Customer Reviews

Stroll on Revisited

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

 

 

One of those "lost legendary albums" we keep hearing about, but in this case a genuine folk revival gem that is certainly worth checking out. Ashley was a songwriter and multi-instrumentalist who was in the general orbit of the fabled Fairport Convention, and plenty of famous folks play with him on this lovely little album, including Ashley Hutchings, Dave Mattacks, Simon Nicol, Dave Swarbrick, Danny Thompson and others. It's familiar-sounding material, straight out of the shaggy-haired, dancing-with-elves scene, yet Ashley's work definitely has an individual stamp to it, a beguiling mix of traditionalism and the searching, spacy mysticism that marked the work of contempraries like Nick Drake and Richard Thompson. Not as cohesive (or perhaps, dare I say it?) as commercial an album as all the oft-cited classic LPs of the Brit-folk canon, but that may be what makes this dsic worth tracking down -- Ashley does have a different take on things, a distinctive voice in a genre that quite often fell back on familiar stylistic conventions...

What marks a classic? Maybe its the extra tracks? I remember this album the first time around when the UK's Sunday Times described Steve Ashley as the greatest songwriter in the country. Bit strong but it measured the strength of feeling at the time. This album got great reviews in the 70s and so has this reissue. He was an accomplished writer of music and lyric and Stroll On is probably his finest hour (at least so far as I see another album is on the way). I think this is an even better record as they have located extra tracks from the recording sessions. Check out the quality of these - most extra tracks are the dreck that didn't and couldn't fit. Not so Ashley's for Stroll On - they are gems. Recommended for collectors of English folk rock.

Thirty years ago I listened to this album on many rainy winter nights in the Pacific Northwest, then lost the album during a move to the Southwest, and the memory of the album kept coming back to me at Christmas time over the years. I loved the interesting vocal style of Steve Ashley, the British folk themes (including a John Donne poem)and especially the reflection on the seasons of the year conveyed in the lyrics - almost a meditation on the changing seasons and the feelings evoked by the change of season which I especially identified with when I lived in the Northwest. This is a unique album that I'm glad I re-discovered.