The latest project from two-thirds of Saint Etienne is a compact disc and deluxe double LP of English music that represented the transition from psychedelia to prog as the 60s moved into the 70s. Most of it is not an easy listen, but it’s always interesting, melodic, melancholy, with jazz and folk touches. While America may have licked its wounds at the turn of the seventies by turning to singer-songwriters, purveyors of homilies like “teach your children well”, Britain wasn't so ready to give up the trappings of psychedelia. And while the UK counterculture may have shed its “faith in something bigger”, it wasn't about to chuck out the mellotron.
This is how the day after the sixties felt: damp, fuzzy-headed, neither optimistic nor pessimistic but more than a little lost. British bands would mirror the ennui of the new decade with a new kind of music. It features 19 tracks from Caravan, John Cale, Camel, Matching Mole, Alan Parker and Alan Hawkshaw, Spring etc. Lavishly put together, with two of Peter Mitchell’s iconic photographs of 1970’s Leeds.
Various Artists - Bob Stanley And Pete Wiggs Present English Weather
A1. Caravan – Love Song With Flute
A2. The Roger Webb Sound – Moon Bird
A3. The Parlour Band – Early Morning Eyes
A4. Scotch Mist – Pamela
A5. Spring (6) – The Prisoner (Eight By Ten)
B1. The Orange Bicycle* – Last Cloud Home
B2. T2 (3) – JLT
B3. Bill Fay – 'Til The Christ Come Back
B4. Van Der Graaf Generator – Refugees
B5. Aardvark (5) – Very Nice Of You To Call
C1. John Cale – Big White Cloud
C2. Belle Gonzalez – Bottles
C3. The Way We Live – Watching White Stars
C4. Offspring (4) – Windfall
C5. Camel – Never Let Go
D1. Daevid Allen – Wise Man In Your Heart
D2. Matching Mole – O Caroline
D3. Prelude (3) – Edge Of The Sea
D4. Alan Parker & Alan Hawkshaw – Evening Shade