Carol Of Harvest – Put On Your Nightcap
As we approach a full year of this pandemic lockdown life, there are some real rays of hope that this stage of this moment will end in a season or two. Aside from losing our normal routines and all the taken for granted aspects of social life, this has also been a moment where we’ve started new routines, many of which are created just so that we can survive and thrive. It will be interesting to see what life is like post-lockdown, but I know that one feature of my current life that will remain is my Saturday routine, which isn’t fancy or complex, it’s mostly shutting down all the screens for one day and listening to lots of records, most of them of the psychedelic variety.
While this isn’t something that was a usual routine for me, it does connect to another time in my life. Growing up in the Atlanta area in the 1980s meant that there was still really great commercial radio, before the days of deregulation and homogenization. Atlanta radio in the 1980s was truly a golden era for music fans, underground and college sounds on WREK and WRAS, politics and left-field tunes via WRFG, jazz on WCLK, and rock on the aptly named on 96 Rock. During this time 96 Rock played long blocks of 60s tunes on the weekends, dubbed “Psychedelic Saturdays,” and this was definitely my favorite day of the week. Many many cassettes over the years recorded those shows, and the foundation for my 60s-centric sensibilities was well established before I even hit high school.
In this moment, in addition to the late night sessions where I listen to records with the lights off (and often with the echo effect on), I’ve been specifically listening to psychedelic records throughout the day and just…chilling. Sometimes the good vibes extend into my Sundays too. Of all the records that have given me mellow joy during these chill sessions is the single LP by the German Kraut-Psych band, Carol of Harvest. I first heard this album at a Rappcats pop-up, and looking over at discogs I knew there was never ever ever a chance I’d own an OG copy, I kept the album in the back of my mind, hoping to find a 2nd press, which I eventually did track down at the start of 2021. The album is an interesting one, because it seems a bit out of place. It was recorded in 1978, but most of the sounds would be welcome a decade earlier. The band is often thought as being a part of the krautrock era, but their sound is very pastoral, and more in line with English folk-psych groups like Fairport Convention. “Put On Your Nightcap,” is the magnum opus of the album, as it covers almost the entire first side. The length of the song and the many places the band travels makes it ideal for moments of pure reflection and the special bliss that comes from setting aside a bit of time for yourself to not do anything except chill out on your couch, check out the sights of the neighborhood out your window and listen to some epic psychedelic sounds. If you haven’t done it, it is something I highly highly recommend.