Release date: June 1970
Label: RCA
Production: Sandy Robertson and Steeleye Span
Length: 38:52
Genre: British folk rock / folk rock
Rating: 7.5/10
Steeleye Span, who along with Fairport Convention are the most important names in British folk rock, formed in 1969, when bassist Ashley Hutchings left Fairport Convention to carve out his own approach to folk rock. He made the call even though Fairport Convention had just scored their big commercial breakthrough with the classic album “Liege & Lief” (1969). He was still haunted by the tragic car crash in 1968 that killed drummer Martin Lamble, while the three remaining members of the British folk rock pioneers were, luckily, only injured. With Steeleye Span, Hutchings pursued his vision of raw, elemental British folk rock, which in his view Fairport Convention had drifted much too far from in the period right before he left.
What made the original lineup of Steeleye Span, who recorded the debut “Hark! The Village Wait” in 1970, special was that Hutchings was playing ‘third wheel’ to not one but two couples: English guitarist/vocalist Tim Hart and English singer Maddy Prior, plus Irish guitarist/vocalist Terry Woods and Irish singer Gay Woods. As usually happens in situations like this, the two couples started bickering over the creative process in true soap-opera style. Once the recording of the Steeleye Span debut “Hark! The Village Wait” wrapped up, both Irish members went their own way. In the eighties, Woods became known for his work with The Pogues.
Up until “Time” (1996), which marked Woods’s brief return, “Hark! The Village Wait” was the only Steeleye Span album with two female singers. Maddy Prior, today the only original member of Steeleye Span, quickly established herself as the lead singer after Woods left, while both guitarists chipped in with a few vocal turns on individual tracks. The guest drummers were Gerry Conway and Dave Mattacks, who later made their names as members of Fairport Convention and Jethro Tull.
“Hark! The Village Wait” was a predominantly acoustic album of traditional British folk rock, packed with arrangements on mandolin, acoustic guitar, banjo and flute. Electric guitar passages were there more for show. One of the main attractions of this incarnation of Steeleye Span was the choral female vocal harmonies, which shine on tracks like “My Johnny Was a Shoemaker” and “One Night as I Lay on My Bed”. While Fairport Convention started experimenting with progressive rock elements pretty early on, Steelye Span were far more ‘traditionalist’ in their early years, which comes through loud and clear on songs like “Two Corbies”, which could just as easily have been made in the middle of the Victorian era. “Lowlands of Holland”, where the epic mandolin harmonies are the real showstopper, was one of the highlights of “Hark! The Village Wait” and one of the few tracks on the level of Fairport Convention’s “Liege & Lief” era.
On their solid debut, Steeleye Span were still learning the ropes of British folk rock and slowly shaping their own recognizable sound. “Hark! The Village Wait”, which mostly stuck strictly to the raw folk rock rulebook, did contain a few gems that later found their way into their live shows. Still, the creative rift between the two male-female ‘factions’ was felt a bit too much in places, and at times it seemed like the album had been recorded by two different bands. After the Woods couple left, Hutchings, Hart and Prior called in violinist Peter Knight, who stuck with the band for more than forty years, and guitarist/organist Martin Carthy for the new version of Steeleye Span, and the two of them gave the cult band stability, at least for a while.
Review by: Peter Podbrežnik
Track list:
1. A Calling-On Song (1:12)
2. The Blacksmith (3:40)
3. Fisherman’s Wife (3:14)
4. Blackleg Miner (2:47)
5. Dark-Eyed Sailor (5:58)
6. Copshawholme Fair (2:34)
7. All Things Are Quite Silent (2:39)
8. The Hills Of Greenmore (4:01)
9. My Johnny Was A Shoemaker (1:11)
10. Lowlands Of Holland (6:00)
11. Twa Corbies (2:06)
12. One Night As I Lay On My Bed (3:30)
Steeleye Span:
Ashley Hutchings – bass guitar
Maddy Prior – lead vocals, backing vocals, 5-string banjo
Tim Hart – lead vocals, backing vocals, guitar, 5-string banjo, electric, lead (4) & backing vocals, guitar (2,4,7,8), 5-string banjo (3), electric dulcimer, whistle, harmonium
Terry Woods – guitar, mandola, 5-string banjo, concertina and mandolin, backing vocals
Gay Woods – lead vocals, backing vocals, autoharp, concertina, bodhrán
Guest musicians:
Gerry Conway – drums (2,3,5,6,7,8)
Dave Mattacks – drums (4,10,11,12)
