Harvest Time

Barclay James Harvest is perhaps one of the most interesting and unique prog bands ever to emerge from the 70's. The music can take a million journeys through a few lush valleys of mellotron and guitar-driven rock. There's a sense of musical drama coupled with an equally dynamic stage presence that is a trademark of Barclay-James Harvest. Moreover, the band has been an audience favorite for decades and still continue to mesmerize crowds with their brand of prog signature tunes. Among these would be the lovely "Galadriel" topped with a bit of "For No One" and "The World Goes on Forever" from the Oktoberon album. "Summer Soldier" played live was a tune that really stood out for me. I'd heard some rather tasty, hard rock live stuff from them on a live radio broadcast. The show was called the King Biscuit Flour Hour and featured a live concert every weekend. Trying to find that live flavor, I came across the double live album Barclay-James Harvest Live 1974.

As a collective whole, Barclay-James Harvest's musical ability only seemed so-so and failed to impress me. I still like them very much, and they've certainly worked hard over the years, and have put out some great work in the process. Their latter works became pretty interesting, and the song "Waiting for the Right Time" is incredible. The song "Sleepy Sunday" is probably one of my absolute favorites. Songs like Suicide and "Hymn" are emotionally stirring.

70's Barclay-James Harvest gave the world some pretty interesting works though. The song Mockingbird is a timeless classic, as is "The Great 1974 Mining Disaster". The live versions of these, as well as "After the Day," and "Medicine Man," are actually quite good, though the live album is recorded poorly. Barclay-James Harvest are like prog minstrels. The songs are great, very well-written, with a twinge of familiarity almost as if you'd heard them before somewhere else. Their music was at times ethereal, but always strangely attractive. To this day I can't explain what it is that I like so much, but they have a certain atmosphere. Keyboardist and founder "Woolly" Wolstenholme eventually gave up music altogether to be a farmer, eventually re-joined the band for a bit, then later, in 2010, he took his own life. Drummer Mel Pritchard left us suddenly in 2004 from a heart attack.