Back Where You Began
Nick Drake’s storied debut, replete with unheard material over four packed discs? Get ready for The Making Of Five Leaves Left.
IN MID-JUNE 1969, Nick Drake visited his sister Gabrielle in her London flat to hand her a just-finished copy of his debut album,Five LeavesLeft. Unaware that her brother’s quest to make a record was so far advanced, she was startled when he threw it onto her bed with no more fanfare than “well, there you are.”
For many listeners, Five Leaves Left also hits like a bolt from the blue, a record that seems to have fallen from the sky – or at least the mind of a 20-yearold singer-songwriter – perfectly formed. A different but equally compelling story unfolds with The Making Of Five Leaves Left, a meticulously compiled four-disc collection of unreleased recordings harvested from the 13-month period where Drake, producer Joe Boyd, engineer John Wood and Drake’s fellow Cambridge student and string arranger Robert Kirby intermittently worked on the album.
Outtakes from London’s Sound Techniques studio and a newly discovered amateur tape culminate in the original LP. It’s dynamic musical storytelling that not only traces the record’s evolution but gently reframes Drake – who died in 1974 at the age of 26 – as a creature of flesh, blood and strong musical opinions rather than an ethereal acoustic ghost.