OLD NEW BORROWED BLUE

Old. New. Borrowed. Blue. Is the follow up album to the stupendous Jewel In The Crown released just one year earlier. On again off again drummer Dave Mattacks stepped out to do session work so the remaining lads, Simon Nicol, Dave Pegg, Maartin Allcock and Ric Sanders, decided to record an album and tour as quartet without him. In many ways, this album is complementary to Jewel In The Crown as features more exceptional songs written by the writers who supplied the "Jewel" album with its best gems. Standout studio tracks are "Lalla Rookh", "Frozen Man" (written by James Taylor), "There Once Was Love/Innsbruck " and the fun instrumental "Woodworm Swing".

The album does an about face and features live performances of the next 7 songs, which is a treat as the acoustic Fairport was always more impressive live and the following songs are all the better for it. Excellently recorded and mixed, the standout songs are old throwbacks "Crazy Man Michael", "The Widow of Westmoreland's Daughter", another nod back to the early days with a great version of "Genesis Hall" (The Richard Thompson penned classic), and a wonderful version of Ralph McTell's "The Hiring Fair".

It would be another ten years before the band would produce albums as good as Jewel In The Crown and Old. New. Borrowed. Blue., but at least Fairport Convention left us two exceptional albums to hold us until then.

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