Vashti Bunyan: Just Another Diamond Day (1970)

In 1968, Vashti Bunyan, husband, and dogs set out on a horse-and-cart pilgrimage from central London to a commune that was to be established in northwest Scotland. Walking towards a utopian dream, this motley crew were the embodiment of the hippy ideal, in both their romanticism and foolishness. For, two years later, by the time they'd made it to Skye, they found that their commune had never gotten off the ground, and no one was left. But, on the way, Bunyan —who'd had a brief, unsuccessful, unsatisfying stint as a pop starlet groomed by Rolling Stones manager Andrew Loog Oldham— had written 'walking songs,' sing-song tunes about keeping the pace up. With an album's worth of tunes in her head, Bunyan returned to London, and set out recording with Nick Drake's producer and arranger, Joe Boyd and Robert Kirby, and members of The Incredible String Band. The resulting album, Just Another Diamond Day, rendered a gentle, fragile, beautiful portrait of the English idyll. Her songs reference neither the politics of the time nor the psychedelically refracted medievalism so prevalent in the folk-rock of the era; the simple quatrains of hypnotic songs like 'Diamond Day', 'Come Wind Come Rain', or 'Where I Like to Stand' instead consist of uncomplicated lyrics that could've been written virtually any time in the past few centuries. The adorable ‘Jog Along Bess’ is about rescuing a bunch of psychologically or physically wounded animals and taking them to the country to frolic with her. ‘Rosehip November’ is a lyrical masterpiece that would not be out-of-place on Nick Drake's albums, whilst ‘I'd Like to Walk Around in Your Mind’ is a touching ode to a reluctant lover. On its release, the album was half ignored, half savaged. Hurt, and feeling like a failure, twice-over, Bunyan retired from music for good. Yet, when Just Another Diamond Day was reissued in 2000, it was passionately embraced by modern audiences and Vashti was roundly recognized as the 'godmother of freak-folk.' And Just Another Diamond Day, a record that once fell through the pop-cultural cracks, has been now, quite astonishingly, accepted as a basic building block in any alternatively-minded collection. http://altmusic.about.com/, http://pitchfork.com/

aa

aa

Vashti sings the atmospheric 'Diamond Day' in a recent live performance:

aa