(A collage of both Hatfield and the North album covers; Image created by Jesse Koblin )
Hatfield and The North (Virgin Records; Virgin – V2008 and A1M, recorded at The Manor Studios in 1973, initially issued February or March, 1974)
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Hatfield and the North are:
Phil Miller – electric guitar and acoustic guitars
Dave Stewart – Fender Rhodes electric piano, Hammond organ, Hohner Pianet, piano, tone generator, Minimoog
Richard Sinclair – bass guitar, vocals
Pip Pyle – drums, percussion
Guest musicians:
Robert Wyatt – vocals
Barbara Gaskin – vocals
Amanda Parsons – vocals
Ann Rosenthal – vocals
The so-called “Canterbury sound” is a unique and idiosyncratic blend of rock, jazz and a pure English sensibility like nothing else in music. It grew from Canterbury, Kent in England during the early 1970s, where a roster of core musicians incestuously jetted between the same fusion bands and conjured a soup of cosmic rock-n’-roll grounded in British humor. No band or album more exemplifies the Canterbury Sound’s odd beauty than the self-titled first album of Hatfield and The North. During a short existence from 1972-1975 (and a later brief reunion), Hatfield and The North released two albums that epitomize the sensibility of Canterbury, and distill the brilliant music of this place in space and time for future generations to enjoy. And enjoyment is a key concept here – miraculously, the band’s music is unrepentantly experimental and individualistic, yet totally pleasing and unabrasive. This is a delicate balance, yet Hatfield and the North walk the tightrope between noodling jammy psychedelia and humorous melodic vision, keeping the music experimental without fully veering into the dissonant avant-garde.
1974’s album Hatfield and The North is the ideal place to start exploring their work. Even though it’s a debut album, the band had already developed a sophisticated vocabulary and sonic vision that reflected the involvement of key musicians in 70’s English music. Foremost is Richard Sinclair, whose mellifluous voice is a distinctive component – relaxed, charismatic, warm, and yes, totally British. Sinclair’s contribution is central to Hatfield and the North’s sound, just as it was during his previous work with Caravan (check out the all-time classic, In the Land of the Grey and Pink). His singing is unorthodox, sometimes failing on high notes or blundering through a chord; but these vocals are never unpleasant, positioning Sinclair’s performances as both delightful and earnest. Because Sinclair’s voice is so unique, it may be easy to overlook his bass playing. With Hatfield and the North, the virtuosity and strong sound of the bass is very much equal to the other instruments.
Sinclar’s backing band is just as strong, composed of a cooperative who’s-who of Canterbury Scene auteurs. In Pip Pyle, Hatfield and the North had an ideal drummer to bridge their rock and jazz influences. Pyle has a loose swinging time, he never overplays and always contributes interesting and varied textures to the music. An unheralded great! On keyboards, Dave Stewart is a renowned player in Canterbury music, and his battery of varied synth sounds are by turns whimsical and energetic. Stewart went on to form National Health and also made key albums with Bill Bruford (profile by TNB here), where his distinctive keyboard performances always stand out. Finally, Phil Miller’s guitar is an invaluable sonic tool lending the band myriad sounds, whether it’s texture and melody, or pure rock, such as on “Rifferama.”
So let’s turn to the album that is the centerpiece of this post. Recorded by Richard Branson’s fledgling Virgin label, the band was provided time and budget that allowed them to realize their vision. And what a vision it is! Hatfield and the North is a continuous opus, its songs both musically and thematically bridged together into a fevered journey. A protean movability tugs the music between acrid, jubilant, and angelic based on instrumental accompaniment and texture. Repeated melodic motifs and instrumental sounds wind throughout the track list, each appearance carrying specific narrative implications. For example, the “Big Jobs” melody (from the first full song on the album) recurs throughout the album, a melancholic downbeat theme with prominent bluesy guitar and high hats falling over the track like sheets of rain; each instance punctuates the track with a stolid sort of loneliness, establishing thematic continuity subconsciously. Reversed synth notes and awkward atonal crooning are transitional markers at the beginnings of songs, each appearance prefacing a new musical expedition. Horns signify hysteria, choir vocals are transcendence; a growling low-pitch synth summons terror, while high-pitch is euphoria. Perhaps the most notable thematic passage on the record comes at the center of “Shaving is Boring,” where the track progresses from bass-led elevator music to an uptempo jam suffused with anguish evoked by distorted guitar reverb. Suddenly, the jam abruptly stops as we hear the cassette the music is playing on being removed, footsteps panning between the ears inserting different cassettes playing motifs from across the album, then abruptly cutting back into the music, where we’ve jumped to a whole new melodic palette. Music is the vessel for the album’s rich universe, conveyed through the semiotic language of an exceptionally-talented band and sonic ingenuity.
