Pink Floyd and The Incredible String Band.
The Incredible String Band.
Track 3 on Side 1 is Mike Heron’s lovely song “When The Music Starts To Play” and here the notes quote directly from the lyrics:
“Listen to the song of Life, its rainbow’s end won’t hold you,
Its crimson shapes and purple sounds softly will enfold you,
It gurgles through the timeless glade in quarter tones of Lightning,
No policy is up for sale in case the truth be frightening.
No place for what the cautious say when the music starts to play.”
This song is full of joy and intense happiness. It is sung by Mike with Robin joining in on the refrains. The sheer pleasure of hearing it cannot be overstated.
Clive Palmer makes his first appearance on the record on Track 4, which is an instrumental called “Schaeffer’s Jig”, and it is indeed a traditional jig. Robin plays fiddle and Clive plays banjo. These are Mike’s liner notes for the tune:
“If this doesn’t lift your heart a bit, don’t worry about it. There are many other things that might appeal to you – how about a bingo session or a knobbly-knees competition? But I wouldn’t advise Music – not until this track is finished anyway.”
I used to like try to sing these songs while playing a guitar accompaniment. I don’t get much chance to do that these days. This is the front cover of the first of two songbooks which I bought:
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