In late 1969, an almost completely unknown singer-songwriter, Nick Drake, made a series of rare public appearances. A perfectionist, he spent too long tuning his guitar, mumbled a few, almost inaudible, words between each song and barely looked up. The audience in the bars of the North of England, carried on loudly eating and chatting, largely ignoring this strange, painfully shy figure on stage.
How often we miss such rare moments of magic! For now, Nick Drake holds a mythical status for those lucky enough to discover him.
I discovered him as a teenager and listened obsessively to his three albums: Five Leaves Left, Bryter Layter, and Pink Moon into my late twenties – an age that Nick was never to reach. He died of a prescription drugs overdose at 26, a possible suicide, after struggling with deep depression.
Of course, the darkness and melancholy are there, and yet, what a joy it is to hear him play the guitar – his unique style of unmatched precision. And what a joy it is too, to hear such sensitivity – In ‘Northern Sky’ he sings:
‘I never felt magic crazy as this
I never saw moons, knew the meaning of the sea
I never held emotion in the palm of my hand
Or felt sweet breezes in the top of a tree
But now you’re here
Brighten my northern sky.’
The sky here both an inner landscape and the grey northern skies of England.
For those who fall in love with his music, as I did, his life is heartbreakingly detailed in an aptly named documentary ‘A Skin too Few: The Days of Nick Drake’. As it starts, a fan says: ‘I think of Nick and it makes me think of home.’
