Some people have called this the ugly duckling of the Nick Drake trilogy. I can kind of see why; besides the hideous album cover, there's a lot of weird instrumentation on this album and it doesn't have the trademark Drake glumness. It has quite a 70s sound, and it borders on being, perhaps too 70s. But Bryter Layter is a very solid album with some wonderful songs. There's a lot more to it than the much praised Pink Moon, in my opinion. It opens with a cinematic sounding instrumental track and the songs remain surprisingly upbeat throughout. I can understand why this album's sound might grate with some, but I think it's right up there with Drake's other stuff (on par with Pink Moon but not as good as Five Leaves Left). If people have put you off this album, it's worth giving it a go anyway.
By the way, if you haven't heard them, you should definitely listen to Nick Drake's other two albums as well.
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Nick Drake. A singer/songwriter of rare, exquisite and fragile beauty. His sister described him as having been born with "a skin too few." There's a wonderful doco of the same name on him. They keep threatening to release a film about him. I hope they don't..
I hope not too. Not everything/everyone has to be made into a film. What do you think of this particular album Big AL?
I love this album. "One of these things first" was the very first Nick Drake song I heard. I bought a "best of album" (Way to Blue) on the strength of that song and found that the rest of Drake's stuffis very different to that song. It's a piano based song for a start. But it has a hypnotic sound that just keeps rolling on.
Hazey Jane is fantastic. 2 Fairport Convention members played on the album and John Cale from Velvet Underground played some stuff too. Very "up" compared to Pink Moon. But that had as much to do with Drake's own self-confidence as much as anything.
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