No Roses

by Richie UnterbergerShirley Collins' collaboration with the Albion Country Band for No Roses is considered a major event in the history of British folk and British folk-rock. For it was the first time that Collins, roundly acknowledged as one of the best British traditional folk singers, sang with electric accompaniment, and indeed one of the first times that a British traditional folk musician had "gone electric" in the wake of Dave Swarbrick joining Fairport Convention and Martin Carthy joining Steeleye Span. The album itself doesn't sound too radical, however. At times it sounds something like Fairport Convention with Shirley Collins on lead vocals, which is unsurprising given the presence of Ashley Hutchings on all cuts but one, and Richard Thompson and Simon Nicol on most of the selections (Dave Mattacks plays drums on a few tracks for good measure). The nine songs are almost wholly traditional tunes with Collins' arrangements, with perhaps a jauntier and folkier mood than that heard in early-'70s Fairport, though not much. It's more impressive for Collins' always tasteful smoky vocals than for the imagination of the material, which consolidates the sound of the more traditional wing of early-'70s British folk-rock.