I do not mean stuff just launched onto the airwaves but in stumbling across something that has been out for years and years and is fresh to your ears.
It does not happen very often but when it does it is a revelation. It challenges many long held loyalties and may, to your nearest and dearest be seen as a complete turnaround in tastes and styles. In my youth I sided with the Mods and would not be caught listening to mainstream rock or heavy metal. By my twenties I was more of a rocker before moving into Brit Pop, indie and just nice melodies.
I like to forget a phase in my late twenties when I only really listened to Classic FM. I realise now that I was just too old for my actual years.
It was and still is fun introducing my children to the music of my time. They seem generally impressed and have sought out the same and similar for their own playlists and tracks of their years.
I have little time for current formulaic releases as they are lacking in quality, depth and overall musicianship. There is nothing to do but to revert to my back catalogue and buying up in vinyl the albums that I have had for years on CD and even before that on the most unreliable and self destructive medium of audio tape.
I may just catch a guitar riff, a lyric or a distinctive vocal from a passing car, an upper window or on a shop PA system that makes me stop and take notice. Identification of that elusive sound is so much easier now than it used to be what with smartphone apps and internet search engines. It is a distinct improvement from having to hum an extract to a friend with musical knowledge or try to ask someone at the source of the sound (Knocking on a house door and asking about loud music can often be misconstrued with an unpleasant and ugly outcome).
The female voice heard on BBC Four Extra just yesterday was like nothing I have ever heard before.
How can I describe the uniqueness in tone and pitch or the emotion and drama of delivery?
It was interesting, sexy, bright and dark in contrast and that was even before I caught the lyrics- funny, poignant, steeped in personal experiences of joy and tragedy and, in finding out that they came from a long past decade, evidently still relevant . The genre was also mixed, mostly rooted in folk but not dwelling on the nostalgic aspects which are a mainstay, with a bit of jazz, ragtime, Beatles, Pop and rock blended it.
I was therefore surprised to find out that Lal Waterson, the performer, was a home town lass from Hull and actually lived for some years in a street across the road from where I now live.
The surname was familiar to me from a singing group from the 1950's and 1960's of the same name but I realised that I had never heard any of their songs and so had not made that link straight away. The Watersons,consisting of Lal , her two older siblings and a cousin had become established on the Folk and Skiffle scene but were different in that they wrote their own songs as well as sticking to the traditional ballads. They specialised in unaccompanied harmony bringing to life real situations and emotions in what was received as a fresh rebellious sound with a cutting edge.
This was largely a consequence of the upbringing of the Watersons who had been orphaned at an early age and grew up with their grandmother in the north east city and Port of Hull.
It was a time of parlour singing, family get-togethers around the piano and with relatives accompanying on guitar, fiddle and cornet and so music played an important part in their lives.
By the 1960's with Lal in her late teen and early twenties the quartet were touring the Folk Club circuit nationally and although the quietest and shyest of the family it was her harmony work that really stood out. This was an indication of her natural ability as a wonderful singer.
Splitting in 1968 and for the first time putting some distance between each other Lal (a family derivation of her real name Elaine) began writing songs on her own. Her brother was himself writing and it was only a matter of time before they collaborated again which saw the release to quiet acclaim of "Bright Fevers" in 1972. This marked a change in style which upset their hardcore fans but brought Lal's distinctive voice and almost metaphysical lyrics to the attention of a wider audience.
Hers was a dark poetry of vivid pictorial images, almost Medieval in themes of a hard life working the land, of battles and history but juxtaposed with pop and rock. I liken my introduction to Lal Waterson as to that with the Mercury Award Winners Portishead in emotion and raw energy.
By 1976 all of the Watersons were living together on the edge of the North Yorkshire Moors, indeed the locals referred to the old farmhouse and converted buildings as the Hippy Commune. It was seen as a happy time in glorious Yorkshire surroundings close to the dramatic coastline of majestic cliffs and secret coves. Lal moved to the picturesque Robin Hoods Bay just a few miles away in 1990 and pursued interests in painting, drawing, stained glass work and as a sculptor but it was also a time of great wealth in her songwriting, confirming her position as one of the greatest of her generation.
Her son, Oliver Knight played guitar on and co-produced "Once in a Blue Moon" in 1996, a definitive masterpiece but Lal refused to tour the album citing an embarassment in the early live gig years when she had forgotten the lyrics on stage and still feared the same.
Her health, like many born during the second world war in Britain and brought up in the austere economic conditions after had suffered to bronchial and respiratory illness, not helped by exposure to tobacco smoke, whether self inflicted or as an integral part of performing in public venues with no smoking ban.
A simple chest infection was, upon investigation, revealed as cancer. After a long confinement to a hospital in Hull, Lal returned to her Robin Hoods Bay home and died a mere thirty minutes after crossing the threshold.
She had been well on the way to completing "A Bed of Roses" which Oliver Knight released after her death.
Her legacy, cannot be judged in terms of actual album releases and sales but in her cult status as a songwriter and for her contribution to the folk-rock genre. Many artistes have covered her songs since and a wider and varied audience have been introduced like myself to Lal Waterson's extraordinary talent.
Timeless her songs may be but her time might still be to come..........
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