Hamish Imlach   •   Ballads of Booze

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  • Ballads of Booze
    • 1969 - Transatlantic XTRA 1094 LP (UK)
  • Side One
    1. Beer Is Best (Trad. Arr. Imlach, Murphy, Ross)
    2. The Mountain Dew (Trad. Arr. Imlach)
    3. Little Maggie (Trad. Arr. Imlach)
    4. Scottish Sabbath (MacLean)
    5. Maids When You're Young (Trad. Arr. Imlach)
    6. As Usual (Alex Zanetis, Murphy)
    7. Goodbye Booze (Trad.)
  • Side Two
    1. Drunk, Drunk Again (Ross)
    2. Twelve and A Tanner A Bottle (Fyffe)
    3. Whisky Seller (Trad. Arr. Imlach)
    4. The Moonshiner (Trad. Arr. Imlach)
    5. The Calton Weaver (Trad. Arr. Imlach)
    6. The Poor Beasts (New Words, Arr. Imlach)


Sleeve Notes

Down with drink! That is the message brought to you by the man who is known in every alcoholic ward in the country as The Hogshead of Song. Accompanying him on this record are The Five Firkins of Folk, known to the police as Daryl Runswick who plays bass (preferring red triangle to blue), John MacKinnon on the fiddle (no surprise to those who know him), Tom Harvey plays mandogin (a sort of inebriated mandolin), Ian Macintosh banjo and whistle (no doubt doing his Scottish best to sound like an English pub name) and Mike Whellan who was busy corroding Hohners with a mixture of Bell's and Barr's Irn Bru, when he wasn't making an empty Teacher's Whisky bottle sound like a marimba as in Twelve and a tanner a bottle.

Down with drink! Is the motto on the bottom of Hamish Imlach's portable two pint pewter tankard and what better message for us here today?

No effort has been spared to make this the authorative treatise on the effects of alcohol. By no means least was the effort required to get Hamish Imlach into the studio from the bar he nearly passed on his way to the recording session. If you are subject to the temptations of Bacchus, may we suggest you keep this disc by you always. You will find that if you are lured into the local for a tipple or two, if some tavern tempts you to imbibe of Barleycorn, this record can prevent you making a mess of things. Consider it not so much a long player more a 12-inch beer mat.