The Free Design

小简介 The free Design一支来自纽约的家庭乐队，成员Chris，Bruce，Sandy及Ellen Dedrick早于1967年推出首张专辑《Kites Are Fun》，凭着主音天籁之声、完美无瑕的演奏技巧再加上出色的编写歌曲才能为人们带来一首首扣人心弦的乐章。乐曲风格属于soft-pop-psychedelic，带点迷幻的folk song，也有人将他们定位为sunshine pop，优美的旋律用上大量的管弦乐。在当时竞争激烈的流行音乐界，纵使有超乎水准的录音技术和各方音乐高手的鼎力相助，the free Design也终未能树立起旗帜，1972年推出专辑《There Is A Song》后便告别了乐坛。 The commercial failure of the Free Design remains one of the most baffling mysteries in the annals of pop music — with their exquisitely celestial harmonies, lighter-than-air melodies and blissful arrangements, the groups records were on par with the work of superstar contemporaries like the Beach Boys, the Association and the Cowsills, yet none of their singles even cracked the Hot 100. The Free Design originally comprised siblings Chris, Bruce and Sandy Dedrick, natives of Delevan, New York whose father Art served as a trombonist and arranger with Vaughn Monroe; when Chris moved to New York City in 1966 to attend the Manhattan School of Music, he recruited Bruce (now living on Long Island) and Sandy (a teacher in Queens) to form a folk group, and soon the trio emerged as a popular attraction on the Greenwich Village coffeehouse circuit. In time Chris began composing original material for the Free Design to perform, and with the assistance of their father, the siblings cut a demo, ultimately signing with producer Enoch Lights audiophile label Project 3. The title track from their 1967 debut LP Kites Are Fun was also their first single, cracking the Top 40 on the Billboard adult contemporary chart but reaching only number 114 on the pop chart — somewhat amazingly, it was the Free Designs biggest hit. Another Dedrick sister, Ellen, joined the group after graduating high school, making her debut on 1968s You Could Be Born Again. 2002—A Hit Song, from 1969s Heaven/Earth, satirically addressed the Free Designs continuing inability to make a commercial impact, but still the groups chart woes continued, and with their next effort, 1970s Songs for Very Important People, they targeted a new audience — children. Stars/Time/Bubbles/Love, also released in 1970, returned the Free Design to their adult constituency; after issuing One by One two years later, the group was dropped by Project 3, at which time they relocated from New York to Canada. There Chris Dedrick recorded a solo album, Be Free, which went unreleased; signing to the Ambrotype label, the Free Design recorded one final LP, 1973s There Is a Song, before disbanding in 1975. In the years to follow, Chris remained the most musically active sibling, forming the choral ensemble Star Scape Singers as well as arranging and composing for the Canadian Brass. He also won a series of Gemini Awards for his scores for Canadian film and television productions. By the 1990s, hipster favorites including Cornelius, Pizzicato 5 and Louis Philippe were regularly citing the Free Design as a key influence, resulting in the 1998 release of Kites Are Fun: The Best of the Free Design. The new millennium saw the Free Design convene for another album — 2001s Cosmic Peekaboo — which gathered Sandy, Chris, and Bruce Dedrick back together again.