Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Bert's Blues, February 8, 2001
Being a longtime and avid Bert Jansch fan, I was looking forward to obtaining this release when I first heard of it. Now that I have it, I have some mixed feelings. First, I should say that the sound restoration is splendid (save those cuts from his first album, which still exhibit some un-fixable tape distortions). The choice of material, however, leaves me wondering. The notes indicate that a real effort was made to sample Jansch's music from across his career, and true to this the whole second cd consists of material from the mid-70s onward. The trouble is--and it really pains me to say this--that fully half of the latter material falls rather short of being in any sense notable. If the intent here was to cover all periods of Bert's career in an effort to draw more attention to his relatively overlooked later releases, it is entirely possible with the present material on display that the maneuver--authorized by Jansch himself or not--will entirely backfire. This is too bad, because at least four 70s period albums of his ('L.A. Turnaround,' 'A Rare Conundrum,' 'Moonshine,' and 'Avocet') contain a lot of excellent material and fully deserve to be re-issued as cds. Jansch's 80s period material is largely (but not completely) forgettable; his last ten years of work are the solid productions of a master with over thirty years of experience under his belt, but display relatively little in the way of the truly striking creativity that burst from nearly every album of his early work.I even have some trouble with the selection of the 22 items for the first cd, covering that period. Does anyone really think that 'Rabbit Run' and 'Woe is Love My Dear' belong in this set? Wouldn't anyone in their right mind rather listen to 'Nottamun Town' (from 'Jack Orion'), or 'Alman' or 'Sylvie' (from 'Rosemary Lane'), or 'After the Dance' (from 'Bert and John'), or 'A Woman Like You' (from 'Birthday Blues'), or 'Veronica' or Casbah' (from 'Bert Jansch') or...or...or... a score of others? It was good, however, to see a few really neglected gems present (like 'Wishing Well,' 'One to a Hundred,' and 'Chambertin'; still, overall I am left with the feeling that this set leans too much in the direction of "representative" and too far away from "best." In my opinion the best survey of Jansch's earlier (pre-1972) material remains the 25 cut 'The Best of Bert Jansch,' the improved sound quality here notwithstanding. P.S.: 'Good liner notes by Colin Harper (Bert's recent biographer), and a helpful discography.
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2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Satisfying Anthology Covering 35 Years, August 28, 2001
Career restrospectives are doomed to fail when it comes to satisfying all the fans of a particular artist. It is either too brief and touches on only the hits and the obligatory album tracks that FM radio has played ad nauseum, or it is so thorough as too include virtually everything an artist committed to tape both in and out of the recording studio. Fortunately, Castle Music (which now owns the rights to Jansch's influential Transatlantic material) has provided a relatively thorough overview of Jansch's 35-year recording career, beginning with his self-titled solo debut in 1965 through last year's Crimson Moon. In fact, over the course of two discs and 44 tracks the listener is treated to material from eighteen of Jansch's twenty-one solo albums with stops along the way for a handful of Pentangle songs, a couple of lovely instrumentals from his duet album with John Renbourn and two tracks from his wife's 1985 album Playing the Game on which Jansch plays guitar. While there is no new material or previously unreleased songs this is a welcome addition to any folk music collection. [Avid fans are told in the liner notes that a multi-disc box set of rarities and previously issued material from 1962-2000 is, however, in the planning stages.] While no new music is to found on this collection, many of these songs are available for the first time on CD or are from releases that have since gone out of print like 1995's wonderful When the Circus Comes to Town and 1990's equally lovely Ornament Tree. It's pointless to kvetch about what tracks are missing or why did they include "(song you don't really like)" instead of "(one of your favorite songs)?" There is much her to savor and enjoy. My advice? Buy this collection while it's still available and discover what makes Bert Jansch one of the most important figures in contemporary British folk over the past forty years. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
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4.0 out of 5 stars
Uneven chronological sampling, but valuable overview, August 25, 2006
I review the US version, which differs from the British, as I explain below. The US version ranks more like 3.4 stars if I could grant this score. Licensing difficulties, unfortunately, it seems.
I admit I am a casual rather than fanatical Pentangle fan, and that I picked this up with hopes that it'd expand my knowledge of Jansch's career both before and after the band. It served its purpose, although given the fact that Colin Irwin, who wrote the liner notes, also had issued about concurrently with this CD his biography (unfortunately only published in Britain) of the same title, I expected more comprehensive details on each of the 42 songs. Since Jansch has had many such career compilations, why choose this one?
It is generous--two hours--and gives you cuts from many of his albums to date. Castle label tends to put out a lot of compilations with bargain-rate sound, but I did not hear any poor fidelity here; admittedly however, I have not heard these songs before in another format, except for the two Pentangle tracks. Yet, puzzingly, and perhaps due to licensing problems, the compilation skips from 1972 to 1985 before resuming, leaving out the intervening period.
Irwin alludes to the frequent changes in ownership and thus rights granted to quick-cash-in collections of his 1965-71 Transatlantic label work. This compilation as released in the US differs from the British version: it deletes material from four LPs from the 80s and 90s and replaces these with songs from an Australia live record and tracks with Auerbach. Disc one covers 1965-73. I'd be interested in comparing this to the British version, as the Auerbach material here noticeably hinders the effect of disc 2, crippling what otherwise would I guess be a much more cohesive, chronologically more thorough, journey through what in the British CD were songs from 18 of this 21 LPs.
The best material, in my judgement, is when Jansch sounds like himself, rather than Dylan or some bluesman. These occur more often on Disc 1, in his earlier career. The tracks that show him searching about for a style rather than being true to his own talents do weaken the disc one; by the way, I was surprised to only find two Pentangle songs included. Although if there was a lot more overlap I would not perhaps have bought this Jansch CD due to my already owning his band's albums!
Disc 2 leaps out somehow sounding better mastered; two strong songs from 1973's Yarrow LP shine as Jansch incorporates his guitar and vocals into a much richer backing of faux-Renaissance moods from session players that give more depth than many of the more skeletal songs on Disc One and less so on Disc Two. However, this momentum skids to a halt by tracks from Loren Auerbach from the early 80s, in which Jansch (her husband) gives only guitar to her vocals, which while not embarassing do not stand out that much to justify such space of four seemingly endless songs co-credited to her. They are very much of a hippie aura, lyrically and in their delivery. Hearing "Rainbow Man"--well, you can imagine. It sounds curiously as if it was recorded not in 1982 but a decade at least earlier, for what it's worth. Perhaps those with a penchant for the freak-wyrd folk that has emerged twenty years after this may find inspiration in these songs more than I have.
Traditional songs, like "Ladyfair," "Mountain Streams,"and especially the Ornament Tree's title track (aka Bonny Portmore) feature some of Jansch's most distinctive work on this compilation, intelligent lyrics, a nuanced vocal delivery, and solid instrumental foundations. Closing with a wonderful song to Robin Williamson, "October Song," that complements the earlier "The January Man," this compilation does hold its strengths for last along with its less memorable songs. It is uneven, but it's generous in its variety. There's nothing here that sinks dreadfully, at least when Jansch is at the mike playing or singing himself.
Hearing "Needle of Death" after for so long knowing of its acclaim only by hearsay, I must tell you, is powerful, forty years after he first released it. Jansch, as Irwin notes, deserves much wider attention than his peers who often, I think, took his ideas and ran away with them to greater profit. Notably, fans of Led Zep and early 70s guitar legends or later British folkies may want to hear, if they have not yet, "Blackwater Side" as it sounded on Jansch's groundbreaking folk LP from '66, "Jack Orion," before he joined the new Pentangle a few months later.
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