Song of the Day
The 1967 edition Incredible String Band strikes an autumnmal pose
The Half Remarkable Question- The Incredible String Band The success of bands like Fleet Foxes and Midlake have renewed interest in the esoteric folk sound of the Incredible String Band. ISB's primary players were a pair of Glasgow based multi-instrumentalists named Robin Williamson and Mike Heron who started ISB as a trio (with banjoist Clive Palmer) and primarily played traditional Celtic and American folk music. Clive Palmer left the group and moved to Afghanistan shortly after the first album was released.
Robin Williamson moved to Morocco for a year and studied Eastern music modalities. The result was an abrupt makeover in the sound of ISB. Their second album was influenced heavily by Eastern and North African music, as Williamson added exotic touches such as the Middle Eastern oud, Indian sitars, and tambouras began to permeate the group's sound.
ISB's music began to touch on themes of cosmic consciousness, pantheism, and arcane practices of Wicca. Some have compared ISB to Donovan, a comparison that flatters Donovan and undervalues the musical skills and the creative songwriting talents of ISB. Williams and Heron didn't yield to the pressure to make more pop oriented music as Donovan did, and eventually Donovan lost his audience by doing so.
This 1968 performance of
The Half Remarkable Question on British television, demonstrates the full force of the remarkable and unorthodox talents of the Incredible String Band.