An initial vote goes to Unicorn

 

Please vote.

 

Barrett.

Of course to anyone with ears and not born in Powys The Madcat Barfs, (note: this was original title before a joint champagne by Mary of the PDSA and Jane from the Cat Protection League forced EMI to change it), was, and thus remains, a Freakbeat Funk album with mild psychotropic influences if swallowed whole. It goes without saying: Don't try this at home kids, go round to a friends house and do it there.

/edit: should Iayn (or anyone else) want to verify any of these made-up facts then I can recommend as the definitive go-to resource, The Ladybird Book of British Rock:

As you can see from the cover, this indispensable volume features an article on Tyrannosaurus Rex. There is also fascinating chapter devoted entirely to "The Battle" from Ryck Wakeman's classic live album 'Capes and Curries of the World':

As well as a chapter titled 'Lesser Known Keyboard Power Trios Who Aren't Emerson, Lake and Someone Whose Name Beginnings With P':

Okay, enough larking about, serious face: 

Okay, I'll take the bait...

...having now listened to the Folk Rock of Drago Mlinarec, and I must a stress this was a cursory listen to random tracks that came up on a YouBoob search... it was (American influenced/American) Folk Rock I'll grant you, and a times even Blues Folk Rock, but where are the psychedelics?

Not only that, I hear absolutely nothing that would remind me of Syd Barrett, The Madcap Laughs or English Psychedelic Rock.

Accepted - I have only heard 4 Mlinarec tracks compared to everything that's been released by Barrett, so perhaps I have yet to hear the quintessentially English Psychedelic Rock of Mlinarec that would be so reminiscent of Barrett.

 

That being said, T-Rex and Bolan's silly mythologizing and sloppy guitars ain't much better. If I listen to T-Rex, it isn't till the Electric Warrior and The Slider period.

 

P.S. Both Barrett and T-Rex are better myths and legends than their actual output suggests. Put the mention of T-Rex in a Mott the Hoople song or a Who song, or Barrett in a Pink Floyd musical memoir and the outcome is much better.

You are correct - I cannot understand Mlinarec's lyrics and I can understand Barrett's, but that is not all we are discussing here. I wanted to know how Barrett's The Madcap Laughs reminds you of psychedelic folk singer-songwriter Mlinarec. If it is purely in the lyrics then you've answered that, so since "unplugged" does not equal "folk" then Syd Barrett's The Madcap Laughs is not Acid/Psych Folk and we're done here. 

 

Just curious.

If Barrett had never been a member of Pink Floyd and produced the Mad Cap Laughs in isolation, would anyone question weather that album was acid folk?

 

The more germane question is, would a record company have even released his solo work without his prior work with Floyd and the assistance of members of Floyd? Like Nick Drake, Barrett was such a basket case that he was unable to hawk his albums via live appearances.

Every nation have its own folk music and hippie nation was not an exception because acid folk was their folk music. Get it?

I salute you!

"Komandant Shamal" did. I was merely echoing his claim in order to refute it.

The album is so un-Pink Floyd it I suspect that most people can listen to it in isolation and not call it acid folk, because hypothetical what ifs aside, that is all anyone can do. It's an album by a solo singer-songwriter recorded almost two years after anything he recorded with Floyd.

The album raises a 'is it/isn't it folk?' debate because of how it was recorded, not because of any intention of Barrett to record a folk-rock album. 

We can ignore the early recording sessions with Peter Jenner, (who I believe simply didn't know what he was doing, let alone understand what Barrett wanted to do), because only one backing track from those sessions made it on to the final cut of the album. It should be noted that the sessions Barrett recorded for Kevin Ayres came from this time (so draw what conclusions you will from that).

Tracks for most of the songs, (though not all that were used, but more of that later), were recorded much later by Malcolm Jones, who at that time was director of the newly formed Harvest imprint and mainly involved in A&R for the label. Jones acted as producer for the album because the preferred option, Norman Smith, was busy with Floyd recording Ummagumma, (Jones's only production credit prior to that was with Love Sculpture) - after the failed sessions with Jenner the big-wigs at EMI and Abbey Road wanted someone responsible in control and Jones wanted someone Barrett would feel comfortable working with, I suspect that Barrett wanted to produce himself but EMI would not permit that. It was Barrett who suggested that Jones do it and he reluctantly agreed.

