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The 5000 Spirits or the Layers of the Onion

The Incredible String Band - The 5000 Spirits or the Layers of the Onion Audio CD

A fair review of the The Incredible String Band "The 5000 Spirits or the Layers of the Onion" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all The Incredible String Band reviews here, or go back to the The Incredible String Band tabs.

Band: The Incredible String Band
Title: The 5000 Spirits or the Layers of the Onion
Rating:

Release Date: 1994-05-16
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Chinese White 2: No Sleep Blues 3: Painting Box 4: Mad Hatter's Song 5: Little Cloud 6: Eyes of Fate 7: Blues for the Muse 8: Hedgehog's Song 9: First Girl I Loved 10: You Know What You Could Be 11: My Name Is Death 12: Gently Tender 13: Way Back in the 1960s

Simply Brilliant
But my Title says it all. Not many people know the Incredible String Band these days.

If you're into acoustic eclecticism, this will work for you, I'm sure.

Others have waxed eloquent enough. I'll just say it's one of my favourite, right up there with "U".

If you let the pigs decide it, they will put you in the sty
2 in my list of the greatest albums ever made. This album sits at no. It really is that good!I have been listening to this album regularly for nearly 40 years, ever since it came out, and have never tired of it. It has stood the test of time better than many better selling contemporaries for sure. There is no other album that I can say that about. I never tire of the stunning acoustic guitar work, or trying to fathom the meanings of the lyrics. Even the name of the album is brilliantly chosen. The 5000 sprirts, well yes it is very spiritual as is all good music, and looks at things from different spiritual perspectives. The Layers of the Onion, yes, it is a bit like pass the parcel. When you think you understand something, you find there is a whole new layer of meaning underneath, and even after 39 years I can't claimto have got to the bottom of it. OK some of the songs are easy. The whimsical ones, like Little Cloud and the Hedgehog Song, and obvious ones like Painting box and The first Girl I loved. But do you fully understand the Eyes of Fate or even Chinese White? I love The Mad Hatters Song, since it is very Christian, and I am a Christian. It even mentions Jesus. The First Girl I Loved seems a very personal song, and very beautiful, but one that I and I am sure many others can relate to. And even if you don't, the guitar work is stunning. I was a young man back in the 1960s always seems to me to be the one track that doesn't fit. It is pure science fiction! Not particularly spiritual, or with any great depth, or with many "layers" but it could have been the basis of a novel. Yes it is a great album. If you don't know it buy it. But be warned, it is something you either love or hate. My wife does not like it at all, but then there are certain instruments she can't stand, and I think the oud is one (bagpipes is another, but there are not bagpipes on the 5000 spirits) My favourite of all of the ISB albums. Just in case you are wondering which is the one album I consider betterthan this , it is Pink Floyd's "Wish you were here".

Their Most Famous, but not their best. I still love it!
But, like the Jefferson Airplane about the same time with `Surrealistic Pillow', it is with this album that the duo of Robin Williamson and Mike Heron made an impact on the overheated world of popular music that was the mid-1960's. `The 5000 Spirits or The Layers of the Onion' (5000 Spirits) by the new (in 1967) duo known as The Incredible String Band (TISB) is, surprisingly, not their first album.

The easiest way to point out the company this album was in is to cite a 1968 newspaper review of the album which compared it favorably to the very summit of pop music at that time, the Beatle's epochal `Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band'. On the one hand, there is no question in my mind that this album is NOT as good as `Sergeant Pepper. . . '. And yet, we are still listening to both albums today.

In the 1960's, I was following avant-garde / rock music about as closely as you can imagine, without actually playing an instrument. My great ambition was to discover new groups that would succeed commercially and artistically, before that great success actually happened. The source of my belief in my ability to do this lay in my having decided, on hearing Barbara Streisand's first album, while still in high school, that this singer will go far. Lo and behold, by her third album, she was sharing stages with Ethel Merman and Judy Garland. I would go on to successfully `discover' David Bowie, James Taylor, the J. Geils Band, and Rod Stewart upon hearing their first solo albums released in the United States.

Until I heard this TISB album, based on the strong review, I had not heard much of the English folk genre except to Donovan Leitch, who was billed as the English Dylan. So, I immediately and correctly connected the style of TISB with the mystical / mythical / trippy style of Donovan. And, every time I encountered a contemporary British folk act, I was anticipating something sounding like TISB. In retrospect, I'm really happy that groups such as Fairport Convention and The Pentangle did not sound like TISB, because the thing they did was just as enjoyable in itself and better than a wan copy of some other band, although there was a fair amount of mutual influence being passed around among these bands and from Mr. Dylan from across the pond.

Oddly enough, `5000 Spirits. . . ' also has a lot in common with `Sergeant Pepper. . . ', especially with songs such as `Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds' and `For the Benefit of Mr. Kite'. According to the Beatles, both songs are simply inspirations from pictures drawn by young Julian Lennon in the first case and a circus poster in the second case. Many of Heron and Williamson's songs have that same sense of being about nothing more than whimsy, especially Heron's `Painting Box', `Little Cloud', and `The Hedgehog's Song'. On the other hand, this judgment may be making them less interesting than they really are, especially as `Painting Box' is something of a love song.

This is not an album of great songs. `When I'm 64', `A Little Help From My Friends', and especially `A Day in the Life' are great songs. There is nothing like these classics on this album. Even among the whole TISB body of work, there are songs from other albums that stick in the head with more staying power than any song on this album. In fact, while it is not a GREAT song, I went to the trouble of memorizing the Gilbert and Sullivan homage, `The Minotaur's Song' from TISB's next album, `The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter'. The only song from this album which brings an `oh yes!' to my heart when I hear this album is the finisher, `Way Back in the 1960's with its parody of Bob Dylan and of 1960's oldsters reaction to the hippie counterculture of that time.

