ODIN DRAGONFLY: OFFERINGS (WITH ANGELA GORDON)

I'm not sure whether this album should be put in Heather Findlay's discography as ODIN DRAGONFLY is a project by her together with her former bandmate before and in MOSTLY AUTUMN, Angela GORDON. In fact, ODIN DRAGONFLY is made from the letters of their surnames.

It's folky like the more acoustic songs of Mostly Autumn and it also includes some MA covers. I have to say that I've always thought that the effort of Angela Gordon as arranger and performer in Mostly Autumn has often been underestimated. Mostly Autumn have lost a lot with her leaving. Of course Heather has been a bog loss, too.

The songs, even those which aren't covers, have the typical mostly autumn mood. They don't have the guitar of Bryan Josh crying in a David Gilmur style and for this reason are tendentially more folk than prog but fans of Mostly Autumn shouldn't miss this album. Heather and Angela were already playing in a duo before joining Mostly Autumn and it's reflected in the songs quality.

An acoustic album of this kind with those qualities would have probably achieved a big success in the flower power age. I don't mean that it sounds aged, as the material, covers apart, is relatively new. It's that it's completely "unplugged" and the female vocals have a sort of hippy resemblance. But on tracks like "Magpie" the instrumental part made by acoustic guitar and flute justifies completely the "prog label". Strangely, while relistening to that song, I have noticed vocal harmonies that made the ABBA pop up in my mind.

Even if Angela is now back to Mostly Autumn and Heather is struggling trying a solo career which apparently is not giving her many satisfactions, this album is fresh and in my opinion shows how important Angela Gordon was in the first albums of Mostly Autumn. Hether's voice can't be discussed in any way.

The album is about to be remastered and the two girls from York are still performing live sometimes, even if this is remained the only Odin Dragonfly album and is now 12 years old.