Noel Harrison
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Mount Hanley Song (1979)
LP and digital download.
If any Noel Harrison record was to be rated a 'lost classic' it would be Mount Hanley Song.
After leaving Hollywood and moving to Canada, Noel hung out with some of the country's best musicians and put together this gem of a record 10 years after The Great Electric Experiment is Over had been released.
In a change to his previous records, the majority of the songs were written by Noel himself, with only three of the 11 tracks being covers.
Stand-out tracks are Wild Child and Southward Bound, which were both written by Harrison and rank among some of the best he has ever recorded.
Another great song, and still a live favourite until his death, The Middleton Fire Brigade, is a humorous song which, strangely, tells the story of Noel's house catching fire.
Other tracks, including Spread it Around, Love Don't Come Easy, Do What You Do and Lilly also rank among some of his best songs and while the beautiful title track may only be short, it is another classic.
Track list:
Middleton Fire Brigade
Love Don't Come Easy
Wild Child
Down on the Farm
Do What You Do
Lilly
Southward Bound
The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo
Spread it Around
Buy Something Pretty For Margaret
Mount Hanley Song
Listen
Listen to and download Mount Hanley Song:
Sleeve Notes:
The Musicians
Noel Harrison: vocals, acoustic guitar and harmonica
Mendelson Joe: acoustic guitar, celeste and harmonica
Jerome Jarvis: drums and percussion
David Woodhead: bass and percussion
Michael Heydon electric guitar
Mark Rutherford: piano and flute
Ben Mink: violin
Kimberley Deschamps: steel and dobro guitars
Melody LeBlanc: Background vocals
The Great Guido Basso: trumpet and flugelhorn
This album was engineered by Ken Friesen at Eastern Sound and mastered by Mr Cub at JAMF
Cover painting and design by Mendelson Joe
Thankyou To: Margaret, Rex, David, Liz, Jay, Andre, Larry, Brent and ultimately this record is dedicated to The Middleton Nova Scotia Volunteer Fire Department.
Produced
by
Mendelson Joe
Single:
To help promote the album, Posterity Records released the single Spread it Around, with Do What You Do as the B-side in 1979.
Makem and Clancy
In 1977, Noel appeared twice on the WENH-TV show Makem and Clancy, hosted by legendary Irish folk musicians Tommy Makem and Liam Clancy.
He performed five tracks from Mount Hanley Song - Middleton Fire Brigade, Wild Child, Down on the Farm, Lilly and Southward Bound.
The recordings from the Makem and Clancy programme are the only footage in the public domain of Noel performing tracks from Mount Hanley Song on television.
Tapes of the full shows were published on YouTube by the Ward Irish Music Archives in 2023 after they restored the original footage.
Noel did perform other tracks from Mount Hanley Song on a number of other programmes in Canada at the time.
Recordings of Noel performing live versions of Do What You Do, Spread it Around, The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo and the beautiful title track from Mount Hanley Song are known to exist in the CBS archives, but sadly they have not been made public.
For more videos from the Makem and Clancy show, go to its dedicated page.
Watch:
Watch Noel sing Middleton Fire Brigade live at East Budleigh, Devon in 2008.
Cover version:
The only known cover version of one of Noel Harrison's self-written songs was the cover of Lilly by The Shaw Brothers.
The folk duo released their version of Noel's song from the Mount Hanley Song album in 1979 as the b-side to their single, The Jogging Song - which was sold as a 'hilarious new song about America's latest craze'.
It is safe to say that Noel's version of Lilly is the better one.
You can hear the Shaw Brothers version - which was known as Lily with the Long Red Hair - here:
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