Nick Drake

[ice nine]

What are your feelings on this singer/songwriter? I have Way To Blue and enjoy it. It is a good mellow collection to do work to.

Did he overdose on purpose or was it an accidental overdose?

I went to his web site and there was a link to an interview of Robert Kirby, an arranger who arranged for Nick and EC. The interview was a video one and my Mac is not configured correctly to view it. Will someone please do the honors for me? Thanks http://www.faceculture.nl/index_eng.htm

[Jackson Doofster]

I don't know a lot about Nick's death, but I know that his loved ones have always said that it was accidental. he suffered badly with depression but he was never regarded as suicidal.

I bought 'Way to Blue - an Intro to Nick Drake' a couple of years ago and I really love it. Beautiful guitarist, angelic voice.

[whtesde]

I have the box set, Fruit Tree, and while it's not something I can listen to 24/7 (it's a bit too 'folky'), I find Drake's voice intensely soothing and melancholy.

ETA: It may have been an intentional overdose, but it may also not have; Drake used the medication as sleeping pills and may have just miscalculated the dosage.

[Otis Westinghouse]

I have Bryter Layter on tape and love it. His voice is beautiful and unique, and the whole melancholic vibe deeply moving. Damien Rice is clearly influenced by him. There was a docu a few years ago that I recal featured family and frineds, or just family, e.g. sister, discussing this topic in an animated fashion.

[BlueChair]

I have all three of Nick's proper albums. I find myself listening to Five Leaves Left and Bryter Layter a lot more than Pink Moon, but I think Nick was an extremely talented singer/songwriter and left the world much too young. Who knows what he could have come out with had he been around longer.

[whtesde]

Following is a transcript of the Robert Kirby interview. Posting it here because it's interesting, but if need be I'll delete it and pray for forgiveness.

