This album contains an interesting variety of unreleased soundtrack demos, silly psychedelia and ditties from TV art programmes. The female vocal on the first track credited to Basil Kirchin reminds me of Francoise Hardy, all breezy and folksy. Singing Low by the Barbara Moore Singers with its male and female vocals is really incredibly naïve ... there's no other word for it. Also, not particularly inspiring - I don't want to hear it again. Pierre Arvay's Merry Ocarina is much nicer, an atmospheric instrumental with some appealing flourishes.
Francoise Hardy returns, er oops I mean Oriel Smith sighs her way through the jazzy Tiffany Glass and is also responsible for track nine, the experimentally jazzy Winds of Space, obviously inspired by Tim Buckley, whilst in between Folk Guitar by Claude Vasori comes & goes, leaving no impression. Christopher Casson makes a brief appearance with Twinkle Twinkle, followed by the charming Cuckoo by Arthur Birkby, a strange name for the lady with the delightful voice. Maybe her name's really Martha? Oh I see on the sleeve notes it's sung by the Barbara Moore Singers. I like it; it's got the sound of a real cuckoo clock.
Spin Spider Spin by Peggy Zeitlin is rather cute and comforting; it's about a friendly, harmless little spider. But did Peggy ever take into account the opinions of bees and other insects that would inevitably end up trapped and sucked dry? How insensitive. The Elf by the Barbara Moore Singers is as far removed from Tolkien as can be imagined, as is The Troll by Reg Tilsley, an instrumental with a buoyant lilting rhythm. If this is how trolls are represented, I shudder to think what Reg would have done with orcs and balrogs. Thanks Reg, for your whitewashing of the deviltry of Saruman and Sauron.
My Mother Said by Christopher Casson is an olde English ditty, fey and twee and silly to the extreme. Next the Barbara Moore Singers indulge in a propaganda piece about the notorious criminal Robin Hood. I see now that the roots of moral relativism go back all the way to the Sixties. Robin Hood ought to have been apprehended and incarcerated after his first robbery. He was probably a juvenile delinquent anyway, so there was no excuse for permitting his career of banditry much less for romanticizing him.
Penultimately, Christopher Casson commits Oh Dear What Can the Matter Be which has a foot-tapping beat, and this weird compilation concludes with the frisky instrumental Teddy Bears Picnic. I have reservations about many of these recordings and cannot recommend this CD to your children. It might be therapeutic for hardcore fans of acid rock like Big Brother and the Holding Company or diehard devotees of Al Jourgensen's bands like Ministry and Revolting Cocks or similar industrial acts like Too Dark Park era Skinny Puppy. Everybody else, stay well away.
