Roy Harper – Flat Baroque and Berserk (Harvest 1970)

Fourth album by this brilliant, but sadly overlooked artist. ‘Flat Baroque and Berserk’ is generally regarded as one of his finest albums ever, and it’s hard to disagree on that. The songwriting is up to his usual standards from this time period, and that means it’s almost unmatched within the whole folk genre. The most famous song here (or should I say infamous?) is ‘I Hate The White Man’, which is a classic. Biting lyrics on this one of course, and it’s also musically powerful. It should not be overlooked how fantastic this folk legend was as a vocalist and acoustic guitar player, as well as a songwriter. Vocally, he could go from the most low key and fragile singing you can image, to angry and explosive – almost like a folkrock version of the progrock legend Peter Hammill! That quality is demonstrated to full effect on the aforementioned song, but also on the closing song ‘Hell’s Angels’ – the only rock oriented song on an otherwise quiet and very atmospheric album. Personally I prefer Roy Harper in ‘apocalyptic folk mode’, which is just what you get to hear on gems like ‘Song of The Ages’, ‘Francesca’, ‘Davey’ and not at least ‘Another Day’ – just to name a few of the incredibly haunting songs on this classic album. ‘Flat Baroque and Berserk’ will be a great first album to check out from this unique artist, but personally I think his next album was even stronger.