Most people know you from Nick Drake. What other artists have you worked with?
I've probably done best part of a hundred albums, I'd say in the last, well, since the late sixties. Most recently, obviously, I've worked with Flemming, and I've worked with Paul Weller, which was the biggest thing about two years ago. I did his album Heliocentric, I did five tracks on that with a biggish orchestra. Um, since that, in the last, sort of this year, I've been working with Linda Thompson, Richard Thompson's ex-wife, um, she's got a new album out, uh, where I arranged a track by, um, Loudon Wainwright's son, I think, Rufus Wainwright. I also worked on an album called Shining Bright, which is , uh, there used to be a very famous folk group in the UK back in the late fifties, early sixties, called the Watersons, and, um, one of them died. And what they've done is recorded some of the lyrics that she'd written, but with music written by other folk artists. And so I did some tracks with Martin Carthy [phonetic], who was a hero of mine when I was at school, he's a really old sort of folksy, I still predominantly...Most of the work I do is in folk rather than rock. But really if you want to go back, sort of, did, um, worked quite a bit with, in the eighties with Elvis Costello and Nick Lowe, um, going, going sort of further back, I, uh, actually more recently in the last five years, I've been working with a duo in the UK called Ben & Jason, they're not well known at all, but, um, they're brilliant songwriters and, uh, um, I quite, I quite enjoy doing stuff with them.
Do you have enough work to do?
I work in another job, is the famous motto they say in the seventies, don't give up your day job, (laughs) and...
What is your day job?
I work in a market research job, funnily enough, just the same as Rutger, I know his company well and he knows my company well. And I've been doing that, gosh, since early '79.
And why did you start with it, because, because you...
Because I got married and got a mortgage.
Oh!
I, I was solely living off music through the seventies, but then, I mean, in the seventies, I used to, um, I arranged a lot in England for a band called the Strawbs, who are probably known for Part of the Union and things like that. But, um, I arranged six or seven albums with them and then Rick Wakeman left them and went to Yes, just before the big American tour. So I went on tour with them, just because I knew the stuff, not because I'm a good keyboard...well, I, I manage the keyboard parts. So I was touring with them for a couple of years, and then this is the late seventies so if you can imagine, when I got back, you have suddenly, Punk, synthesizers, Disco. I'd been away. Other arrangers had come along. There was a lot less work for orchestraters and arrangers. It's increased again, more sort of through the eighties and nineties. But it really dropped away in the seventies.
What music fits best with your arrangements?
I think that there's a lot of very good arrangers around, but I think people come to me because they know because I've got this other job, I'll only work on stuff that I really like and respect and I do turn a fair number of things down that I get asked to do. Not because they're necessarily bad, but because I don't feel I can contribute. And I try...It's wrong to say I use a classical style, although it's true to say...for example, the stuff we've been doing today is a string quintet. But, um, I would, I try to make sure that it complements the song. I listen to the words, I listen to what they're playing. and, although I hope it is commercial, my first aim isn't to stick on stock commercial riffs and make it sound sort of poppy. My first aim is always to try and contribute to the song.
How do you get the idea for a suitable arrangement?
Well, with Flemming, they've been really good, because, um, uh, well, I got to know them through, I did a Nick Drake concert at the Paradiso the year before last and [failure on my part] was there and he asked me if I would work with them.
On Star, uh...?
On Starry Night, as it turned out. But, instead of just...some people would just send you a tape and say, "This is the song, stick strings on it." They said, "Come over." Warner Brothers, as well, are very good to them and they said, "Will you come over and come in the studio while they're doing the rhythm track, when they're doing the guitars, when they're doing the vocals?" So you hear the song building up and you see the way they're thinking, and that makes it much easier when you go away, uh, you know, then I, I go back to England with the CD of the basic track, the rhythm guitars, bass, things like that, and then write the arrangement at home. But at least then I feel more confident that I'm on the same wavelength as they are, because I've been here with them, listening to what they're doing and discussed it.
How do you arrange?
Well, there's lots of, I mean, I'm a bit, I'm what they might say a Luddite, I'm a bit old-fashioned. I mean, I've studied classical music in the sixties, I've written music at Cambridge University and I was very much classical music. I still write with manuscript paper at a table, not at an instrument. I write, like (makes writing motions). I was going to say like Beethoven, nobody's as good as Beethoven (laughs) the same way, and I'm not deaf. But, um, uh, I write in that way and then I give my parts to a copyist who then programs it onto Servailis [Phonetic], onto a computer and then prints off the parts for me. But I don't write, these days a lot of musicians and arrangers use, uh, computer systems for arranging. And it will more or less do the arrangement for you. But there's one thing I've always, um, been very wary of. If you write arrangements at an instrument, you will never write anything better than you play the piano. You see what I mean? If you're doing it, whereas if you just listen to it, you'll write things that you couldn't possibly play on the piano. And also it's, for example, here (points) on the score today, we've got the double bass there, we've got the first violin there, and we've got lots of other things where you're playing with your notes if you're going to, so I write very much like classical musicians do. At manuscript paper.
So you just hear it?
Hear it, yeah.
Do you have to be a good musician to be a good arranger?
I mean, it's a funny thing to say, but you don't. I mean, Berlioz, as a classical composer, couldn't play anything except very bad guitar. Brilliant as a composer and orchestrator, because he heard it. Hector Berlioz, yeah, he's a French composer, and he apparently couldn't play anything. But, yeah, brilliant composer and arranger. It helps obviously. I mean, I can find my way around a guitar. Um, I play brass instruments. Not trombone, but if they've got valves (motions). I play keyboards, as I said, I used to tour playing keyboards. It does help, yes. But as I say, you've got to be careful, it can hinder as well. That sort of thing. You know, I've played synthesizers, and, you know, top line, dancey synthesizer strings are very nice for what they are, but as soon as you do it, it's going to sound disco and seventies. You know what I mean? No matter how brilliant you are, it's going to sound like that. So, um, I tend to leave the synthesizers who are much better than me at it.
Did your arranging change over the years?
Yes, it has, um...
Can you explain, maybe, the difference in...
Well, I suppose it's just like, um, anything, I've learned...I take more risks now because I know they'll work, I've had chance and time to experiment with things like that. Um, I'll do more technically difficult, I won't...When I was a lot younger they were pretty straightforward, the arrangements I did. Based on good melody, but I, I wouldn't take too many risks with harmony and things like that. But now I'll put in (shrugs), I'll try and put quite complex parts in.
Do you write your own songs, also?
I do, actually, but only for myself, sort of thing. There were a couple that were released back in the seventies, but (shrugs, makes 'pffft' noise). You know, it didn't really do anything.
Why are you best known for your arrangements with Nick Drake?
