STACKRIDGE

Stackridge is a quintessential English band whose music is very hard to categorize. Their 1971 debut album is a variegated and highly inventive blend of folk, rock and Classical music, and is full of absurdity and quirky humour. This is a fun album. Instrumentally, it is dominated by flute, violin and acoustic guitar. Lyrically, it is filled with colourful characters and fantastical narratives; the band's two lyricists, Andy Creswell-Davis and James Warren, had intended to write a children's book around 6 of the album's songs though this idea never saw the light of day. However at least Stackridge's albums are now widely available on cd, so we can be thankful as these are truly charming works.

Highlights here include the upbeat Beatles pastiche of GRANDE PIANO, the whimsical WEST MALL that recalls The Bonzos, and the band's first single DORA THE FEMALE EXPLORER, which sounds like a West Country version of Lindisfarne complete with fiddle and harmonica. Brilliant! The entire album is good but it's the album's longer tracks that are probably of most interest to prog fans. THREE LEGGED TABLE is a multi-part song that sounds like Trespass- era Genesis with some rock'n'roll tagged on at the end, while the 8-minute instrumental, ESSENCE OF PORPHYRY, is an ambitious chamber music patchwork. However the undoubted centrepiece of the album is the epic SLARK, a 14-minute fairytale about a lad being carried off by the dragon of the title.

Stackridge is an eccentric, eclectic, slightly camp musical extravaganza. It's very English and it's very good.

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