Originally Posted by tore

Hatfield and the North - Hatfield and the North (1974)



Hatfield and the North's debut is, for me, the quintessential Canterbury album. It has Richard Sinclair singing on it (as Anteater has called him, the "voice of Canterbury") and a guest appearance by Robert Wyatt, whimsical song themes, avant-gardeness with a jazzy flavour sometimes coupled with a Caravanish pop sensibility and a very .. Canterbury-ish sound.

For me, at first it came across as a bit of a chaotic album. They have a lot of strange ideas pulling the songs in different directions. Still, the album is very comfortable on the ears. As the album becomes just a little more familiar and some order is structured from the initial chaos, it becomes a magnificent record, a true Canterbury classic.