Search - Ed Askew :: Little Eyes

Freak Folk?

T. M. Orange | 10/23/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Thank god Byron Coley is around to tell us what's cool and why! As his liner notes explain, this is the legendary second, never before released recording from Askew, who debuted on ESP-Disk, the pioneering NY indie label of the late 1960s that included the occasional folk oddity in the midst of a catalogue dominated by free jazz luminaries (Albert Ayler, Ornette Coleman, Sun Ra). And Little Eyes is quite a treasure indeed. Accompanying himself primarily on harmonica and tiple -- something of an overgrown mandolin that under his strumming often sounds like an autoharp -- Askew wends his way through one strangely fascinating and beautiful little ditty after another. The imagery is largely natural and elemental (sun, moon, sky, water, fire), occasionally a little surreal (k7), very Romantic, altogether apolitical and borderline visionary/religious. Obvious touchstones are Dylan (especially on the tracks w/harmonica), though Askew's voice actually sounds more like Tiny Tim. Roky Erickson's Never Say Goodbye and Daniel Johnston are other possible damaged folk touchstones here, but this really goes alltheway back to the swooping falsetto of John Jacob Niles. And with all the recent interest in freak folk, why not go back to the real deal? Askew's otherworldly tenor warble is a genuine American original & a reminder that label "freak folk" is in fact redundant."