Few survivors from the golden age of British folk rock have kept their reputations intact. Among the survivors there is one figure whose body of work, comprising 23 studio albums and almost as many live and compilation releases, has come to stand for a particularly single-minded form of integrity. That man is Roy Harper.

Now officially ‘retired’, and living in a secluded corner of Ireland, Harper has recently been hailed as a key influence by a much younger generation of devoted starsailors who instinctively recognise his innovations. The likes of Fleet Foxes, Joanna Newsom and Jim O’Rourke are avowed fans, and in previous decades he has enjoyed public endorsements and tributes from the likes of Led Zeppelin (Roy is immortalised in ‘Hats Off To Harper’ from Led Zeppelin’s ‘III’), Kate Bush, Pink Floyd’s Dave Gilmour and many more.

Beginning with 1966’s ‘Sophisticated Beggar’, Harper’s music has consistently rattled the cage of received ideas. His versatile, poetic sensibility was employed in a wide range of song styles from romantic love songs to late night mantras to blackly comedic throwaway numbers.

‘Stormcock’ (1971) is generally regarded as a masterpiece: a sprawling but focused suite of four lengthy tracks which explored the inner space of Abbey Road Studio to rhapsodic effect; like ‘Astral Weeks’ refracted through the pages of OZ magazine. Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page added guitar, disguised as S Flavius Mercurius.

In 2005 Harper was awarded the Mojo Hero Award by the staff of Mojo magazine. The award itself was presented by long-time collaborator and friend Jimmy Page. In 2013 Harper received the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Lifetime Achievement Award.

TRACK LISTING

Hors D’Oeuvres
The Same Old Rock
One Man Rock And Roll Band
Me And My Woman

Featuring Jimmy Page, ‘Jugula’ was originally released in 1985 and reissued as ‘1984 (Jugula)’.

Remastered and reissued on 180gm vinyl packaged in deluxe gatefold sleeve with original cover art and printed heavy inner sleeve including lyrics, comprehensive new notes and images.

All remastering was done by Roy Harper and John Fitzgerald at Lettercolm Studio in Timoleague, West Cork, Ireland. Artwork redesign by Harry Pearce at Pentagram.

TRACK LISTING

Nineteen Forty-Eightish
Bad Speech
Hope
Hangman
Elizabeth
Frozen Moment
Twentieth Century Man
Advertisement

‘Folkjokeopus’ was originally released 1969 and produced by Shel Talmy.  

Remastered and reissued on 180gm vinyl packaged in deluxe gatefold sleeve with original cover art and printed heavy inner sleeve including lyrics, comprehensive new notes and images.

All remastering was done by Roy Harper and John Fitzgerald at Lettercolm Studio in Timoleague, West Cork, Ireland. Artwork redesign by Harry Pearce at Pentagram.

TRACK LISTING

Sergeant Sunshine
She’s The One
In The Time Of Water
Composer Of Life
One For All
Exercising Some Control
McGoohan’s Blues
Mañana

‘Sophisticated Beggar’ was originally released 1966.

Remastered and reissued on 180gm vinyl packaged in deluxe gatefold sleeve with original cover art and printed heavy inner sleeve including lyrics, comprehensive new notes and images.

All remastering was done by Roy Harper and John Fitzgerald at Lettercolm Studio in Timoleague, West Cork, Ireland. Artwork redesign by Harry Pearce at Pentagram.

TRACK LISTING

China Girl
Goldfish
Sophisticated Beggar
My Friend
Big Fat Silver Aeroplane
Blackpool
Legend
Girlie
October Twelfth
Black Clouds
Mr. Station Master
Forever
Committed

Never shy about using the most intimate and personal autobiographical details in his songs, Harper is one of the most genuine of songwriters. He has recorded several albums of great quality and beauty and "Bullinamingvase" is one of his finest. With an original vocal delivery and a sympathetic acoustic guitar style, Harper never crosses that line that divides the heartfelt from the bitter and mawkish. The halcyon summer feel to much of this work still has the timeless quality that can stand comparison with the best of music of the period.

