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#1312: Nick Drake – Sunday

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I think I first heard Nick Drake’s Bryter Layter during my second year in university. I have a memory of being in the new shared house, in my room on the top floor listening through the LP. Although that may be a memory of another time of listening to it, having maybe done so at some point previously. My times are muddled. I’d have to check my old laptop to be sure. Saying all this, I think Bryter Layter is a fine album. It’s not the one out of Drake’s three studio albums I go back to frequently, that would go to the one that starts with ‘P’ and ends with ‘ink Moon’. But I can appreciate it a bunch, just ’cause it is a Nick Drake album and the guy was really good at what he did during the short time he did it for. It’s the last one in which Drake played alongside hired musicians, and I’ve come to think of ‘Sunday’ as the coda, final statement, whatever, that brings that era of his style to a close.

The track is the last song on Bryter Layter, coming after the LP’s most well-known track of ‘Northern Sky’ and ending the whole package as an instrumental, switching between minor and major keys. I think it’s minor for the most part, but ends on an unexpected major chord leaves things on a small, bright note. Nick Drake strums and plucks away on his acoustic guitar in the left channel, but very much gets buried by the other instruments, particularly the strings that are eventually brought into the mix. Maybe it was this production choice, that does sort of happen throughout the whole album, that eventually led Drake to go against having backing musicians and go with the absolute bare minimum on Pink Moon. And I’m sure Drake’s playing some interesting chord shapes on that guitar of his on this track. Someone should do something like a Pink Moon‘d version of all the songs on Bryter or even Five Leaves Left. It would certainly show both records in a new light, I feel.

The melodic anchor of the whole track relies on the work of Australian flautist Ray Warleigh. Unfortunately, he passed away in 2015, but a small, small part of his contribution to the art of music lives on in this track. I guess you could split the track into a group of sections, each with their own theme going on. There’s the first minute and three seconds, which set the tone, 1:04 – 1:18, another minor-key transitional piece that leads into a major-key section from 1:19 – 1:49, followed by 1:50 – 2:28, which sounds quite a jazzy tone to me, I’m not quite sure. And then comes an optimistic, springtime morning-sounding passage from 2:29, which might just be the happiest sounding piece of music associated to Nick Drake’s name. Like a sun coming out from the clouds. The jazzy interlude returns at 3:00 before the track returns to its first section to finish it off from 3:21 onwards. If only I knew my music theory, it would help a lot. I know that I definitely feel something throughout this whole track, its changes within certainly take me on a journey. And I think that passes a test of some kind. If you’re listening to music and you’re emotionally affected by it, feel like you’re transported to another plane, then the song is most likely a very, very good one.

#943: Nick Drake – Northern Sky

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It may be a despicable thing to say. But for me, when it comes to Nick Drake’s three-album discography, there’s Pink Moon, and then there’s the other two. I feel some shame just typing that. I’ve grown so use to the desolate and stark atmosphere of Pink Moon that when I hearFive Leaves Left or Bryter Layter, the fullness of the instrumentation seems a bit unfamiliar to me. Those are both very fine albums in their own ways, and I’ve been trying to appreciate them more as time has gone on. In fact, wasn’t relatively long ago that I truly understood how good today’s track was.

‘Northern Sky’ is the penultimate track on Bryter Layter. Might not just be me, but I get a lot of imagery from this track. Clear skies of purple and deep blue at dusk on a chilly winter evening. Oddly specific, but that’s what I see. The album cover may play into it a bit too. But mainly it’s those visions are caused by the soft resonance of those celeste keys and the soothing Hammond organ which are present throughout, provided by former Velvet Underground member and all-round fine musician John Cale. Initially turned off by the instrumental choices, Drake grew to like the arrangement and anticipated it to be his big commercial breakthrough. That didn’t happen. Record label antics.

The lack of widespread recognition of his work dampened Drake’s hopes, and he became more and more emotionally withdrawn and distant as a result. He was known to be quite the shy person anyway, so it makes a song like ‘Northern Sky’ all the more profound and affecting. It’s a love song, something of a rarity in his work, and it captures all the feelings that usually come along in that situation of being with someone. The courage, the wonder and happiness, the underlying uncertainty, numerous others, but most of all the appreciation. It might be one of the best love songs out there. And with that, the sadness seeps in when thinking on how everything ended for Drake. He just wanted his music to be heard. If he could have hung on that bit longer, he would have arrived at a point where he would see his material be adored by millions. Too tragic. But we’re all listening now.