FROM THE WITCHWOOD

This moody album holds a nice collection of songs, which form a loose theme by their similar aesthetics and subjects of lyrics: These are truly short stories from the ancient medieval days. The music itself is still clearly played by an early 1970's European band, as the melodies and instrumentations are quite conventional when evaluated from a view point of the progressive rock music. So the medieval influences are present in the themes of the music and in lyrics, but this is not a pure record of ancient music, but more a product of a strong musical fusion. Rick Wakeman brings a very pleasant extra touch to the songs with his keyboard contributions.

The opener "Glimpse of Heaven" is a calm and beautiful opener, and the organs, the melody and vocal chorus some reminds me the classic 1960's song "Morning Has Broken", which also contains an example of Rick's keyboard talents. This composition has also few different rhythm parts in it, so the arrangement holds even more qualities of an art rock than just these keyboards. The title tune "Witchwood" is then quite medieval like calm composition, which melodies and rhythm hold a nice Irish feeling. The few sitar passages are brought surprisingly by the bands drummer Richard Hudson to the "Thirty Days", which is a conventional hippie-oriented 60's folk song with an annoying fade-out. "Flight" is also an average basic folk song, but the following "The Hangman and The Papist" is clearly the most affecting track from this album for me, being a grim short story from the shadow of the gallows pole. It's interesting how folk music can also be quite brutal and raw, as the classic version of folk music usually stands for airy fairy songs by a lady singer with a guitar, embodying as a kind of Western version of Japanese Geisha culture. The following song "Sheep" also continues the oppressing feeling brought in at the previous number, but after the middle part of the song it takes a wonderful turn to a peaceful direction. "Canon Dale" combines mysterious European melody with flavors from the oriental music presented with a beatnik style. "The Shepherd's Song" has a smooth theme paired with a faster acoustic guitar runs, which elevated associations of classical Spanish music due to its rhythm and the melody swinging around two adjacent tone steps. "In Amongst The Roses" is a peaceful lullaby, which has some nice harpsichord runs strengthening the medieval themes of the melody. "I'll Carry on Beside You" closed my version of this record, as I didn't have the bonus track in my copy. The final song had also an electric guitar solo, and though it's not a poor tune, it still isn't among the better parts of this album.

It is hard for me to compare this album to the other releases by this band, as I haven't heard them yet. Still I would consider this as a quite good artistic folk album. Anybody who has appetite for such record should give "From The Witchwood" a listen.