[Today: Nick Drake's majestic and moving swan song...]
Nick Drake had become a mere footnote in the history of music for many people when the title track from this album was picked up for a VW ad in 2000. This small push started a resurgence of interest in this long dead folk singer who passed away in 1974 and released but three frail, gorgeous albums during his short life.
These 11 songs combine to take up just 28 minutes that feature Drake, alone with his guitar, baring his heart and soul in calm and simple terms. Despondent at the commercial failure of his first two albums, Drake stripped his sound to the bones, and produced this chilling slice of melancholy. Just 26 years old at the time of these recordings, he sounds like a man weary with life and old before his years. His elegant and underappreciated guitar makes the perfect bed for his woe-drenched lyrics to lie down in.
The irony of Drake’s life and death (an overdose of antidepressents that led many to believe he’d commited suicide) is that he is many times more appreciated today than he was in his own time. Had he received anything approaching this kind of approval during his life, the man might still be with us, but then he may have never descended into the gorgeous depths of Pink Moon, either.
Tags: Nick Drake, Pink Moon, VW
16 September 2008 at 7:46 am |
[...] but almost everyone agrees that he was severely depressed in the months leading up to his death. Pink Moon was the last album released during his brief life, and it’s a crushing listen – akin to [...]
30 January 2009 at 10:17 pm |
[...] wrote the title track about his troubled friend Nick Drake, who would overdose on anti-depressants in November of 1974. It’s a gorgeous song that [...]