Various "The Traitors Gate Folk Club - Five Years On" LP Stereo 1982

Another offering from the kindly Victorian Bush Folkie. Thanks again. I have been asked for this a few times over the years.

The Traitors Gate Folk Club  was the folk venue to go to in Adelaide in the late '1970s and early 1980s. I attended  the club a couple of times when they were using the Leicester Hotel in Parkside as a venue.

This LP was released in 1982 featuring singers who performed at the club over the years but they are not live performances.  The record was released with an informative insert but we do not have it.

The LP had quite a few glitches - quite a high level of crackles and pops and the vocals had far too many moments of distortion.  I have managed to clean the recordings to a good standard so please ignore the occasional residual glitches. The album is quite enjoyable and has a little of something for everybody.

Tracklist
1. Heights of Alma - Lis and John Munro
2. She moved through the fair - John Francis
3. If wishes were fishes - Irene Petrie
4. Queen amang the heather - Bob Hardie
5. Long Shadows - Lynne Muir
6. Patriot Prejudice - Bryan Cullen
7. The legend of Kelly - Eric Bogle
8. Jigs: Denny Delaney's, Morrison's - Joe Manning and Warwick Nottage
9. Only our rivers (run free) - Margaret Monks
10. The Week before Easter (The False Bride, I once loved a lass) - Denis Tracey
11. The town I loved so well - Phil Cunneen
12. Down and out blues - Chris McGloin and Bryan Monaghan

New Link 12 Feb 2017
Click here to commence downloading the compressed album file with slip graphics.
File is 61Mb. Tracks are MP3 @224-256VBR
Let me know if download is no longer available and I will re-up the file.

Denis Tracey "No man's land" LP 1979

I downloaded this particular album sometime ago from the web and I have kept putting off posting it on the blog. (The Victorian Bush Folkie has also provided a copy of this album but this one is an excellent rip likely done from a very clean copy so I have been saved a lot of work). I have no idea who did the work but thanks if you are reading this.

Oh, as far as I am aware the artist's given name is "Denis" as shown on the LP labels and "not Dennis" as consistently listed on the album slip. I know very little about this man even though he has been a constant Australian Folk presence for many years. He appears to have had a strong South Australian connection. I suspect that he stopped performing for a few years now. I could use some help here please!

This is an excellent album with great performances both vocally and instrumentally. Most tracks are British Isles traditionals with three Australian items one of which is traditional, and the album finishes with an hilarious ditty about funeral caskets, supposedly from an American advertising jingle - who knows. You do not need to be a folk fan to enjoy this album.

Tracklist
1. The dark-eyed sailor
2. The Coventry Carol
3. Instrumental Medley - The South wind, Rolling in the Rye Grass, Drowsey Maggie
4. She moved through the fair
5. No Man's Land (aka Green Fields of France) (Eric Bogle composition, of course)
6. Lowlands (male dying sailor version) (windlass and pump shanty)
7. Lassie wi' a yellow coatie
8. Arthur McBride
9. Wee pot stove (Harry Robertson composition - Scot immigrant with whaling background)
10. The banks of the Condamine (Australian traditional - shearing version)
11. Instrumental Medley - The Tenpenny bit, and the lark in the morning.
12. Lizzie Lindsay (Child 226)

Click here to proceed to download the compressed file with graphics. MP3 320CBR 94 Mb.
If download lapses - please let me know and I'll put it up again.

The Bushwhackers "Australian Bush Songs" EP 1957

Do not confuse this band "The Bushwhackers" with the substantially later "The Bushwackers Band". This group was one of the pioneer bush bands formed by a group of Sydneysiders in the mid 1950s. The group had a relatively short life but their music was popular for many years. This was a 7" vinyl playing at 33 and a third rpm. It was produced in 1957 by Wattle Records which focused on folk music. It was the first of this type.It was a follow up to their first five Bushwhackers 78s. A search for Wattle Records will locate further information about them at folkstream.com.

We know that the group broke up in about 1957 and three of its members, Alex Hood, Harry Kay and Chris Kay went off to form The Rambleers with other performers; also recording with Wattle starting in 1958. This band also focused on Australian folksongs and included old-time dance music. For those interested, the National Library of Australia, in 2002,  released a compilation CD "The Rambleers" featuring their original material. I have a copy of the CD but I do not know if it is still for sale at either the Library or the National Film and Sound people. Update 2017 - Bush Music Club still has the Rambleers CD for sale.