In his frustration Barrett then went behind Jones's back to Gilmour to ask him for help with the album and Jones (again reluctantly) agreed to hand over to Gilmour/Waters (and Wright) - the word Jones used was "acquiesced". They listened to the recordings and decided to re-do many of them, why is again something we can only speculate about. That's when the problems that had faced Jones became apparent to Gilmouret al, the re-takes were different, often very different. [I tend to ignore the false-starts and "page-turning" break because those happens all the time in the studio, I question the inclusion of them on the album but I suspect it was a reflection of everyone involved's frustration at the time, including Barrett's]. Pressure to finish the album then took over, whether this was due to EMI big-wigs, lack of studio-time, "Floyds" prior commitments to their own albums (More and Ummagumma) and tours, or to Barratt himself are all probably contributory here, so they pieced together an album of some kind of coherence using the takes that were the easiest to work with (though as many have commented since, including Jones, not necessarily the best takes).

If you feel the end result makes it an Folk-rock album then that is an opinion. I think it feels like a folk album because of how it was recorded but that doesn't make it a folk album. It should be noted that many (often posthumous) releases from salvaged "singer plus guitar" demo tapes have this "feel" too.

Personal attack, however they are intended, are unwarranted. If you cannot continue this conversation without snide and mean-spirited comments then we are done here.

Lack of riffs does not make a piece of music "folk" or "not-rock" - very little Progressive Rock is "riff-based"

Acoustic does not equal Folk. 

/edit: ...and it's 52 albums, not 28 

 

I've not heard the MCL in many a moon including the ones that circle around Saturn, but I do recall songs on the album that had folk music motifs such as a song sung in the same meter with mostly repetitive lyrics and an undeviating melody similar in form to the Old English folk song London Bridge. I believe the song I'm speaking of is Love You, but I could be wrong. There are also a few straight up Folk Rock songs  on the album such as Long Gone as well a few songs that I would consider straight Psych Rock such as Octopus.

 

But a majority to me have atypical folk motifs that are similar but not limited to the types of folk motifs that I stated above, excluding the song Golden Hair which is as folk as you can get. No form of music exists in a vacuum and their will always be outside musical styles and references drawn into it from time to time. No different from Barrett's adventure on TMCL.

 

Where all of this goes array is in the lyrical subject matter or purpose of Syd's lyrics. Syd did not write another version of London Bridge. These were songs that contained whimsical and in some cases, nonsense lyrics. Whatever Syd's actual intention of his lyrics was is unknown and academic. What is known is that acid heads globed on to this music which I mostly consider to be Folk Rock, variations not withstanding. Hence, Folk Rock for acid heads=Acid Folk.

 

But as you stated, even if I drop the Acid Folk tag, the album is definitely predominantly Folk Rock to me, as those very results of the recording process that you have outlined, combined with some of the motifs  that I stated above, are what determined the albums' end result, as opposed to what Barrett intended the album to be. What ever that may have been.

 

We've both explained our positions, so I think we can put this issue to rest now and get back to Prog.

to The Madcap Laughs a lot in college, but it hasn't aged as well

in my mind compared to Unicorn. 

Hmm... certainly food for thought. If by 'London Bridge' you mean the children's nursery rhyme 'London Bridge Is Falling Down' then I don't see it myself, though that rhyme is sung to various different tunes around the world so perhaps the one you are thinking of is not the same as the one I am. Lyrically the problem I have is 'London Bridge Is Falling Down' lacks a chorus that 'Love You' most definitely has, the (apparent) repetition in the nursery rhyme is in the verses all of which are different but end with the phrase "my fair lady". However, the English Pscyh Pop/Rock scene's dalliance with children's nursery rhymes is well known and as far as I am aware would not be considered as Folk Music as such. {then perhaps 'Love You' isn't the right song either}

 

I think we've run our horse to death and I can't afford a new one. May he rest in peace.

Proof?

There is a touch of psychedelic rock in Syd Barrett' solo catalogue (few songs) but it couldnt be enough for people who were listening to psychedelic rock albums in 1970 (and later) to call it psychedelic rock in the case that he was not the former Floyd member. 

Furthermore, i think even that Syd Barret hardly could have been in a position to release officially that material in the case that he wasnt the former Floyd member because the Bandcamp, Soundcloud and other platforms werent existed in 1970.

That isn't proof, that is an informal logical fallacy called "begging the question" where the conclusion is derived from the initial assumption. 

To summarise what you have just said: "The album is Acid Folk because the album is Acid Folk" ... 

That is your supposition, it is not proof. To be clear here, (once again), Not-Rock does not equal Folk.