Al Stewart - part of the Folk revival in the 1960s and 70s, and then rocked it up a bit.
Al Stewart – Live At Cambridge Folk Festival 1989 – Nights At The Roundtable: Mini-Concert Edition
Click on the link here for Audio Player – Al Stewart – live at the Cambridge Folk Festival – 1989 – BBC 6 Music
Most people think of Al Stewart and Year Of The Cat comes to mind. That was his huge hit in 1976. But what a lot of people don’t realize is how much he was involved in the Folk resurgence in the UK in the 60s and 70s. Al Stewart was one of the acts to play Glastonbury at its first festival in 1970. By the time Year Of The Cat was released, Stewart had been mixing Folk with Rock and this wound up becoming his most accessible work. It was a massive hit in the U.S. and became a staple on FM for several years after. But times and musical tastes changed by the time the 80s rolled around, and Al Stewart quietly fell off the the radar, going back to a more traditional road with Folk as a result. He’s still around and still gigging – but like everything, it’s different now. Still, he has a total of 19 albums (16 studio and 3 live) to his credit. So he’s not exactly a one-hit wonder.
Tonight it’s a concert recorded at the 1989 Cambridge Folk Festival by BBC 6 Music.
A memory jogger for those of you who haven’t heard the name in a long time. An introduction to where Folk was coming from in the mid-70s for those who aren’t.
Oodles of thanks for this!
Myself, “Year of the Cat” was roughly where I began losing interest in his work: it was the kind of folk/pop anyone at the time could have done, whereas much of his earlier stuff was instantly recognizable as his. Bedsitter Images hasn’t aged well, but a string of albums thereafter have: Love Chronicles, Zero She Flies, Past Present & Future, Orange, Time Passages, Russians & Americans . . . I still play ’em from time to time; still love ’em.
And oddly enough, that’s where he ends the concert 😉
Gordon, I’m a little late to this one, and my knowledge of Al Stewart’s music is pretty much confined to “Year of the Cat.” And even it sounds fine on this recording. This show is a delightful surprise to me. Thank you!
As always, my pleasure! You just never know what you’ll find around here. Thanks for all your support.