Equally integral to the record’s tonal world are Richard Sinclair’s brilliant, hermetically-British lyrics. Hatfield and the North are referential to their status as musical entertainers, grounding their music in its own diegetic world. Foregrounding the entire record is the couplet from “Big Jobs,” “We try our best to make it sound nice / and hope that the music turns you on to our latest LP,” presenting the album as an enclosed, cogent work, and Sinclair as the omnipotent shepherd of its musical stylings, confident in purring acousmetre. On the song’s latter restatement and album closer, “Big Jobs No. 2,”, Sinclair’s character returns to announce that he’d like to sing this track “in a Hatfield style,” expressing his desire “to sing our songs and entertain.” This Fielding-esque narratorial self-reference bolsters the album’s erudite charm. Equally, the lyrics are suffused with twee musings on creature comforts and kitsch as well as morbid moments of self-loathing. On “Fitter Stoke Has a Bath,” Sinclair muses that he’s “happy just to sit around at home” with his wife “Pamela looking elegant and writing prose” – in the next line, he states “If anyone’s in need of me / I’m drowning in the bathroom.” The next verse of the song is sung submerged, distorted vocals and crackling synth warbling evoking the sudsy demise. The sardonic interplay of faux politeness and abrupt violence is deeply English, especially when abetted by whimsey. My favorite song was recorded on the same sessions but released as a separate single (as was the English custom – most of the great singles from 60s and 70s English bands did not appears on their LP’s). “Let’s Eat (Real Soon)” speaks from the perspective of a sentient toaster strudel, remarking “I’ll be tasty Mr. Pastry / Wouldn’t that be lovely?” The song’s instrumentation emulates a cheesy food commercial, complete with a straightforward drum meter and hokey rhythm piano. Few bands could pull off such a mix of unabashed musical joy and parody; Sinclair imploring “I’m vitamin-enriched / What’s more, I’m absolutely wholesome” amounts to absolute musical delight. Similarly, the aptly-named “Gigantic Land Crabs In Earth Takeover Bid” leaves nothing to the imagination, drawing on the dramatic juvenile ephemera of 1950’s sci-fi pulps. This band and record are unique and intoxicating; humorous, joyful, light, and paradoxically morbid, the record’s characteristic lyrical approach punctuates the fevered delirium of its cosmic musical arrangements. Give Hatfield and The North a listen with open ears and a mind open to its peculiar charms, and you will come away enchanted.
More Hatfield and the North:
Once you’re dug into what makes the music on Hatfield and the North’s first album so special, there are lots of adjacent avenues to explore:
Classic Album Cover. The album cover and inside fold compound the music’s thematic weight. The cover of Hatfield and the North depicts a sleepy, bucolic vignette of the Icelandic city Reykjavik, flanked overhead by a pink-hued rendition of Luca Signorelli’s 16th-century painting “The Damned” superimposed over the sky. The image of pastoral life, rows of desolate marshes and homesteads clashing with Signorelli’s supernatural lattice of bodies contorted by demons evoke the album’s meeting of quaint English folksiness with frenzied psychedelia and sardonicism. You can read a terrific blog post about the making of this cover here.
How they got their name. A band’s name can be so important to its mystique and part of its bond with the listener. One of many things about the band that is a bit cryptic and irredeemably British, Hatfield and the North is a reference to the road signs out of London, pointing to the A1 motorway – in the 1970s, they simply said “The North.” The current signs still have the same language, which you can see in this picture:
A look forward. If you’re digging Hatfield and the North, definitely listen to the rest of their slim but uniformly excellent discography. Their only other studio album is The Rotter’s Club, released in 1975, which manicures their discography with a shorter, stripped-back sophomore project wearing jazz and prog-rock influences on its sleeve. The Rotter’s Club is a formidable record, boasting an arguably-improved rendition of “Fitter Stoke Has a Bath,” the infectiously anthemic “Share It,” and the side-long sonic edifice “Mumps: Your Majesty Is Like A Cream Doughnut.” Nonetheless, there is an unadulterated charm to the self-titled record’s incendiary freshman mania and raconteur narration that is lost in The Rotter’s Club’s pursuit of aesthetic refinement. After their second album, the group broke up due to poor album sales and the constraints of band life, but they re-banded in 1990 with Sophia Domancich in place of Dave Stewart and recorded the excellent Live 1990.
And a look back. If you dig Richard Sinclair’s voice as much as we do, then you need to listen to the classic Caravan album which Sinclair made before he joined Hatfield and the North, In The Land of Grey and Pink. This 1971 album is arguably the high water mark of the Canterbury sound, and when you hear Sinclair sing on the album’s opener, “I chanced upon a golf girl, selling cups of tea,” you’ll never forget its quirky charm.