It's very strange because, I mean, as I say, I think I arrange much better now than I did for Nick Drake, but I have to say I owe him a huge debt because the boys Flemming chose me because of Nick Drake, they liked Nick's stuff, Paul Weller picked me because of Nick Drake, and Elvis Costello liked Nick Drake. Most of the name people I've worked with have done it because of the work I did with Nick. So I have to, I'm really grateful that I even got the chance to do that. But, um, (sighs) you know, the working with Nick was just totally by accident, he, um, I was a student, exactly the same age as him, and he knew that I'd been in a pop group on television, as well as studying classical music, and just came and said, "Would you write some strings for my songs?" So we could do live gigs. It wasn't for a record at all, it was, uh, at that point, all I thought was that we were going to be doing live gigs, which we did, I had my own little string orchestra of students at Cambridge that came and we used to do balls and dances and things like that, with Nick playing and doing the arrangements.
So it was your lucky break then.
Well, it was, yes, it was, but I mean, as you just said, as you know, Nick, I mean, wasn't successful in his life at all. At all. But in the beginning of the seventies he was a musician's musician. Lots of musicians knew about him. And he sort of, it's, since the late seventies, early eighties, there've been sort of periods where he goes (motions) up and comes down, but I mean, he's still, he's selling by the truckload now. But I mean what has helped it a lot is, um, Volkswagen in America picked Pink Moon as the theme music to the advert. I believe something off of Bryter Later's currently the theme music to the Telecom advertising in France, that's just what I've heard. Uh, and (sighs) back in, oh, about ten years ago, a TV series started in the UK called Heartbeat, um, about this sort of soap opera type thing. But it's about, um, a village in the North of England in the 1960s, and whenever anything serious happens, like the house burnt down and someone was killed or a dog got shot or something like that, they finished up playing Way to Blue or Day is Done or Fruit Tree and those albums all went gold, I think one of them even went platinum in the UK, very middle of the road, they were compilations of sixties records but Nick was on all of those, so then he started to get heard by a much broader public, not just sort of, uh, almost middle of the road sort of people really, yeah.
Doesn't it annoy you when people always refer to Nick Drake?
No, no, it doesn't. It does if people think that's...I get a bit pissed off at people who think that's all I did. You know, that's possibly, but I mean, I'm perfectly happy to admit that I owe a huge debt to Nick, that none of this would have happened...I mean, I was planning on being a schoolmaster and teaching music, that's what...
So this job is better?
Sorry?
This...This job is better.
Oh, yes. The one I do is a lot better, yeah.
You once said your work best suited Nick's work. How come?
Um, (sighs), well, again, there wasn't the, uh, demand that I was doing arrangements for a date, for a record. It was simply we were friends doing it for a laugh. No money, that's all, I didn't think of it, except if we were to get paid when we did these concerts which we did, but, you know, not much at all. And so I think it was, um, it wasn't a professional gig. It was, uh, friendship. So, um, and also, I mean, I have, I've been in a folk group back in 1964, when I was sixteen, and I was heavily steeped in classical music, and this was the first opportunity I got to let rip. So I had a lot in there to get out, you see. So arrangements like Fruit Tree and, uh, particularly some of Bryter Later, I think, better, it gave me the chance to...I had a lot of ideas to get out all at once. And also we were very similar, you know, we were both born the same year, um, both been through the same sort of education, we had a lot in common, sort of from our experiences, I suppose, so all of those things sort of came together. And also it was a great time within London in the late sixties.
In the Swinging Sixties.
Well, it was just post Swinging Sixties, but where everybody was a songwriter or wanted to be a songwriter, I mean, like Joe Boyd who was producing it had already got The Incredible String Band and Fairport Convention, and so, you know, when I first went up to record, there I was with Danny Thompson, Richard Thompson, I mean, all these unbelievably good musicians, you know.
Are you satisfied with the arrangements for Nick if you hear them now?
The only thing, I was talking to Rutger earlier today about this actually, that River Man, which Harry Robinson did, I didn't arrange that, lots of people think I did that but I did four tracks on the first album but not River Man. Harry Robinson was already a very, very famous composer of film music in the UK, uh, and, uh, I do kick myself that Nick asked me to do River Man in five form and I said, sorry, I can't write in five form. The song's in five form. I mean, I can write in five form now, but at that time I thought I couldn't. I kick myself for that, but no. I wouldn't change anything I did then at all. If I did them again now I'd probably do them exactly the same.
Do you miss Nick?
Yes, I do actually. It's, it's a long time ago now. But, um, when he first died, I missed him incredibly, because, uh, I think a lot of, to tell you the truth, I think a lot of people, uh, I was a bit angry, because I thought, "What'll I do now?" because I was expecting to be getting on with more work with Nick. So yeah, it was, it was quite confusing then. Uh (shrugs), it's a long time ago now. I mean, I still keep in touch with his sister Gabrielle. And if people are doing films or documentaries about him I'll gladly take part. I mean the best film of Nick was made by a Dutch film crew.
You know what it's called?
A Skin Too Few. Jeroen Berkvens. Beautiful film. And he caught the atmosphere of England better than any English person has ever caught it, when they've tried to make things about it.
Because he can look from the outside in.
Exactly. He looks from the outside. I thought it was a brilliant film, really did.
Why is Nick still popular?
Um, I think now, if you listened to him, I think a lot of people put him in the same bag as, um, Tim Buckley, or put him in the same bag as people're dead, Jim Croce, all of that sort of era, but I say in addition to that, if you listen to, uh, Jim Webb, I think you'll find there's songwriters from that time, if you listen to it now, you know it was written in the late sixties, early seventies. If someone'd never heard of Nick, I would put on Five Leaves Left, Bryter Later or Pink Moon, and say to them, this album came out last year. I don't think they would doubt me.
Maybe Bryter Later, maybe, because when I listen to Bryter Later I think, well, maybe it feels a bit dated, I don't know.
Well, that's simply because Bryter Later was a conscious attempt to make a commercial album. I mean, Nick wanted it to be commercial and so we were listening to Pet Sounds, trying to get it more and more upbeat and brass and things like that. But at the same time it still has got on it Northern Sky and things like that, which, I mean, it's the greatest love song ever written, you know? So I think that's the thing about it, it's time is, and also, all young men go through that period of angst and self-searching and well, particularly the sort of student type of people want to ask questions about themselves. And I think that's the - there will always be that generation of people bringing people to listen to Nick's stuff, because of that.
What was Nick really like?
To start off with, he was really pissed off, cuz everyone told him, in the industry that he was the greatest thing since sliced bread and he was going to be successful. And so, he, to start with, he was very angry. And then when Joe had to go back to America and do things, he felt that people were sort of letting him down, which they weren't at all, and he'd also got this problem where he didn't get a band together to go on the road, but then yes, he did get depressed, but again, at that time, I've known lots of depressed people and I did then. If you were brought round London in the late sixties and seventies, everybody had long hair and was angst-ridden and was reading French Impressionist poetry. He wasn't that abnormal.
Because that's now the picture people have of him.
Yeah. We used to go down the pub and get pissed and, uh, have a good time. You could go out with Nick and have a good time. Yeah.

