Are You Ready To Take A Dip Into Folly's Pool?

 

Even though the reaction to my Will Beeley Anthology was, I felt, a bit muted, I continue to dive a bit deeper into some of the fabulous little known artists featured on this blog's beloved All Pearls No Swine series. Our candidate for today : Folly's Pool, as featured with the song of the same name (cool, their own theme song. Or : lazy, they naed themselves after one of their tracks. Both work.) on All Pearls No Swine Volume  29. Maybe Beeley's folk-rock wasn't your thing, so how about folk rock via prog rock this time, in the best sense of the term. No endless keyboard noodlings just because, no sidelong instrument wanking just because. Instead a prog rock that has their roots in folk and folk rock, in something older and more solid than 'oh, look, what this Moog can do'. There is a clear link to the more progressive wing of the British folk-rock scene of the early 1970s, but I'm not an expert on that subject, so I let you, more knowledgable reader, if you are out there, make those connections. But really, “Jig In A” makes that link really obvious, even though the band was from Fresno, California!

There is some stuff on here that I would normally be cautious about, like a a ton of flute by band member Danny Jordan. But really, this is lovely stuff, with the flute, like the guitar breaks dosed just right to not overstay their welcome, even on a quasi instrumental like "Kathleen". "From A Memory" has a decidely West Coast feel to it (Fresno strikes back!), while "Before The Gates Of Elessaar" - befiitingly for its epic title and construction brings on some heavy guitars. Every one of the seven tracks here has something to recommend. I am also a fan of the epic tale of "Fallen Pony". But really, there are no duff tracks here, which given the slim track list, is great news for you and me and everyone we know. 

Folly's Pool - the band - dropped this fantastic album in 1977, at a time when prog rock was on its way out, then disappeared for a couple of years before making a new wave/pop record ten years later, then went silent before reuniting at the begining of this century and being surprisingly prolific since then. But Folly's Pool - the album - is a great one-shot of ultra lovely folk-prog-rock, so give this a listen, and I'm pretty sure you'll agree...