Black Sheep Boy by Tim Hardin.

Today I thought I would talk about an album I bought recently. It is called Black Sheep Boy by Tim Hardin. It is an eighteen-song compilation designed as an introduction to his work. On the internet I saw that December 29^th was the 40^th anniversary of Tim’s death. He sadly died of a heroin overdose at the age of 39. I did know about Tim Hardin, mainly because he wrote such songs as Reason To Believe by Rod Stewart and If I Were A Carpenter which I knew by Bobby Darin and The Four Tops but I was not very familiar with his own work  as a singer-songwriter in his own right. My curiosity was aroused, and I looked him up on YouTube and liked what I heard, particularly a song called Lady Came From Baltimore. I decided to order an album and chose this one because I thought it would contain his best songs.

I will not tell you about every song because I cannot think of anything to say about some of them. I do like most of them though. Right from the opening title song Black Sheep Boy you get a sense of melancholia in Tim’s voice which pervades nearly all the songs. You can tell that he was not a happy person. I wonder if that was due to his heroin habit which he acquired in Asia when he was in the marine corps, or did he seek out drugs because he was unhappy? The first song shows what a good guitar player he was. Tim also plays piano on some of the tracks. It’ll Never Happen Again has string arrangements which I think were added by the producer Eric Jacobsen who you might know from the Lovin’ Spoonful. I read in the notes that Tim didn’t like the added strings. I don’t mind them. Misty Roses has a kind of Latin Jazz feel to it which I like. Stan Getz and Astrid Gilberto came into my mind. Red Balloon reminded me a lot of his big hit If I Were A Carpenter which strangely is not included in this collection. I recognised How Can We Hang On To A Dream because it was covered by British Prog-Rock band The Nice who featured Keith Emerson. It is a great song. I think I like Lady Came From Baltimore because it tells a story. I like storytelling in songs. I found a video of Tim singing it on UK television with none other than Twiggy which I found surprisingly good. I shared it to this page if you want to hear it. Most of the songs are quite short, around two minutes. The longest and the only live song is You Upset The Grace Of Loving When You Lie.

One of my favourite songs is Tribute To Hank Williams. It reminded me for some reason of Song For Woody by Dylan. I expect Tim recognised a kindred spirit in Hank who was another soul tortured by substance abuse. I think Tim’s version of Reason To Believe is the best one. Rod’s version is great, but Tim’s has the authentic emotion of living it himself. The very last track Unforgiven is also one of the best, an emotional song with piano accompaniment.  When I was reading about Tim on Wikipedia, I discovered something interesting. In the Autumn of 1968 Tim and Van Morrison shared a double bill for a residency at a club in Greenwich Village. They would have known each other as well because they both lived in Woodstock. The club was called the Café Au Go Go. At the very same time Van was recording Astral Weeks in New York. 

It makes me wonder if Van watched Tim perform, or maybe even jammed with him. If so, did Tim Influence Van in any way, even subliminally?. There is an underlying feeling of melancholy in the songs on Astral Weeks which is not quite as evident in earlier recordings of the songs. I cannot see much similarity from this album of Tim’s except maybe the flute playing on Speak Like A Child reminded me a little bit of John Payne’s flute playing on Astral Weeks. I am probably looking for things that aren’t there. Anyway, I am very pleased that I bought this great CD by the brilliant but tragic Tim Hardin.