Nick Drake's Five Leaves Left - reissue out on July 29
Album reissue: Five Leaves Left by Nick Drake
Release date: July 29, 2013
Label: Island / USM
Poverty stricken students of 1968 rolled their own – not for them the cigarette temptations of a pack of 10 Embassy, no, their tobacco thrills came hand rolled, usually in Rizla papers which kindly reminded the participant that they were about to run out, with a yellow interleaf paper with bold red type stating ONLY FIVE LEAVES LEFT.
Nick Drake’s bucolic autumnal shades in his debut album of a similar name, heralded a new signing for Island Records: not traditional enough to be folk, not weird enough to be psychedelic, Drake avoided the pitfalls of what was expected and collaborated with producer Joe Boyd, orchestrator Robert Kirby and recording engineer John Wood to make a singular and almost unique record released to a largely indifferent media.
A few leaves fell in the right place and Nick’s reputation grew, despite his early death at 24 in 1976, escalating into the world-wide fame he enjoys today. Released initially only on vinyl and cassette, these formats became redundant with the dawning of CD and downloads - leaving a gaping hole that was filled by high collectors prices for original pressings and the inevitable poor quality bootlegs.
Nick Drake’s bucolic autumnal shades in his debut album of a similar name, heralded a new signing for Island Records: not traditional enough to be folk, not weird enough to be psychedelic, Drake avoided the pitfalls of what was expected and collaborated with producer Joe Boyd, orchestrator Robert Kirby and recording engineer John Wood to make a singular and almost unique record released to a largely indifferent media.
A few leaves fell in the right place and Nick’s reputation grew, despite his early death at 24 in 1976, escalating into the world-wide fame he enjoys today. Released initially only on vinyl and cassette, these formats became redundant with the dawning of CD and downloads - leaving a gaping hole that was filled by high collectors prices for original pressings and the inevitable poor quality bootlegs.
Island Records now complete the ReDISCovered vinyl set on Nick Drake with this boxed faithful replica of his debut album. As before, it was remastered from the original un-eq’d quarter inch master tapes by John Wood at Abbey Road Studios and pressed using wholly analogue processes onto 180 gsm virgin vinyl. The sleeve is an exact replica of the first edition of the album and is coupled with a period shop poster, lyrics to two of Nick’s songs and options to download the tracks in MP3, Hi-Res FLAC files or the new DFD (dubbed-from-disc) files for that authentic listening experience.
Key Features
- Mastered from original master-tapes at Abbey Road Studios by original engineer John Wood
- Analogue Pressing onto 180GSM audiophile virgin vinyl
- Gatefold sleeve, inner sleeve, paper labels
- Original shop poster
- Reprint of Nick's handwritten lyrics to two songs
- Digital download/ card- 3 Formats: lo and hi res plus Dubbed-From-Disc
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