Talk:Time of No Reply

FOLK SINGER ?!?!?!?!?

Looking at his heritage, Calling Nick Drack a "folk" singer in 2012 is beyond my understanding. Before modifying it and possibly entering a useless flame war, I'd like to hear the arguments of who wrote this page.

Please write them here. Thank you.

Descriptions need improvement

I notice someone (rightly) queried "folk singer" in 2012, and yet there's been no further comment or correction since, which is more than a little surprising. Wikipedia's main Nick Drake article calls him just a "musician", and even that's not quite right. He should surely be described as a "singer-songwriter and musician", in the same mode or mould as Bridget St John, John Martyn, Richard Thompson, Joni Mitchell etc. But I've no idea what description those wiki-bio articles actually use yet (haven't checked), so I'll crosscheck and then amend from plain "folk singer" accordingly on another day. Nick Drake had learned some initial Jackson C. Frank and Bert Jansch covers by c.1967 (evidenced in home tapes that were released on "Family Tree" in 2007) but he never took up and followed the mixed "traditional and own compositions" fork in the road that Jansch, Renbourn, Baez and other guitar players stayed with. Now I think of it, "folk singer" doesn't do justice to them either, but it's certainly 100% incorrect for Nick Drake. The other main reason for adding this note however, is because the description appended to the track listing is inaccurate. It says "Tracks 5 & 6 pre-date the Five Leaves Left sessions (October 1968)" but they don't. The album sleeve notes say all of tracks 1-6 were from the FLL sessions (1-4 being Nov-Dec, but 5-6 being Oct). The description also says "Tracks 11, 12, 13 are 3 of the so-called "final four" recordings (February 1974). The other, "Tow the Line," was recorded in July 1974", but that's not correct either. The album sleeve states that tracks 11-14 (this 1987 album's 'final four') were all recorded in Feb 1974. And Nick Drake's wiki-bio states "The initial session was followed by recordings in July 1974.", from which the "Tow The Line" recording was released on the 2004 album "Made To Love Magic". The importance of the "Time Of No Reply" compilation album has since been superceded by other later, larger compilations - but it was a significant standalone album at the time of its issue in 1987 because none of its 14 tracks had been released before, and 12 of them were effectively "new songs", never heard before. So I'll amend the descriptions to reflect this. Pete Hobbs (talk) 13:26, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

Ooops! - The album's 'final four' songs HAD been previously released - on the (UK only) 3LP 1979 "Fruit Tree" boxset compilation, and then the whole of this album was released on "5 August 1986" as disk#4 of the (US only?) 4LP/CD version of "Fruit Tree". Wikipedia's dates are confusing here, as the "Fruit Tree" article says the 1986 version was released in "the same year as the separate Time of No Reply album", and yet this article states Time of No Reply was "released March 1987" and "included as the fourth disc of the 1987 version of the Nick Drake box set Fruit Tree". That's another devil needing to be sorted out! (The devil's in the detail...). But ultimately it means that when Time Of No Reply was issued, 10 of its 14 tracks were previously unreleased and 8 of them were effectively "new songs", never heard before. And therefore still a significant addition to Nick Drake's catalogue at the time, and regarded by myself and probably many others as "his fourth album" when it came out. Pete Hobbs (talk) 14:29, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

Hi Peter, thanks for corrections to the track listing. Agree with "singer-songwriter and musician"; "folk" is all wrong and have amended accordingly. Ceoil (talk) 15:44, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

ps, re "fourth album", there is an analogy here with "Still (Joy Division album)" which contained many early demos and alt versions of existing songs, but also had three or four tracks intended for their third album, sadly abandoned after the singer's suicide. Ceoil (talk) 15:48, 3 May 2025 (UTC)