Customer Reviews

Fairport Unconventional

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

OK, I really do like Fairport Convention. I knew when I bought this box that some of the material was, well, less than audiophile quality. However, I still feel that, for the price of this set, some of the remastering of the source material is subpar. There are several "out-takes that have really excessive tape hiss and SOME of this hiss could surely have been removed without affecting the music. The quality is so uneven that, to me, it makes this set difficult listening.

That being said, I do like some of the older out-takes and radio and TV broadcasts. I am particularly a fan of '67-70 Fairport, and there are some nice things from that era.

The book is wonderful, and probably helps justify the price. But, I believe the sound quality is not what it could be.

This is a pretty impressive collection. It's not a "greatest hits" box set in the normal sense (which is fine, since the world is hardly lacking in Fairport best-ofs...) but rather a sweeping overview of the band's career, reaching back to the early demos and BBC appearances up through more current concert appearances at the band's Cropredy festival. It's true that the sound quality on some of the broadcast appearances leaves a lot to be desired, but the chance to hear the band in all its experimental glories and blunders is worth a bit of tin and muffle. Besides, correct me if I'm wrong, but it's my understanding that the BBC didn't always archive these live appearances, and in many cases fan airchecks taken straight off the air are the only source material left. So it's not always a matter of "paying" the Beeb for the use of better recordings -- in some cases these are the *only* recordings that exist. (Sure, someone may have better tapes than the ones Free Reed uses, but I sure don't, and I think it's worth sixty bucks to hear the stuff they had access to, especially when combined with all the other goodies on here...)

In addition to all the music, there is an incredible profusion of Fairport-abilia crammed into this box... The 170-page booklet has tons of insider-y info and reproductions of countless old press clippings, behind-the-scenes memorabilia and endless asides about the band's creative process and convoluted history. An accompanying "family tree" chart is amazingly dense and informative, while a separate booklet commemorating the Cropredy Festivals has its own oddball charm. (Like many Free Reed releases, the graphic design leaves something to be desired, but, hey... you can't have everything!)

Four CDs worth of Fairport rarities and outtakes may be more than enough for casual listeners, but I would think that hardcore fans will be pretty pleased with this collection, and the wealth of information that comes with it.

...

This is one of the most incredible boxed sets i've had the good fortune to own; Free Reed look rather like a British Bear Family on the basis of this set and of others listed in the catalog that came with it.

The 180-page book, which covers Fairport's history from beginning to present (well, presstime; given the band's background, there's always the nervous feeling that any listing of personnel more than about a day old could be seriously out of date), including commentary on each album at the appropriate points. While certainly respectful of the band's history and influential position, and obviously friendly with the members, author Nigel Schofield doesn't fall into the trap of being overly reverential, and is not above more-or-less gently twitting them when it is obvious that don their trousers unipedally in a manner similar to the rest of us.

The Cropredy memories book is a nice touch; having been there in '90 and '92, i can attest that it is A Lot Of Fun, even in a downpour (and didn't we have one in '90).

Pete Frame's "Fairport Family Tree" is an expansion of the one he did entitled "Resolving the Fairport Confusion", which is reprinted in his first "Family Trees" book (and, in a streamlened form, on the cover/inlay of the "History of Fairport Convention" compilation), and followed the band up till their breakup in '79. In order, presumably, to get in all of the most-directly-related data on Fairport's lineups and its members' other projects, and related bands and projects, some of the more peripheral material included on the original tree is MIA -- i find a minor mention in a note of "The Bunch", but they do not appear on the chart as such, and he doen't number the various incarnations of Fairport and Steeleye Span referenced. All the same, a fantastic piece of work (You have to see it to appreciate how densely packed it is with information), ....P>Great packag. Seems as if there ought to be something else, though...

Oh, yeah -- the music!

, P>Disc 1 -- "Fairport -- A History"; a chronological overview
Disc 2 -- "Rareport Convention"; hard to find and unreleased material form many sources, including private collections and radio and TV sessions.
Disc 3 -- "A Fairport History"; sixteen folk tracks that take us back to various key moments in British history
Disc 4 -- "Classic Convention"; which is rare and non-standard versions of what is described as the "core Fairport reportoire", including a completely outrageous version of "Matty Groves", which was created by editing together a whole bunch of versions in chronological order.

the sound quality on some the cuts on this set is less-than-pristine (i noticed this particularly on at least one cut which was obviously recorded from an AM radio broadcast, with severe peak distortion). This can be a bit off-putting, but, since at least one reason to have this collection is for the historical/completist value of the performances it documents, many people (i confess to tending that way) will be happy merely to have these 72 tracks in any form at all.

That said, most of the cuts are at least decent-sounding, ranging upward to pristine.

I, like any Fairport fan, can list a number of items i would like to have seen included on these discs, if only to have them all in one place, but many or even most of them -- Simon's practical joke on Swarb, which appears on the 30th Anniversary box set, for instance -- are already available in more-or-less accessible form, somewhere.

This set is, mostly, The Other Stuff... and i'm glad to see it.

Now i can hardly wait for my bonus disc.

Besides over 5 hours of wonderful music, the enclosed book gives an excellent background of the (many) band members as well as all the songs. Highly recommended!

This box set, which had the potential of being spectacular, is a waste of money. The majority of the recordings are described as archival. Which means, they were taped off of the radio 20+years ago on someone's home tape recorder. And rather than paying the BBC, Island records and other companies for origianl recordings, the creators of this set used these poor and often unlistenable recordings. The booklet is quite nice, but the money spent on the booklet could have been better spent purchasing original source recordings.
There are a few (and I mean few) shining stars, like the Hexhamshire Lass from '76 and Wat Tyler from '92, but not enough to justify the price.

Some may tell you that this set is designed for long time fans of the band. But I say that it was designed for ripping off long time fans, who buy everything Fairport.

Much has been said about the extremely-variable sound quality, and the word "bootleg" has been used (negatively) to describe it.

Ordinarily, when artists and/or record companies assemble `rarity' compilations, they aim for the newcomers instead of the real hardcore fans. They exclude the most revelatory outtake/live material, either because of less-than-sparkling sound quality or because of a pathological fear of exposing any lapse from professionalism and/or predictability. (Example - those disappointing Beatles Anthologies). Bootleggers often have a better understanding of the needs and wants of hardcore fans - because they too are hardcore fans.

So, if you're a hardcore fan, you'll probably agree with me that in adopting a "quasi-bootleg" approach to the assembling of this box set (and the annotating of the individual CDs) Free Reed made a very wise decision. If the "bootleg-style" approach has its drawbacks - most notably, a few songs are badly edited - then these are outweighed by its advantages: the sheer volume of essential material that a major record label just wouldn't have touched.

My personal faves:
The early radio session tracks which aren't available elsewhere (Let's Get Together, Lay Down Your Weary Tune, The Deserter, The Lady Is A Tramp, A Sailor's Life - the AM radio hiss is a small price to pay for hearing this live in 1968)
One Sure Thing (sounds like it was recorded underwater? So what, Richard's on great form here, though the BBC '67 take was even better)
The TV versions of Mr Lacey, Reno Nevada (now available on the debut LP? So what, it's still a highlight) and Breakfast In Mayfair.
I Don't Believe You (which really should've been on Nine)
Glimpses of the least-known line-ups - the Dan Ar Bras band, the Hill & Farnell band, and especially the David Rea band.
and, of course...
Sloth (you thought you'd heard more than enough of this song? Think again. The two Daves are on peak form and - at last! - A seriously compelling Jerry Donahue solo!)