[ice nine]

Thank you, whtesde. I enjoyed the interview. Mr. Kirby sounds like a down-to-earth guy.

If you have to pray for forgiveness I will be in the pew right besides you.

[FaceCulture]

whtesde, can i use your transcript for our site?

[FaceCulture]

if you like the interview, read my music story about nick's life, music and death:
http://www.faceculture.nl/martin/muziek ... engels.htm

[whtesde]

Sure, use away! Did you do the interview? I enjoyed it very much.

[FaceCulture]

yep, i did the interview. glad you like it!

[ice nine]

Good job on both interview and article, FC.

[FaceCulture]

thx!

[bambooneedle]

There's a story on Billboard about an upcoming Drake release of rarities:

http://www.billboard.com/bb/daily/artic ... 1000514400

And a reminder that the BBC Radio 2 show is due to be aired soon, May 22. Am totally unfamiliar with his work but would be interested to hear it.

[johnfoyle]

Magic by Nick is in at 32 in the new super, soaraway Top 40 !

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio1/chart/top40/

[BlueChair]

For those of you on the board who like Nick Drake enough to own all three of his proper albums, I can't recommend the new compilation Made To Love Magic highly enough.

Many of the songs aren't on the three proper albums, and are just as incredible. My favourite would have to be "Magic." The album also includes a few alternate versions... "River Man" without strings, "Thoughts Of Mary Jane" with a guitar replacing the flute, etc.

[Otis Westinghouse]

Don't buy until you have the three originals? I don't have Pink Moon.

[BlueChair]

It's probably worth having Pink Moon before this one, but I think Five Leaves Left and Bryter Layter should prepare you enough to enjoy it

[lapinsjolis]

Do you need it if you have all three and 'Time of No Reply'?

[BlueChair]

Probably not... the two albums are VERY similar. I didn't know of Time Of No Reply, but it looks like more or less the same album with slightly different tracklists.

Time Of No Reply:

1. Time of No Reply
2. I Was Made to Love Magic
3. Joey
4. Clothes of Sand
5. Man in a Shed
6. Mayfair
7. Fly
8. The Thoughts of Mary Jane
9. Been Smoking Too Long
10. Strange Meeting II
11. Rider on the Wheel
12. Black Eyed Dog
13. Hanging on a Star
14. Voice from the Mountain

Made To Love Magic

1. River on the Wheel
2. Magic
3. River Man
4. Joey
5. Thoughts of Mary Jane
6. Mayfair
7. Hanging on a Star
8. Three Hours
9. Clothes of Sand
10. Voices
11. Time of No Reply
12. Black Eyed Dog
13. Tow the Line

[Otis Westinghouse]

I know someone who has been desperately trying to get hold of Time Of No Reply, with no luck on eBay, etc. So she'll be dead chuffed with this new release.

