"The folkies did not take to him; they wanted songs with choruses. They completely missed the point. He didn't say a word the entire evening. It was actually quite painful to watch. I don't know what the audience expected, I mean, they must have known they weren't going to get sea–shanties and sing-alongs at a Nick Drake gig"
.. that's folk singer Michael Chapman remembering Nick Drake.
John Martyn, a fellow songwriter who also knew him later described Drake as "the most withdrawn person he'd ever met".
Nick Drake was an enigma. His life ended at just 26 years old in 1974 by a medicanal overdose to help the suffering from depression and insomnia. It can't be described as suicide yet he seemed to have given up on life.
Ignored by most audiences during his days playing the colleges and small gigs in the late 60's and early seventies, partly due to his complete lack of spoken communication with the audience and partly his music was as quiet and inward as his on stage persona. A self-taught guitarist he used alternative tunings, which he meticulously tuned and retuned from one song to the other. The songs were plaintiff and somber. He seemed so inwardly focused it was like he just forgot there was an audience. In the main they just forgot about him.
He released three albums none of which sold many at the time. After the release of his third (1972's Pink Moon), he withdrew from both live performance and recording, retreating to his parents' home in rural Warwickshire where he died two years later.
Over two decades later these three albums were discovered to hold some of the most sensitive and melancholy songwriting put to record and a whole new audience heard his music for the first time. They now touched people who, somehow were sharing his deeply personal vision.
This excellent video is posted by his record label Island Records, and whoever had made it must have seen this as a small tribute to that lost soul. There's no known video footage of Drake only photographs.
19th June 1948 was Nick Drake's birthday and that's worth remembering through one of his now most well known songs "River Man" from the album "5 Leaves Left". A song that demonstrates the melancholy and inner thoughts that have now connected with many other people around the world.
Nick Drake did eventually get his songs to be heard.
