Possessing abundant technical gifts and delivering his doleful acerbic observations in a hybridised Yorkshire Yankee growl, Michael Chapman remains one of the most underrated singer-songwriters of the not-quite-folk-not-quite-rock boom of the early ’70s.
Hopefully a complete reissue series of his Harvest output is on the cards. In the meantime, the earliest portions of this compilation remind you that, in full flow, he was as feisty and hilarious a stage performer as John Martyn. Unfortunately the lacklustre later material, recorded with an equally lacklustre band, does him little justice.
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