SHAWN PHILLIPS: FACES, CONSIDERED (1972)

As with albums by The Amazing Blondel, Ram John Holder and Mireille Mathieu, I have no idea how the Faces album by Shawn Phillips came my way in the early Seventies.

But I'm very glad they did. 

Back in that time the American folk-rocker Phillips was known for two things: the astonishing length of his hair, and a soaring falsetto.

And although he was moderately successful at the time -- bigger than a cult, not a chart topper -- he barely gets a mention in rock or folk encyclopedias today.

That's surprising given he performed at the Isle of Wight festival, played sitar on a few Donovan songs (and appeared with him), and had the great Paul Buckmaster -- who worked on Nilsson albums, Elton's Tumbleweed Connection and others, Bowie and Cohen records and more recently Mika's Life in Cartoon Motion -- as a longtime arranger.

During the late Sixties the Texas-born Phillips was itinerant as he worked across the US and Europe, but then he settled in beautiful Positano on the Amalfi Coast in Italy and it was there he created the Faces album of '72 (among others).

It is the album which has been pulled off the shelf at random for these on-going pages. 

Described on the cover as "an anthology of music from 1969", it was a collection of recordings in various places and with many musicians, among them Steve Winwood, Glen Campbell and Caleb Quaye (on the 18 minute Parisien Flight II), and a full orchestra on L Ballade.

For Chorale he multi-tracked his voice(s) over guitar and sitar.

The album offered an indication of his musical breadth from the slightly satirical Anello Where Are You (Anello and Davide had made hip Beatle boots etc in Swinging London) to the angry I Took A Walk ('through the fields of America"), and the somewhat poppy We, which should have been a hit.

But it was when he let loose that extraordinary voice on music which, as with that of Tim Buckley, bridged folk and rock and jazz.

There's a case to be made that this should be an Essential Elsewhere album.

Landscape is about the journey from Naples to his home in Positano which was rather less touristy and populated in those days).

This is music which soars -- and reminds what a singular talent Shawn Phillips was.

Over the years I've picked up other albums by him, but none quite match this one for its soaring intensity on Landscape and I Took A Walk. 

At the time of this writing the man once described as "the best kept secret in the music business" by promoter Bill Graham is 79 and still recording and playing.

And still has quite a mane. 

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You can hear this album at Spotify here.

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Elsewhere occasionally revisits albums -- classics sometimes, but more often oddities or overlooked albums by major artists -- and you can find a number of them starting here