Fairport Convention - Fairport Convention (1968)

Fairport Convention are a successful English band who are credited with inventing ‘electric folk’, a subgenre of folk rock based heavily on traditional English folk songs.
 
Fairport Convention were formed in London in 1967 by Simon Nicol, Ashley Hutchings, Richard Thompson and Shaun Frater. Frater was soon replaced on the drums by Martin Lambler, and they then brought in singer Judy Dyble. They were soon regularly playing at such underground clubs as UFO and The Electric Garden, and came to the attention of Joe Boyd. Boyd became their manager, and got them signed to Polydor Records. He also persuaded them to recruit a male vocalist to work alongside Dyble, reccomending Ian MacDonald (who would later call himself Ian Matthews). By the summer of 1968, their debut album had been released.
The self-titled Fairport Convention album is often seen as little more than an interesting prologue to their later works, as it contains none of the English folk material which would define their later sound. Instead, it is heavily based on American west-coast folk-rock, containing covers of songs by Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell and other American songwriters. At the time many comparisons were drawn with Jefferson Airplane, mostly due to their use of two lead singers. It was their only album to feature their first lineup of of Ian MacDonald (vocals), Judy Dyble (vocals), Richard Thompson (guitar), Simon Nicol (guitar), Ashley Hutchings (bass) and Simon Lamble (drums).

|> What We Did On Our Holidays (1969)
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2 comments:

Roo Gatsby said...

hm why do i keep running across ian macdonald listed as the lead vocalist for this album? did he change his name? Ian Mathews is the man i always thought sang lead on this record..

the link takes me to ian matthews' albums anyways... but yeah, lovely musics,
cheers,
Roo
magicafternoon.bandcamp.com

Roo Gatsby said...

so after a bit of research, wikipedia tells me his name is actually Iain Matthew MacDonald... he shortened it when he went solo around 1970....

yeah, i wish i could find more of his solo records!!!!

cheers,
Roo
magicafternoon.bandcamp.com