And yet, this album has great value in that if it were not for it's critical success, there may not have been all those other great TISB albums to come. Few albums can quite bring back the sense of the 1960's as this one.
.

"I'm not the kind to complain.."
. . about this album. It's brilliant! Robin is a genius and Mike not far behind him! They are a very overrated duo of songwriters. Folk-rock never sounded so good, I swear. Bob Dylan and The Chioeftans must love them! Highlights on the album are:

"Chinese White"-surreal, love the bowed gimbri
"No Sleep Blues"-funny lyrics. Do you just to snore?
"Blues For The Muse"-the best song on the album, bluesy and great, Mike harmonica and Robin's lyrics are perfect!
"The Hedgehog's Song"-Mike, you've got quite the sense of humor. I keep imagining Sonic the hedgehog in this.
"First Girl I Loved"-their best known song, beautiful.
"Way Back In The 1960s"-great way to end the album! Love the lyrics!
You need this album, verrry bad.

ONE OF 'THE' GROUNDBREAKING RECORDINGS OF THE 1960s
With the appearance of this album, THE 5,000 SPIRITS or THE LAYERS OF THE ONION, there could be little doubt that something special had been born. With the release of their eponymous first album, the Incredible String Band made it know to the music listening public that a new force had arrived - one which would inject some energy and vitality into the folk music scene in the UK and the world. The albums which were to follow over the next few years bore this out dramatically.

THE 5,000 SPIRITS was released originally in 1967 - at the height of the psychedelic music movement. One only has to look at the artists of the day, and their releases, to see the rapidly expanding imaginations and creativity at work, breaking new ground right and left. This album, I feel, stands head and shoulders above most other releases of its day, in many ways - it should be regarded as a classic for its lyrical content alone. Musically, the ISB were going places - and drawing from sources - that other artists would only dare to touch in years to come. I believe it was their long-time producer, Joe Boyd, who once said that the ISB was the original `world music' group - he couldn't have stated it better.

After the critical acclaim garnered by their first album, the trio (at the time composed of Robin Williamson, Mike Heron and Clive Palmer) split up and traveled separately. The music Robin and Mike heard (for the band had become a duo by the time this album was recorded) around the world touched their souls - they breathed it in and gave it back to there listeners, combining both vocal and instrumental styles and techniques that would most like never have met if not for their artistic explorations. Mike had begun playing the sitar, and Robin's singing clearly bears the influence of the voices he encountered in the Middle East and Asia. The two writers' heads were already bursting with poetry and ideas born in their native lands - myths from Europe and Asia mingled with other images, creating a heady concoction perfectly suited to the times. Listeners were eager to hear something new - something besides the standard pop fare of the day, love songs with `moon/June/spoon' rhymes. The ISB gave it to them in abundance.

The album is pretty evenly balanced between the two writers - an equity which would be present in most of their subsequent releases as well. Licorice McKechnie makes her first appearance with Robin and Mike on this recording - and they are assisted by Danny Thompson on bass here and there. The songs deal with a variety of subjects - even the aforementioned love songs are present, but in the ISB's own unique style.

The set opens with Mike's `Chinese white' - the bowed gimbri played by Robin on this track lets the listener know right away that things have `expanded' a bit since the band's 1966 release. `The bent twig of darkness grows the petals of the morning', sings Mike - a beautiful image worthy of traditional Asian poetry. Mike's other songs on this album run the gamut from love songs (`Painting box' and the eternally lovely `Gently tender') to humorous looks at our place in the world (`Little cloud' and `The hedgehog's song') to a song offering encouragement to the listener to reach for his full potential (`You know what you could be'). The seriousness of some of his topics is gently offset by a childlike quality that, through the ensuing years, would infuse most of his writing with an innocence that would endear it to his fans.

Robin's offerings here are for the most part more serious than Mike's - but there is humor in his writing as well, as is evidenced by `No sleep blues' and the hilarious `Way back in the 1960s'. His `First girl I loved' - covered by Judy Collins as `First boy I loved' on her WILDFLOWERS album - is simply one of the most beautiful songs ever written to a first love, looking back with honesty and tenderness on the gifts exchanged, both physical and emotional. His guitar work on this song - and, actually, throughout his career - is astonishingly creative and lovely. In 'The eyes of fate', he muses `O who can see in the eyes of Fate all life alone in its chronic pattern?' - his lyrics are, throughout this album and all to follow, insightful, probing, spiritual. He is one of the most amazingly talented writers ever to pen a verse.

There are a couple of places in the recording where the signal is over-driven - but that's to be expected, given the era from which this dates. The remastering has been done lovingly - the sound on the cd is as good or better than any edition of the lp I ever owned.

Anyone with any sort of appreciation for the musics of different parts of the world, of exploring the myths with which mankind has explained the unexplainable, who has ever asked the really deeply rooted, `half-remarkable' questions, will find in the music and lyrics of the Incredible String Band the voices of kindred spirits of the closest order. This album - and, indeed, everything they released up until about 1970 (and they produced a lot of music in that short span) - is as beautiful and relevant today as when it first appeared. Moreover, there are still those who will never `catch up' to them.

The band continued to experiment and expand into the follow-up album, THE HANGMAN'S BEAUTIFUL DAUGHTER, issued the following year.

You can see a complete list of all The Incredible String Band discography, or go back to the The Incredible String Band tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.