One curious thing about Nick Drake from the English class-system perspective is that there is a general rule in rock that working class = rock'n'roll, and posh knobs = wankers. So Joe Strummer was outed for being a diplomat's son though he made sure he didn't have the accent to match, Pete Townshend insisted he was still working class despite the millions in the bank, Radiohead get slagged off for being posh, Keane are almost never mentioned without their poshness being emphasised, Genesis were laughed at for meeting at Charterhouse, etc. Nick Drake's Marlborough/Cambridge pedigree is as posh as they come, yet his cool and his cult float beyond that, and it's never mentioned as an accusation the way it is with all others of that ilk. So there must be a rule of thumb that a public school education is forgiven if you die tragically young.

[ice nine]

I was watching Pratical Magic (I know..... a 'chick film'......and a Wicca chick film to boot) and they played a snipet of 'Black Eyed Dog' when the one guy is about to get hit by a truck.

[johnfoyle]

http://www.news.com.au/mercury/story/0, ... 21,00.html

Ledger obsessed by dead singer

PETA HELLARD in LOS ANGELES

January 24, 2008 12:30pm

IN a bizarre twist to Heath Ledger's shock death, it has emerged that the actor was obsessed with a reclusive '70s musician who died in eerily similar circumstances at the age of 26.
Ledger's fascination with troubled British singer Nick Drake - who died from a suspected accidental overdose of prescription medication in the prime of his music career - saw the actor determined to bring his life story to the big screen.

The Brokeback Mountain star had recently shot and edited a music video for a Drake song called Black Eyed Dog - which earned its title from a Winston Churchill quote describing depression.

It was the last song Drake recorded before overdosing on anti-depression medication in 1974 at the age of 26.

At the end of the video, Ledger is seen drowning himself in a bathtub.

In September, Ledger spoke of his fascination with the songwriter, who he described as a "very mysterious figure", while he was at the Venice Film Festival to promote the Bob Dylan biopic I'm Not There.

"I was obsessed with his story and his music and I pursued it for a while and still have hopes to kind of tell his story one day," Ledger said.

A representative for Drake's estate described the clip, which was shot in black and white, as "gorgeous" and "extremely moving".

The video, which consists mainly of Ledger turning the camera on himself, has not been released commercially and has not yet leaked to the Web.

It has been screened just twice, once in September at a music festival in Seattle and a second time in October at an event honouring Drake held in Los Angeles.

The similarities between the two men are striking - talented, young artists who struggled with the limelight that came with their successful careers.

Ledger also directed the video for the song Morning Yearning by American singer Ben Harper, a longtime friend who is also the actor's business partner in LA-based record label Masses Music Co.

The label's first signing was Grace Woodroofe, a 17-year-old singer from Ledger's hometown of Perth.

Ledger also directed a video for her cover of David Bowie's Quicksand.

While Drake garnered just a cult following during his life, his music has enjoyed a renaissance in recent years.

In 2000, Volkswagen scored a television ad with the title track from his 1972 album Pink Moon, with the exposure seeing Drake's albums reportedly selling more in one month than they had in the previous 30 years.

Drake's melodic, haunting songs have also featured in the soundtracks of films including Serendipity, a romantic comedy starring John Cusack and Kate Beckinsale.

This past November, fans were treated to a limited-edition box set that included not only the three albums Drake recorded in his short career, but also a book and a DVD documentary about his life.

[johnfoyle]

Loads of Drake stuff 'free-to-read' this week -

http://www.rocksbackpages.com/library.html

Free this week: Nick Drake

Jerry Gilbert has a quick chat with Nick Drake (Sounds, 1971)

Gerrie Lim looks back at Nick Drake (Big O, 1994)

Mick Brown's extensive telling of the Nick Drake story (Sunday Telegraph, 1997)

Ian MacDonald's monumental Nick Drake retrospective (Mojo, 2000)

Robert Sandall on the Nick Drake revival (Daily Telegraph, 2004)

[Otis Westinghouse]

There's a fabulous John Martyn interview in the latest Word, including photos of the great man in his Kilkenny home. Lots about his early years, how he got into music, got on the scene, and of course some stuff about Drake. JM sips his rum and orange juice and says 'Ah Nicky, Nicky, Nicky'. It's a great read.