Birthday Blues (studio album) by Bert Jansch

From Mercury 10/19/2017 20:27

This Jansch album does remind me of a more grounded and perhaps less perfectly composed version of The Pentangle circa 1969. After all he was one of the main driving forces of that group and a lot of the same musicians are here in this batch of recordings. The difference? MORE JANSCH! Which is awesome, just what the doctor ordered. Also, as Jansch was one of the great british interpreters of the deep Blues, the record is a bit more down and dirty with the blues. Still, there is lots and lots of space for gorgeous british folk and folk tunes throughout. This may not be the best Jansch solo album. I have only heard 3 as of now. But of the 3 I've heard this is my favorite and the one I come back to the most. Something about this album just feels perfectly in the middle between loose, relaxed Jansch musings and the more gorgeously traditional and composed sound of Basket Of Light.

And my goodness "Poison" is just such a cool, atmospheric blues song! I Loves it!

Rating: 8.2/10

This album is great, I cannot understand why it is not more well known. Some of his finest original songwriting represented on this album, combining whimsical folk with blues. "The Bright New Year" is beautiful in its sincerity, "Poison" and "A Woman Like You" are magnificantly dark. The album has its its happy points too like the "Tree Song" and the extremely hard to remember "Come Sing Me A Happy Song To Prove We Can All Get Along The Lumpy Bumpy Long And Dusty Road" is as catchy as anything I have ever heard. I strongly reccomend this to any music fans.