially, her recordings concentrated on the works of Dylan, Ochs and Paxton but then she began to feature songs by 'new' songwriters such as Cohen, Joni Mitchell, Fred Neil and Randy Newman. By the time of her fifth album she was including songs from such varied sources as the Beatles, Kurt Weill and Jacques Brel and expanding the musicians backing her on the recordings. Judy recorded two versions of 'Who knows....', initially there was a sparser, voice, bass and two acoustic guitars version released as the b-side to 'Both sides now' but, for the album, only the first verse survived with a rerecorded, enlarged backing ensemble and new vocals. The single (taken from the previous album, 'Wildflowers') reached number 8 in the charts in late December 1968. In the intervening years Judy's star has waxed and waned with songs varying from revolutionary and protests songs to synth based recordings such as a cover of Yaz's 'Only You' and a couple of albums of children's songs. Still an active recording artist, Judy also tours regularly and can be seen in Bury St Edmunds in October."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4loOplI_tA

Fairport Convention- 'I don't know where I stand' (From 'Heyday: the BBC Radio Sessions 1968–69' LP released 1987. Hannibal label)

"Most RPM'ers are much more au fait with the Fairports family of artists than I am so the following two tracks are probably over-familiar to them (apologies). Nevertheless, here's a superb track from the initial vinyl issue of the groups BBC sessions which, I think, has been re-issued in an expanded edition (on CD) with an extra seven tracks including a live version of the 'What we did on our holidays' LP opening track, 'Fotheringay'. Different versions of that song have now been released on five Fairports albums plus it became the name of Sandy's next group...."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-1hH0rqeRA

".......and so onwards to..."

Fotheringay- 'The Sea' (from 'Fotheringay' LP released June 1970. Island label)

"Pretty much a folk 'supergroup' featuring Sandy, hubby to be Trevor Lucas and Gerry Conway from Eclection and Jerry Donahue and Pat Donaldson from Poet and the One Man Band. Despite appearing in the Top 20 listings of both the NME and Melody Maker in 1970, the album was deemed commercially unsuccessful by Island. Sandy had been voted the UK's best Female Singer for two consecutive years and, as a result, Island preferred to promote Sandy not only as the front person in Fotheringay but, due to the lack of sales, they then applied pressure for her to commence a solo career. Sandy would later add that there were ill feelings between the band and producer Joe Boyd when sessions began for the proposed second album which exacerbated the split and the tracks recorded for that album never materialised for almost forty years. Several of the songs appeared on Sandy's debut solo album where she was backed by members of the Fairports and Fotheringay but, in 2007, it was announced that Jerry Donahue had access to the recordings and would attempt to complete the LP from those sessions and this was duly released in mid 2008. In 2011 a complete concert recording from Germany was released and, in 2015, there was a retrospective box set released featuring both LP's in complete and demo form, a live set from Holland, seven BBC radio performances and four appearances on Beat Club. There have been a couple of tours by the surviving members since then but no further recordings. Sandy, of course, sadly died after a fall down stairs in April 1978. One of Sandy's regular attention seeking 'tricks' was to apparently fall down stairs and, after lying prone for several seconds, jump up to show she was OK. However, whilst on holiday in Cornwall, Sandy fell badly down stairs, hitting her head on a concrete post and began suffering severe headaches. She was prescribed the painkiller dextropropoxyphene, a drug known to have fatal side effects when mixed with alcohol which was particularly dangerous as Sandy was an known alcohol abuser. There was a further fall when she returned home and, at this point, her relationship with Lucas ended and he left for Australia, taking their daughter with him, without telling Sandy. Several days later Sandy fell into a coma from which she never emerged."

(I'd recommend reading I've Always Kept a Unicorn: The Biography of Sandy Denny by Mick Houghton...the first part of the book covering Sandy's early years and her time with Fairport is very interesting, but of course, the latter part of the book is all very sad, not only due to the nature of death but also how her record company misguided her artistically. Tim.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHPbD_niEVE

"Great choices again recently........... roll on Saturday (or midnight Friday!!!😀)."

John -

"Hi Everyone, Last weekend I replaced the old stereo system in my studio with one purchased at a car-boot sale. This wonderful piece of technology consisted of a CD player, radio and a cassette player. Having disposed of most of my cassettes many years ago when automobiles ceased to have cassette players fitted as standard, I managed to find a couple in order to test this great example of retro engineering. One of them was a C90 'Mix-Tape' I started to compile towards the end of the last century. One side consisted entirely of songs written by Tim Hardin but covered by other artists including, among others, Kathryn Williams, Joan Baez, The Four Tops and Colin Blunstone. The cassette player worked perfectly and I enjoyed the whole 45 minutes. Hence my three for this week are songs composed by Tim Hardin...."

"By the way, the other side of the cassette was a kind of reversal of the same idea, i.e. a band known for their own original compositions doing cover versions of other artists songs... all may be revealed via RPM 7DS at a future date - watch this space!"

Dave -

"Hi RPMers, hope you all aren’t too sun burnt !!! Here’s my 3 this week." .. 

Nina -

"Hi folks, hope you're all well and had a merry solstice. I'm dashing these off before joining the Golowan torchlit procession in Penzance then will be swimming in the harbour as the fireworks go off, same as last year with my mad mermaid friends.

Here's 2 from me; the Blur track's been an ear worm for a few weeks and the other one, a homage to the Glastonbury festival. Enjoy!"

Tim -

"Solstice good vibes to you all. Here's my Mid Summer three..."

'Til Next Time....in a fortnight....