Stephen Hunt wrote this review which first ran on Green Man Review.
Belfast man Colin Harper is a music writer whose work regularly appears in Mojo magazine and The Independent, and The Irish Times newspapers. He’s also undoubtedly the world’s biggest Bert Jansch fan, and has contributed to two Jansch-based television documentaries, Acoustic Routes, and Dream Weaver.
Harper was born in 1968, so he wasn’ta first-hand observer of the events and times that take up the bulk of this book. Far from being a disadvantage, however, this puts Harper in an unprejudiced position to approach his subject. Remember, it’s often said that if you remember the ’60s you weren’tthere.
Harper wasn’t, so doesn’t have to rely on failing memory. Several years of research, countless hours of interviews and reams of correspondence lie at the heart of Dazzling Stranger. A cursory glance at the acknowledgements section reads like a who’s who of ’60s folk (and beyond) music — Andy Irvine, Robin Williamson, Christy Moore, Anne Briggs, Martin Carthy, Dick Gaughan, Jacqui McShee, Donovan, Ashley Hutchings, Ralph McTell, Pete Townshend … They all remember the ’60s, and not always for the same reasons. When you add in the contributions of Jansch’s various friends, wives, lovers, critics, admirers and adversaries (and of course Jansch himself), then the sheer scale of Harper’s achievement becomes apparent.
Somehow, miraculously, Harper manages to find a navigable route through the impenetrable string-tangle, (hats off to John Renbourn!) of a scene, which was too busy spontaneously happening to bother recording itself accurately. Harper has seemingly checked every detail before committing it to print.
Compare this book with David Hajdu’s Positively 4th Street, which touches on similar territory. In Hajdu’s book there’s a photograph of Bob Dylan playing at The Troubadour club with Martin Carthy. Carthy’s credited as an unknown musician. Harper would have found out what song they were playing, how many were in th audience and who was selling the tickets on the door.
For all its painstaking scholarship Dazzling Stranger is still first and foremost a thoroughly entertaining read. How could it be anything else when the central character’s lived such an extraordinary life packed with wine, women and song? A man who recorded his first album on a borrowed guitar and might have ended up as a market gardener?
Picture a young Bert riding the coach down to London from Edinburgh with Robin Williamson. Picture yourself bleary-eyed at three A.M. in a dingy Soho cellar listening to three blokes called Bert, Martin and Jimi picking blues tunes on acoustic guitars. Picture the backstage scenes after a huge Pentangle concert….
This book performs the remarkable trick of making its readers seriously nostalgic for times that they’e never known. It’s unquestionably the finest work yet published in the field of British folk and blues, and it’s highly unlikely that it’ll ever be bettered. Of course, if you were there, and can add to Mr Harper’s vast knowledge then I’m sure that he’d love to hear from you. I wouldn’t put it past him to come up with a revised and expanded, version in a few years’ time. True labours of love are never really over.
(Bloomsbury, 2000)
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