Synanthesia

Though recorded quickly over two days - and indeed, literally recorded live in the studio with no overdubs - Synanthesia's sole album from 1969 is a gentle treat for anyone interested in the obscurer realms of late-'60s U.K. folk and its descendants. It's always a pleasure to hear something that did not deservedly go out of print - and therefore get an unnecessary reputation. Instead, the combination of bandleader Dennis Homes' gentle vocals and delicate guitar work, Leslie Cook's equally strong talents, and the ace-in-the-hole performing of sax and flute player Jim Fraser is often quite magical. That the band openly has a debt to the Incredible String Band and Bert Jansch practically goes without saying, but there's a difference between mere aping and finding a particular spin on a sound, and Synanthesia firmly comes down on the side of the latter…

VA - Dust On The Nettles: A Journey Through The British Underground Folk Scene (1967-72) {3CD Grapefruit CRSEGBOX030 rel 2015}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 1.22 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 554 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 27 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1967-72, 2015 Grapefruit Records / Cherry Red Record | CRSEGBOX030
Folk Rock / Pregressive Folk / Psychedelia / Pop Fok / Electric Folk / British Folk

With 63 tracks and a total running time of just under four hours, Dust On The Nettles examines the metamorphosis that British folk underwent during the late 1960s, when the influence of psychedelia and the counterculture saw the idiom being twisted into all kinds of new and exotic shapes, as the finger-in-the-ear folk clubs of yore were inexorably drawn into a brave new world of Arts Labs, free festivals and the nascent college/university circuit.

Released in 2015, Grapefruit’s 3-CD multi-artist British underground folk compilation Dust On The Nettles was widely praised, with a five-star review in The Times hailing it as “a delight from beginning to end”. A long-overdue follow up to that set, Sumer Is Icumen In tightens the mesh by focusing on the point when traditional folksong and the burgeoning late Sixties counterculture collided, largely courtesy of seminal acts like the Incredible String Band, Fairport Convention and Pentangle.