Our kind Victorian Bush Folkie provided digitised files from the EP. Did they call them EPs back then? I doubt it.
Not surprisingly, the vinyl has not aged gracefully and the roughed-up slip gives some indication that it has had a hard life. Still, I have managed to do acceptable cleans of the first four tracks. The fifth track has some bad distortion which I can do nothing about but it is still listenable. Incidentally, these recordings are far from complex and although I have encoded them at 224VBR, as a matter of principle, they could be reduced to a lower level without any noticeable loss. Compressing the total of 27Mb resulted in a .RAR file of only 12Mb. Of course, the recording is mono.

This is definitely an item of historical interest.

Additional: This album did come with an insert/s and Sandra from the Bush Music Club (see comments) has posted images of the insert. The insert also provides lyrics for each of the songs. Click here to see the posting.

Tracklist
1. The Hut that's upside down
2. Australia's on the wallaby
3. Click go the shears
4. Black velvet band
5. Drover's Dream

Download compressed file containing track and graphic files

Click here for MP3 version VBR 224 MP3 12.28Mb Mono

Download compressed FLAC (lossless version - 61MB
File needs to be decompressed to extract music and graphic files

Any problems with downloading - let me know mr.stockman@gmail.com

Twankydillo - Untitled cassette album 1990

"Twankydillo" was a Victorian-based grouping featuring the singers Lis Johnston, Meg MacDonald and Annie McGlade resulting in very beautiful singing. The album was released in February for sale at the 1990 folk festivals. Tragically, Lis Johnston died towards the end of 1990 but Annie McGlade with others set up the annual Lis Johnston Memorial Award for vocal excellence which , since 1992, has been bestowed at the National Folk Festival in Canberra.

The name "Twankydillo" is from a traditional English folk song but it is not included in this album. The tracks are a mixture of old (2, 6, 9) and modern including the old pop standard "Sugartime". A very enjoyable album with great voices and lots of instrumental backing. Their first track is "The Fields of Athenry" written by Pete St John in the 1970s. It made three successful appearances in the Irish hit lists. Since about 1990, it has become the Irish defacto sporting anthem. It's a great song in the folk style about a fictitious man who, during the Irish famine (1845-1850), steals corn to feed his family and is sentenced to transportation to "Botany Bay". Go to a sporting event in Ireland and you are very likely to hear everyone singing this song; very impressive.

Oh! It is another welcome offering from the Victorian Bush Folkie.

Tracklist
1. Fields of Athenry
2. False Knight (Traditional - Child 3 -  The False Knight is Satan)
3. Don't get married.
4. Let her go down
5. Shadow Dreaming (has a modern Irish feel - any information welcome)
6. Dumbarton's Drums (Scottish traditional)
7. The Bramble and the Rose
8. Dittisham Lad (song of South Devon supposedly - could be a fairly recent traditional?)
9. Reynardine (traditional)
10. Sugartime


Click here to download entire album (compressed) MP3 224-256 VBR 45Mb

Any problems - email me at mr.stockman@gmail.com

The Flyte "Tern" Cassette 1989

Another one gratefully received from the Victorian Bush Folkie. The Flyte were composed of Penny Davies, her life partner Roger Ilott, Jim Gregory, Byrd Fairport and Kim Brown. The music was recorded 1988/1989. I have not found any references to this album which was produced by Restless Recordings owned by Davies and Ilott. I recommend that you click here to peruse their website "Restless Music". It is well worth a visit and they have several CDs for sale at reasonable prices and some free downloads.. Davies and Ilott are still very active at folk festivals and folk venues and catch them if you can. They do a great job on the late Bill Scott's poems and songs.

This particular album is "out-of-print" and quite clean. The major task for me was the simple one of removing the usual tape and player noise. The tracklist is shown on the above graphic.

Click here to proceed to download the compressed album. Needs to be decompressed before playing. 48Mb of 10 MP3 files @224-256 VBR.

If the download link fails make a comment on this posting or email me mr.stockman@gmail.com