TIP OF THE TONGUE 25 JANUARY 2009
Collie Ryan
The Hour Is Now
Sebastian Speaks SSP-006
LP
OUT OF STOCK!
Massively unlikely public service here, with a single beautifully assembled LP that compiles the best tracks from the three incredible and very rare private press LPs that legendary acid-folk hippy-goddess Collie Ryan recorded in 1973. Ryan is possibly best known for her appearance on the great Ladies From The Canyon compilation, though private press fans and psych collectors have worshipped before her three solo LPs for years now. Her story is pretty incredible, moving through various communal set-ups in the 1960s and 70s until eventually living off-grid completely in an old bus in the Texas countryside, making occasional money by selling paintings done on old hubcaps. This new LP, limited to 1000 copies in hard tip-on sleeves and with all-new cover art by Ryan, revisits her amazing albums and picks winning tracks from each. The sound is stripped-down but deeply atmospheric acoustic guitar and vocals, with Ryan's weird, primitive finger-picking style copping moves from Joni Mitchell and Bert Jansch while her vocals, bathed in a beautiful deep-echo reverb, sound like beams of pure-tone, turning melancholy minor-key ballads into void-gobbling transmissions. There are very few records that seem to so perfectly articulate the daffy, drug-baked vision of the counter-culture as pure sonic experience, maybe Linda Perhacs' Parallelograms is the closest comparison, but Ryan's albums are possessed of a solitary magic, with the feel of someone who kept on believing and whose life was turned around by the revolutionary tumult of the 1960s. If you've never experienced Ryan's music this is the perfect place to start and if you already have alla the originals you're still gonna want this as it's so lovingly done it looks like the long-lost fourth volume and will sit perfectly on your shelves beside the first three. To top it all of, the sonics have been completely re-mastered by long-term VT obsession J D Emmanuel. What a package. Highly recommended.
