First-time-out for these early-seventies recordings — countrified drafts of some classic Hurley, with backing from Vermont mates the Fatboys, aka the Deranged Cowboys.

Precious 1964 recordings, top-notch though never previously released, part of the First Songs sessions for Folkways.

A singing trio from Charente-Maritime, reviving folk songs from the neighbouring department of Vendée, on France’s western seaboard. Mostly recorded at home, with guests playing accordion, violin, piccolo and contrabassoon, and cigar-box guitar.

In his liner notes, old admirer and collaborator Alasdair Roberts registers ‘a deepened richness’ in these new recordings, ‘unfolding with a patient confidence… considered and poised.’
‘There’s a greater complexity and subtlety to their unique three-part harmonising, too. Their voices mesh in even stronger — almost telepathic — ‘fraternité’ than ever before: now commanding and mighty as a full-rigged counter-vessel, now gentle and lulling as a mother’s cradle-croon, or a whisper in a lover’s ear.’

‘Returns to original composition and the blues… with a freshness and authority that nostalgic retreads cannot deliver… Three songs (Odds Against Tomorrow, The Writhing Jar, Already Old) are multi-tracked, an innovation that, for guitar buffs familiar with Orcutt’s stripped-down vernacular, jumps out of the grooves like a Les Paul sound-on-sound excursion in 1948, or a Jandek blues rave-up in 1987. Specifically evoking John Lee Hooker’s double-track experiments on 1952’s Walking the Boogie, the steady chord vamps of Odds Against Tomorrow and Already Old form a harmonic turf on which Orcutt solos with lyrical abandon. The Writhing Jar’s crashing overdubs recall the brassy six-string voicings of This Heat or Illitch. With the exception of the unreconstructed Elmore James-isms of Stray Dog’ and the Layla-finale-like haze of All Your Buried Corpses Begin To Speak, the remaining non-overdubbed tracks dovetail snugly with Orcutt’s previous solo output, reeling gently in a Mazzacane-oid mode or vibing up the standards (Moon River)...  Odds Against Tomorrow challenges contemporary solo guitar practice in a way that simultaneously nullifies hazy dreams of folk purity and establishes a new high-water mark for blues-rock reconstruction” (Tom Carter).

Fabulous, rough and rare early blues and country, including two unearthed Son House treasures, with an ace Crumb cover and nice booklet.

Bringing together all his 1960s studio recordings, plus demo and live recordings; with extensive notes.

The three albums for John Peel’s Dandelion label, plus live material, and recordings made for the BBC between 1968 and 1972. Clickety-click, sixty-six tracks.
‘Bridget St John proved to be the closest Dandelion got to acid folk and psychedelia; her two later albums for the label contain flashes of avant- garde adventurousness, but are closer in spirit to Nick Drake or a post- Fotheringay Sandy Denny’ (Seasons They Change).
The discs are presented in mini LP sleeves; the booklet includes memorabilia and comprehensive notes.

This is a great way into Partch, revisiting with gusto three well-known, relatively-compact works — a highly rhythmic dance piece, a cross-cutting film score, and Barstow, with HP intoning hitchhiker graffiti.