Trees – Fore & After [IMPORT 2xLP] – New LP

Vinyl rarities release of original Trees’ demos and BBC sessions circa 1969/70, plus 2007 remixes of tracks from ‘On The Shore’ and 2018 live performances of ‘She Moved Thro’ The Fair’ and ‘Murdoch’. Trees helped define ‘Acid Folk’, creating a sub-category in the lexicon of record dealers and music critics alike. “Not scholarly devotees of the folk tradition but enthusiastic converts who brazenly experimented with traditional forms.” Pitchfork.

“A beautiful hybrid, Trees found a unique space between intimate folk and freewheeling psychedelia. Musically ambitious yet brilliantly balanced, they have left an enduring legacy for those lucky enough to be in on the secret” Edd Gibson, Friendly Fires

It’s now over fifty years since Trees’ formation, a band who helped define ‘Acid Folk’, creating a sub-category in the lexicon of record dealers and music critics alike. Earth’s new Trees collection brings together both albums adding shiny alternate mixes of key tracks along with a selection of radio sessions and demos, all sounding brighter and cleaner than ever before.

Trees first album, ‘The Garden of Jane Delawney’ (1970) shares some of the pastoral-whimsy that characterised The Incredible String Band or Donovan, offset by some stunning interpretations of traditional material and Bias’ own songs, which were somehow part of the tradition Trees had adopted. Readings of ‘Lady Margaret’, ‘Glasgerion’ and the old standard ‘She Moved Thro’ The Fair’, and the extended fade of the group’s own ‘Road’, presage the explosive instrumental duelling that would come to characterise the follow up album, ‘On The Shore’.

There’s a definite shift between the records, the second being darker and more ambivalent. Here Trees don’t tell you what to think. You’re left to formulate your own response to this odd, opaque music.

The ‘Streets of Derry’ session version leans into the brain vibrating drone-groove they somehow found at the traditional tune’s centre. ‘Polly On The Shore’, another traditional tune, is one of the definitive moments of English folk rock.