She is going to play tonight at the Mousonturm (thank you, Andreas for the tip) in Frankfurt. Probably she will play mostly her new very good album You Are Free. But I wouldn't mind seeing her perform my two favourites of hers which almost made me cry when I listened to them today. The terrific Nude as the News and the hypnotic Cross-Bones Style.

Somehow in her purity and other-worldiness she reminds me of Nick Drake. I had Northern Sky in my waking ear this morning and had to listen to it together with the whole of Bryter Layter. Northern Sky is almost a lush song in Nick Drake's œuvre. I don't mean that in terms of production. Maybe the piano which is played by John Cale makes the difference. There is a lucidity and serenity in this song I absolutely adore. Nick Drake seems to have found the joy in his melancholy. Just the first lines:

radiate an inner beauty I can't resist.

I also noted that on Hazey Jane II, another perfect song from this album, Richard Thompson played the lead guitar. Untypically for Drake the feel of this song is very American, very Western. The characteristic lead guitar play to me sounds a lot like a guitar heroe who was going to emerge about eight years later: Mark Knopfler. Richard Thompson must have been a very strong influence for him.

The three instrumentals on Bryter Layter are also grand cru. My faves are the title track (a mystification of Brighter Later, I suppose) and especially the closer Sunday with the wonderful and wise impressionist flute theme. The strings fit in there perfectly.

In the end I was surprised how much I liked the record as in my memory it was the least appealing of his due to the over-production with strings and stuff. But even the women background choir on the self-mocking Poor Boy somehow made sense though I really hate these kind of choirs. One of these Things First was another stand-out in the simplicity of the tune and the almost surreal lyrics:

reminding me a little of the incarnation of a chanson d'amour which is Jacques Brel's Ne Me Quitte Pas.

It is really sad that there are no albums made like that anymore today. And the jazzy Bryter Later from 1970 is even Nick Drake's weakest album.

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