Dreamy psychedelia or gentle, easy pop? Or both? You decide.
Label: Masquerade
Year of Release: 1967
This one comes firmly recommended from a number of sources online, with the words "dreamy" and "psychedelia" often being used in close proximity to each other in people's descriptions. As I'm a sucker for the kind of swirling, mid-summer haziness of many of 1967's releases, I decided to take a gamble on this one while it was still cheap.
And guess what? I'm not really sure it is especially psychedelic, but I'll leave you to judge for yourselves on that point. What it certainly does is take the melody from Adagio in G Minor, plonk it on a shimmering church organ, place the most delicate brushes of rhythms behind it, and push a cooing female vocal about romantic reminiscence to the forefront. If this makes matters sound rather saccharine, that's probably unfair - the song has a very melancholic, nostalgic air and focuses on memories of youthful love rather than the giddy rush of the present. No sooner has it made its point than it fades, dream-like, into the dawn. There's no doubt it's exceptionally well arranged and performed, and a solid recording all round, but claims of "lost psych classic!" or even "lost sixties smash" seem to be exaggerated.
Nestling on the flip is a somewhat muted version of the old Last Night Of The Proms classic, William Blake's "Jerusalem". There's a touch of the Ronnie Hazelhursts about the arrangement here, and I doubt it will be replacing Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty's version at the end of "It's Grim Up North" as top contemporary cover anytime soon.
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