"The major event on the record, One of 'Those Days In England', is a collection of reminiscences. The legend of Excalibur in the first line. The last of the willow leaves at the top of the tree hanging on into January. 'Alfred had me made', the words written in anglo-saxon around the Alfred Jewel. More precisely 'AElfred mec heht gewyrcan' Alfred ordered me to be made. The Alfred Jewel is housed in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford (England) and I visit it regularly when I can for emotional sustenance. In the light of the events of his lifetime, Alfred must not only be considered as the founder of the British Navy, but more importantly as the founder of the English language. Had it not been for Alfred's victory over the Danes in the late ninth century, it would perhaps be conceivable that one fifth of the world's population would now be speaking some kind of Danish dialect. I really love this album. It's always been one of my real favourites. I've always thought that the long version of 'One Of Those Days In England' is a touchstone of my long affair with my own culture. All in all, the album has the pastoral feel of the nature of my life at the time. Having said that, it also has a lovelorn edge in 'Cherishing The Lonesome' and angst in 'Naked Flame'. There's also sufficient reference to the nature of the times in lines such as 'You and me sister we're gonna plant a bomb in a street to change law and order', and 'You and me brother wrapped up in silence brooding for better breathing spaces'; both of which unfortunately still seem set to demand attention in global culture for the foreseeable future. Perhaps the reason I always think of it as a gentler album is the subtle ushering in of the realisations embodied in 'These Last Days', which are not so much resignation to a certain maturity as recognition that negotiation in life is paramount to community." - Roy Harper

Remastered audio reissued on 180gm vinyl.

Packaged in deluxe gatefold sleeve.

TRACK LISTING

One Of Those Days In England
These Last Days
Cherishing The Lonesome
Naked Flame
Watford Gap
One Of Those Days In England (Parts 2-10)

Originally released in 1967.

Produced by Shel Talmy.

Orchestral arrangements by Keith Mansfield.

Remastered audio reissued on 180gm vinyl.

Packaged in deluxe gatefold sleeve.

Printed heavy inner sleeve including lyrics, extra notes and images.

Artwork redesign by Harry Pearce.

TRACK LISTING

Freak Suite
You Don’t Need Money
Aging Raver
In A Beautiful Rambling Mess
All You Need Is
What You Have
Circle
Highgate Cemetery
Come Out Fighting Ghengis Smith

"HQ is to date my most integral 'rock' record. The songs on the record are less acoustically oriented than on any of my other albums. However this is not to say that any of the songs couldn't have been recorded playing just an acoustic guitar. The combination of Chris Spedding, Bill Bruford, Dave Cochrane and myself was a band I should have kept together, but hindsight is a wonderful thing. Dave Gilmour, John Paul Jones and Steve Broughton were the band that played together at a Hyde Park Free Concert and then recorded the backing track for 'The Game'. 

The highlights of the record are one, Chris Spedding's guitar solo on 'The Game,' which was a first take and is a wonderful piece of spontaneous Rock and Roll. He played it on a tiny amp in the middle of the empty aircraft hanger sized Studio 1, at Abbey Road, a studio built for a 100 piece orchestra and opera cast. He was dressed in a white suit with a red carnation and was in and out of the studio within 20 minutes! And two, the great lift that the Grimethorpe Colliery (brass) Band gave to the David Bedford arrangement of 'When an Old Cricketer Leaves the Crease.' It was recorded in the same studio and there were about 50 musicians in the studio that day. 

My childhood memories of the heroic stature of the footballers and cricketers of the day invoke the sounds that went along with them. Paramount among these was the traditional Northern English brass band, which was a functional social component through all four seasons, being seen and heard in many different contexts. My use of that style of music on 'Old Cricketer' is a tribute to those distant memories. Finally, not least among the highlights is the third verse of the lyric of 'The Spirit Lives.' A poem of mine that I really enjoy. I always look back on HQ as a great album made at one of the best times of my life." - Roy Harper

Remastered audio reissued on 180gm vinyl.

Packaged in deluxe gatefold sleeve.

Original cover art with additional printed heavy inner sleeve including extra notes and images.

Artwork redesign by Harry Pearce.

TRACK LISTING

The Game (Parts 1-5)
The Spirit Lives
Grown Ups Are Just Silly Children
Referendum (Legend)
Forget Me Not
Hallucinating Light
When An Old Cricketer Leaves The Crease

"I've had it in my mind to present a new edition of my 1971 record Stormcock to the world for some years now. It seemed a shame that one of my best loved albums was hanging around as an inferior package when compared to the prowess of its original 12 inch LP forebear. I've spent a long time thinking about it, and how I might go about returning it to being one of the brightest lights in my canon. The release of this new edition marks the fruition of those thoughts.

There are a few good reasons for this update and re-release. The first is that the cd packaging has never remotely been able to achieve what was possible with the original album art. Secondly, the transfer of what was a very dynamic record on vinyl to a cd with a 44.1 sample rate format just didn't seem to come across properly.

Another good reason is that there has been a lot of interest in this record in recent years. It has never lost it's place in the music pantheon, and as time goes on it seems to be gaining in stature. It's become wholly appropriate that it should have the kind of new presentation we have now given it. In digitally re-mastering it I have attempted to take off some of the distortional effects and digital noise brought over by the transfer from tape/vinyl to cd. Apart form that very little has happened to it. I now believe it to be an altogether better audio experience. (see blog entry for tech info).

