Over the past few months, The Guardian have been running “Beginners Guides” on their music blog. For each one, they select an iconic artist with a substantial body of work, and ask readers to recommend one song with a few words to justify the choice. Then they collate the ten best responses and publish them on the music blog.
They’ve covered artists such as Led Zeppelin, Neil Young, Black Sabbath and Bob Dylan to far; they have yet to include any major prog artists, thought I’d suggest King Crimson, Rush, Van der Graaf Generator or Marillion as excellent choices for the future.
But what about the smaller bands that feature heavily on this blog? Let’s try our own version of the same thing.
We’ll start with the band I’ve written far more about than anyone else, Mostly Autumn. With ten studio albums over a decade-and-half they I think they meet the “substantial body of work” criteria.
So. Which Mostly Autumn song would you recommend to a listener unfamiliar with their work, as a good and accessible introduction to what you love about the band? Leave your response in the comments.
Assuming I do get sufficient responses, I will collate the responses here and on various social media sites, and post them, with your reasons as a blog post.
I think I would go with ‘Fading Colours’. Has a bit of everything without being too overwhelming for a newbie
It Has to be either ‘Evergreen’ or ‘Heroes Never Die’, but I do love ‘Above the Blue’ for it’s full on emotion…..on the gentler side.
The Gap is Too Wide – Honestly, this works. I’ve shown this song to a few people and they have really got into it immediately. Of course providing they are the kind of people who have patience to start with a 10+ minute track. It has the emotion of the best of Mostly Autumn’s material, it has that build-up and a great climax. Obviously there are a lot of other good MA tracks with essentially the same recipe to pick from, but this also happens to be one of my personal favourites.
Hi Tim, hope everythings fine in Reading ?
I think it will be EverGreen, it now works with LS-J, as it had done when Miss F. was around. That’s the Song most people respond. Thou’ I’d prefer Shrinking Violet. But That’s another story….
All the best,
Till december,
H, PS. Greetings from Ulli.
Tough choice – but the live version of Shrinking Violet from the Leamington CD is absolutely spellbinding and contains everything that makes Mostly Autumn special. If it has to be a studio track, Heroes and Evergreen are the obvious ones, so to avoid being too obvious, I’m going to say Carpe Diem.
I would pick different songs depending on the taste of the listener. E.g. Answer The Question for Rock, Above The Blue for singer/songwriter fans. Storms Over Still Waters is one of the few to include lead vocals from both Bryan and Heather as well as typically powerful guitar solo. A long track, but any new fan would need to get over that. But there are plenty of other songs I would put in the frame. A very difficult choice.
hard to pick just one track but would be one of the following
Spirit of autumn past part two, great catchy song with folk feel and lots of flute shows highlights the bands roots.
Storms over still water a great track that features both heathers and Brian’s vocals and and an epic guitar solo, first Mostly Autumn track I heard and I have been a fan ever since. Why is it so rarely played live?
Unquiet tears show cases the amazing voice of Olivia and pulls of the trick of sounding modern and contemporary but instantly mostly autumn.
What a difficult choice to make!
In a way the band’s new stuff and their earlier output are two very different beasts and I think any beginner’s guide would have to have elements of both. Of the newer material Deep in Borrowdale is probably representative and Hold the Sun and Top of the World showcase Bryan’s talents. But for me Wild Eyed Skies is the pick of the new material – great guitar and vocals and Anne-Marie’s wonderful harmonisation which is the making of the track.
Regarding the older stuff I would have to agree with the above posters concerning Evergreen, it has all of the quintesential Mostly Autumn elements and although it’s not a short song (which might put some folk off) it certainly worked as an introduction for me. It took just one viewing of a YouTube clip of the song to get me hooked on the band. I would also suggest The Gap is Too Wide and The Last Climb but if we’re looking for shorter songs then you can’t go far wrong with Passengers or Distant Train, the former is such a good song with a great vocal performance and the latter to showcase the band’s prog credentials, it gave me goose bumps the first time I heard it.
Seeing some really good suggestions here, and it’s nice to see them coming from right across the band’s career from the first album right through to the latest.
Keep ‘em coming.
Pocket Watch!
Removing tongue from cheek, Evergreen would my choice along with For all We Shared.
Can you elaborate on what you like about “For All We Shared”?
Underrated song which the band dropped from their live set too soon.
It’s hard not to go with “Evergreen” of “Heroes Never Die”, purely because they’re so archetypal. I think it’s one of the reasons why they stubbornly refuse to drop them!
“Mother Nature” is a good one for the prog crowd, I think. It’s got a bit of everything the band do best. Personally speaking, ones that have gone over well with non-fans in the past would include “Passengers”, “Storms…” and “The Night Sky”. They all have a great atmosphere and some inspired playing. I think you’d have to have a heart of stone not to be moved at all by “Storms…”, but it might not be the easiest intro.
I agree, For all we shared is underrated. There’s not one particular aspect I like as such, just the overall feel and sound of the song. I find it uplifting.
Collated results here.
If the listener is receptive to a new sound, and generally has good taste in music, then Mother Nature would be my choice. Its just so atmospheric. Hopefully they won’t lose patience with the longish opening section before the band really kicks in.
Like the title suggests, its a real earthy song and the sounds of rain and thunder intermittently in the background adds something special and dramatic to the song. Musically, its got everything in there that is Mostly Autumn and its a great singalong number as well. But its the closing instrumental starting at 7:30 until the end that’s, for me, MA’s finest hour. Like a meeting at a crossroads of Floyd, Genesis (good Genesis, from the 70s – not Turn It On Again) and MA. I could listen to that bit all night with Iain and the weaving guitars.
Not sure whether the band have played it with Olivia, but they should play it more often. Doesn’t have to be a 20 minute version. I would also recommend that the newbie listens to it on headphones to help focus the mind.
They did play Mother Nature on the Spring 2010 tour when Olivia first took over as lead singer but before the release of Go Well Diamond Heart. They revived “Storms” on that tour as well. Neither song has been played since, sadly.
My favourite is Heroes Never Die, yet Half the Mountain would be my other. I’m quite suprised nobody else has mentioned it yet!
Oh – I also forgot! My third favourite would be Violet Skies.
Violet Skies is a great song; shame they’ve only played it live a couple of times. Didn’t quite work, and they dropped it from the set before it really had a chance.