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Neighbourhood Songs,Melanie,2024
I was deeply affected by news of Melanie‘s death in January 2024. I’d been a fan ever since Brand New Key charted on the first day of 1972; over the next two years, her work was rarely off my turntable. As an early teenager, I came of age to Melanie and her unique theatrical, soul-baring songs. Yes, I was a big fan of the cover photo on Gather Me too. Melanie set the bar incredibly high.
Moving on a couple of decades… After the first interview in 1989, there were several more over the years, as well as an occasional to-and-fro via email. For years, our intermittent conversations would always end up with two big ‘what ifs’ – the Melanie-sanctioned biography, and the Melanie box set.
“I know it’ll happen,” she’d say of the book. The box set, however, was always going to be a tough nut to crack, given the confused paper-trail concerning her old contracts and copyrights.
Now the good news. Dave Thompson, who took over Melanie’s management last year, is now busy working on that much-needed biography. Having had the pleasure of editing Dave’s work while at Record Collector magazine back in the 80’s/90s, I know he’ll do a great job in chronicling her life and reassessing her work.
While we wait for that, a box set – all six discs of it complete with essays by Dave and myself - is already here. The result of painstaking research by Dave and Easy Action label boss Carlton Sandercock, with Melanie enthusiastically helping with tapes and advice, Neighbourhood Songs is both a fans’ paradise and a perfect introduction to the singer at her peak during the 60s and 70s.
The set’s stunning cover photo popped up from the Melanie archive. Similarly, much of the material here has been sourced from under ground. Even that which may be familiar sounds fresh thanks to the efforts made in cleaning up the tapes and acetates.
Neighbourhood Songs kicks off with Beautiful People, surely Melanie’s Imagine, though written several years before the Lennon song. It ends with her on a 1951 TV show aged four singing Gimmie A Little Kiss.
Sandwiched between are more than 100 reasons why Melanie stands alone as one of the most singular artists of her times - with a voice like no other, songwriting that brings new meaning to the phrase ‘bare all’ and a style that takes in Piaf and Baez, Lotte Lenya and Jean Ritchie, nursery rhymes too. It’s an absolute treasure and an entirely fitting tribute to one of the great singers of our times. Neighbourhood Songs is available now at www.easyaction.co.uk