Stormcock was born in 1969 as I began to stretch my wings. I'd been there a few times before, but this time I gave myself the space to go deep..and stay there. Hors D'Oeuvres is perhaps the lightweight in the collection, but after all, it's the starter...

The Same Old Rock records my opposition to continued dependence on the cheap opium of convenient mass religion. Humanity as hostage to superstition is a position which infuriates me. To allow superstition to control your life, as the world burns, is careless.

One Man Rock And Roll Band.. Welcome home oh Johnny Soldier, we treat you here just like they treat you there.. is a sad fact, and is an indictment of this kind of society. Are queues for tattoos with 'love' on one hand and 'hate' on the other a sign of old age?

Me And My Woman.. what IS our destiny? Does it matter? Is it bound up with 'our' planet? In my opinion, yes. We are now out on a cultural limb that's taking us steadily further away from the planet. The average human misses the reality of the planet entirely. 40 years ago, there were tens of thousands of people asking serious questions about the state of the environment. It's only a few miles thick. It can be changed very quickly. Surely, hindsight isn't our only view.... is it? Hopefully not.. but what is for sure is that our environment is all we have. At the time there were establishment figures who were certain humans were having no effect at all on the planet's environment. This of course will eventually be true!

Pete Jenner and I turned out a great record. Seems like a thousand years ago now. Though I very rarely listen to my own records I would definitely say that my personal highlight on the record is Jimmy Page's guitar solo on 'The Same Old Rock.' My opinion has not changed since the day he put it on there. Absolutely brilliant. The string arrangement on 'Me And My Woman' is by David Bedford." - Roy Harper

STAFF COMMENTS

Andy says: Incredible, deep, heady, roving record. Four MASSIVE songs, one with Jimmy Page on and another, "Me And My Woman", probably the greatest thing in Roy's canon.

TRACK LISTING

Hors D’Oeuvres
The Same Old Rock
One Man Rock And Roll Band
Me And My Woman

"'Flat Baroque and Berserk' was the first record of mine to go into the charts. For the first time in my recording career, proper care and attention was paid to the presentation of the song. Peter Jenner was assigned by EMI Records to produce the recording. Peter and I got on really well and he was a better overseer of my work than anyone I have been involved with before or since. I had also had a Studio upgrade. EMI Studios, Abbey Road was at that time the most advanced studio in Europe, and over the next ten years I was to record in near-perfect conditions.

Over those years, the studio buzzed with four separate Beatles, some Stones, The Pink Floyd, Cliff and the Shadows, Gracie Fields, three of four musical knights, Kate Bush, Olivier Newton-John, The Hollies, Yehudi Menuin, Stefan Grapelli, The Plastic Ono Band, Eric Clapton; you name them, they were all there. Jimmy Page and I were in there three or four times together.

It was a creative hotbed where the technical staff, headed by Ken Townsend, were second to none.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I was very pleased with my first record made in such elevated surroundings. The song that I was best known for in those days, 'I Hate the White Man,' was recorded live for this album, and still stands as a testament to my lifelong devotion to espousing equal rights for all humans. I have long since wondered about the wisdom of stating that you have the capacity to hate your own race for it's misdemeanours, but as a polemic it has been both an effective tool and somewhere of a place for a humble humanitarian to stand.

'Another Day' is probably one of the best love songs I ever wrote, and much of the rest of the record is on a gentler level, although 'Hells Angels,' recorded with 'The Nice,' is raw and was very eventful." - Roy Harper

STAFF COMMENTS

Andy says: It's little wonder that Roy Harper is popular amongst all the groovy, new, West Coast folksters: here's the reason!

TRACK LISTING

Don’t You Grieve
I Hate The White Man
Feeling All The Saturday
How Does It Feel
Goodbye
Another Day
Davey
East Of The Sun
Tom Tiddler’s Ground
Francesca
Song Of The Ages
Hell’s Angels

With his unique voice and style Roy Harper has been a declaimer and entertainer throughout his long career. In 1972 he starred in a bleak, contemporary film with Carrol White called "Made", releasing the music he composed for the picture's soundtrack in 1973 under the title "Lifemask". It's one of his most satisfying albums, full of great songs, passionate and dramatic with startling use of echoplex and multi-tracking.

STAFF COMMENTS

Andy says: Includes the incredible tracks "Highway Blues" and "South Africa".

TRACK LISTING

Highway Blues
All Ireland
Little Lady
Bank Of The Dead
South Africa
The Lord’s Prayer

14 songs featuring Roy Harper's collaborations with the likes of Kate Bush ("You"), Jimmy Page, David Bedford, Dave Gilmour and Paul McCartney amongst others on an excellent US compilation.