Rainsongs and Painsongs - pt.9

Rainsongs and Painsongs is the new edition of YHO which can be downloaded as a pdf here, free for all. It is at heart a celebration of Julie Tippetts' work, very much inspired by her collaboration with Martin Archer on Tales of FiNiN which is undoubtedly the most rewarding record of recent times.

While doing some background reading for this issue I came across a review in International Times (IT) of a concert Julie took part in on 27 February 1970 at The Roundhouse, London. This was organised by Peter Swales (of Sahara publishing/records) and he billed it as The New Day concert. The review itself was gloriously over the top, and fired by the optimism the new decade brought with it. If I had a time machine this very definitely would be one event I'd want to go back and visit.

From what I can piece together Jess Roden's Bronco opened proceedings, and were followed by Peter Swales' proteges Gypsy, who he managed to get signed to United Artists. Gypsy released a couple of great LPs at the start of the '70s and almost had a bit of a hit on their hands with Changes Coming.

Gary Farr and Kevin Westlake were up next to do a set. They'd been writing, recording and hanging out together for a while, and some of Gary's recordings with support from Mighty Baby at the time still sound simply magical. Gary's LP Take Something With You was produced immaculately by Reggie King, and features some real classics like Don't Know Why You Bother Child.

Reggie himself was up next, and by rights should have been backed by his colleagues in Mighty Baby but something went awry at the last moment, and he was instead supported by the guys from B.B. Blunder or the Blossom Toes if you like. This seems just about typical of Reggie's luck. I like to assume this is the show that the photo of Reggie with the B.B. Blunder guys. Reggie played and hung out with Brian Godding, Brian Belshaw etc. quite a bit at this time, and they released a single together of Little Boy and 10,000 Miles.

Julie Driscoll was the headline act on the night, and her set sounds astonishing. Some of it was just Julie solo, some of it was just with Brian Godding on guitar, and the rest with the full B.B. Blunder line-up. The climax of the concert seems to have been Julie leading an emotional rendition of the Blunder song that gave the concert its name and tone. This was from the Worker's Playtime LP which featured Julie quite strongly, particularly on the glorious Seed.