While the seismic cultural impact of The Beatles has burned Liverpool into the world’s consciousness forever and a day, the Merseybeat phenomenon produced few other artists who stayed the creative course.
However, if there’s one Merseybeat-era reputation out there crying out for re-establishment, then it’s surely the overlooked genius of the sadly late JIMMY CAMPBELL. Having initially made a name for himself as the founding member of The Kirkbys (a highly respectable Merseybeat outfit in their own right), he would later embrace psychedelic pop when he founded The 23rd Turn Off, make a highly-prized Power Pop album with Rockin’ Horse (with long-time friend and cohort Billy Kinsley) and embark on a short-lived solo career straddling the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. This brief but mercurial period yielded three largely fabulous albums for the Fontana and Phillips labels, including the gloriously sensitive ‘Son of Anastasia’ from 1969. Think Nick Drake grace laced with a little Michael Chapman grit and a spoonful of typically off-beat Scouse thinking then lie back and simply wallow.
Following a spell spent backing Chuck Berry on a European tour in the early 1970s, a disillusioned Campbell pretty much turned his back on the music industry, so the discovery of this rare-as-Hen’s-Teeth live recording from 1977 comes as quite a surprise. A low-key acoustic guitar and vocal affair recorded (incongruously)in a Liverpool club at the height of Punk, its’ gentle troubadour’s stance is a million miles from the way the commercial wind was blowing at the time, but that does little to diminish the quiet power of the material contained within.
The recording quality itself is intimate and devoid of frills, but as a historical document, ‘Live 1977’ scores from the word go. Campbell ploughs through a generous 25-song set, touching on all three of his solo albums, but with 14 previously unreleased numbers featuring, one can only wonder where Campbell might have gone should he have had the inclination to continue with his career.
It’s a testament to the confidence Campbell had in his material that none of his shoulda-been ‘greatest hits’- ‘Michaelangelo’, ‘Penny in My Pocket’ or a stripped-down take of psych-pop classic ‘Flowers are Flowering’ – make the cut. However, we do get goodies galore. From ‘Son of Anastasia’ we’re treated to the witty, acerbic folk-pop of ‘Another Vincent Van Gogh’ and the introspective beauty of ‘Lyanna’, while highlights from his ‘Half-Baked’ album include the regretful ‘Green-Eyed American Actress’ (“I’m here thinkin’ how it could’ve been/ while she’s on stage in New York”) and the gloriously world-weary title-track. Previously unreleased gems are also polished up: not least the tender and sparse ‘It Never Rains But It Pours’ and the wordy, Dylan-ish romanticism of ‘When I Cross Your Path’ which features the wonderfully fatalistic lyric: “while you’re lying prostrate on Second Avenue/ you may come round to realising there are things you just don’t do.”
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Communication is minimal. Campbell makes the occasional dry, Lennon-ish aside (“here’s the title track...if I can get through it” he mutters before cue-ing up ‘Half Baked’), but while the applause is always polite, it’s sometimes short of enthusiastic. Like most cult heroes holding court, I can imagine the cluster of die-hards at the front, but attention elsewhere drifting in and out. That’s life and that’s what you’ll get listening to any low-key recording of a folk club gig from the ‘60s and ’70.
However, we should thank our lucky stars someone kept this particular tape and it made its’ way into Mike Badger and Paul Hemmings’ safe hands at the Viper Label. As a result, ‘Live 1977’ more than proves its’ worth as both a historically vital artefact and a great tribute to a man whose work deserves to cast a far bigger shadow down the Rock’n’Roll years.
Download 'Live 1977' from The Viper Label website
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