Steeleye Span - WNYU FM New York 1974 (Bootleg)

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Steeleye Span is a British electric folk band, formed in 1969 and remaining active today. Along with Fairport Convention they are amongst the best known acts of the British folk revival, and were among the most commercially successful, thanks to their hit singles "Gaudete" and "All Around My Hat". They had 3 top 40 albums. They achieved a certified "gold" record with sales of "All Around My Hat".

The name Steeleye Span comes from a character in the traditional song Horkstow Grange (which they did not actually record until they released an album by that name in 1998). The song gives an account of a fight between John "Steeleye" Span and John Bowlin, neither of whom are proven to have been real people. Martin Carthy gave Tim Hart the idea to name the band after the song character. When the band discussed names, they decided to vote between the three suggestions "Middlemarch Wait", "Iyubidin's Wait", and "Steeleye Span". Although there were only five members in the band, six ballots appeared and "Steeleye Span" won out. Only in 1978 did Hart confess that he had voted twice. Terry Woods maintains that the members had agreed that if more than one person departed, the remaining members would select a new name, and he was upset that this did not happen when he and Gay Woods left the band. The liner notes for their first album include thanks to Carthy for the name suggestion.

Throughout its long history, Steeleye Span has seen a great many personnel changes but has maintained a strong continuity of tradition. Lead vocalist Maddy Prior was one of the main attractions of the band's music, being one of a handful of strong-but-melodically-voiced women in rock music in the 1970s (along with Sandy Denny, Renaissance's Annie Haslam, Jacqui McShee and Linda Thompson).

Their typical album is a collection of mostly traditional songs with one or two instrumental tracks of jigs and/or reels added in; the traditional songs often include some of the Child ballads. In their later albums there has been an increased tendency to include music written by the band members, but they have never got completely away from traditional music, which draws upon indigenous pan-British traditions.

The Steeleye Span story began in late 1969 when London-born bass player Ashley Hutchings departed Fairport Convention, the band he had co-founded in 1967. Fairport had been involved in a road accident in 1969 in which the drummer, Martin Lamble, was killed and other band members injured. They convalesced in a rented house near Winchester in Hampshire and worked on the album Liege & Lief. Despite the success of the album, Ashley Hutchings and the band's vocalist Sandy Denny left Fairport Convention.

In part, Hutchings's departure was because he wanted to pursue a different, more traditional, direction than the other members of Fairport did at that time. However, Fairport's co-founder, guitarist Simon Nicol, says in an interview on the band's website: "Whatever the upfront reasons about musical differences and wanting to concentrate on traditional material, I think the accident was the underlying reason why Ashley felt he couldn't continue with us."

Hutchings' new band was formed after he met established duo Tim Hart and Maddy Prior on the London folk club scene, and the initial lineup was completed by husband and wife team Terry (formerly of Sweeney's Men, later of The Pogues) and Gay Woods. With two female singers, the original lineup was unusual for the time, and indeed, never performed live, as the Woods departed the band shortly after the release of their debut album, Hark! The Village Wait (1970). While recording the album, the five members were all living in the same house, an arrangement that produced considerable tensions particularly between Hart and Prior on the one hand and the Woods on the other. Gay and Terry were replaced by veteran folk musician Martin Carthy and fiddler Peter Knight in a longer-term lineup that toured small concert venues, and recorded two albums - Please to See the King (1971) and Ten Man Mop, or Mr. Reservoir Butler Rides Again (1972). While the first album was traditionally performed - guitars, bass and with a guest drummer - Please to See the King was revolutionary in its hard electric sound and lack of drums.

Shortly after the release of their third album, the band brought in Jo Lustig as their manager who would bring a far more commercial sound to their recordings. At that time, traditionalists Carthy and Hutchings left the band to pursue purely folk projects. Their replacements were electric guitarist Bob Johnson and bass player Rick Kemp, who brought strong rock and blues influences to the sound.

Lustig signed them to the Chrysalis record label, for a deal that was to last for ten albums.

With the release of their fourth album, Below the Salt, later in 1972, the revised lineup had settled on a distinctive electrified rock sound, although they continued to play mostly arrangements of very traditional material, including songs dating back a hundred years or more. Even on the more commercial Parcel of Rogues (1973), the band had no permanent drummer, but in 1973 rock drummer Nigel Pegrum, who had previously recorded with Gnidrolog, The Small Faces and Uriah Heep, joined them, to harden up their sound (as well as occasionally playing flute and oboe).

Also that year, the single 'Gaudete' from Below the Salt belatedly became a Christmas hit single, reaching number 14 in the UK Charts, although the a capella motet, sung entirely in Latin, cannot be considered representative of the band's music, nor the album from which it was taken. This proved to be their commercial breakthrough and saw them performing on Top of the Pops for the first time. They often include it as a concert encore. Their popularity was also helped by the fact that they often performed as an opening act for fellow Chrysalis artists Jethro Tull.

Appropriately enough, their sixth album (and sixth member Pegrum's first with the band) was entitled Now We Are Six. Produced by Jethro Tull's Ian Anderson, the album includes the epic track 'Thomas the Rhymer', which has been a part of the live set ever since.

Although successful, the album is controversial among some fans for the inclusion of nursery rhymes sung by "The St. Eeleye School Choir" (band members singing in the style of children), and the cover "To Know Him is to Love Him", featuring a guest appearance from David Bowie on saxophone.

The attempts at humour continued on Commoners Crown (1975), which included Peter Sellers playing electric ukelele on the final track, "New York Girls". Their seventh album also included the epic ballad "Long Lankin" and novelty instrumental "Bach Goes To Limerick".

Steeleye Span - WNYU FM, The Bottom Line, New York, July 4th 1974.

FM Broadcast >>>Excellent SoundQuality<<<

Disc One :
01. DJ Intro
02. Beg Your Leave 
03. Instrumental 
04. Allison Gross
05. Cam Ye O'er Fra France
06. Tuning > John Barleycorn
07. Little Sir Hugh
08. Two Magicians (1 drop in the first part of the song)
09. Saucy Sailor 

Disc Two :
01. Robbery with Violins
02. Summer Is Icummin In >
03. Staine's Morris >
04. ? > DJ
05. One Misty Moisty Morning
06. Gaudete
07. Thomas the Rhymer
08. Instrumental

Encores :
09. Nautical Medley
10. Royal Forester >
11. Instrumental

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