If you are looking for an album that is only guitar music. Pink Moon is an album that is just guitar music and the mystical lyrics and finger picking style of Nick Drake. A Luther was quoted that the finest-sounding acoustic guitar is so delicately built that it is forever on the verge of coming apart at the seams. Sometimes the same theory applies to the guitar player.
The acoustic guitar is the Truth and only guitar music albums like Nick Drakes Pink Moon can give that true felling of acoustic expression. The player has nowhere to hide. There are no smoke and Mirrors. The only Mirror involved is the fact the player is reflecting their deepest self through the wood and strings that are at any given moment ready to explode.
Pressure is involved in two ways. The face of the guitar itself when at full concert pitch is supporting roughly 200 pounds of pressure. Once more the player is under that similar pressure. Such was the work and soul of Nick Drake.
Upon his death, at the age of 26, he Had achieved 3 commercial releases that established him as one of the finest fingerstyle players ever be we other musicians or solo with just guitar music and vocals.
This is combined with the fact that the songwriting was autobiographical, speaking to the human condition asking questions, and speaking of life and death in lyrics that someone 3 times his age would be hard-pressed to do. His whisper of a voice was not weak.
I find it was more like telling secrets to the listener about these Mysteries and truths he had discovered.
The albums Five leaves Left, Bryter Layter and Pink Moon were not the full body of his work, but the full circle of the best qualities of Nick in that he was discovered playing with just the guitar alone and only accompanied by the Mystifying vocal. There was material released Posthumously as happens to so many.
He was prophetic in that sense as well if one goes and reads the lyrics of the song Fruit Tree. He knew his work was ahead of its time and would not receive its due respect until the years after his passing in 1974.
Pink Moon is a Full Album with only guitar music
Each song was a statement of depth. It may have been done in a slick production of “Northern Sky” a song of hope to find love.
It may have been a stark message of Haunting and Mortality in “Black-eyed Dog“. Lastly the title track of his last work proper “Pink Moon” a 2-minute piece that in my interpretation was a kind way of saying to those who would talk throughout his rare live performances “none of you stand so tall, The Pink Moon is gonna get you all.” Well it did get them all, eventually when released for use in a car commercial decades after his death it opened the door for those who Nick was unknown to and I like to think some were left who disrespected him by making him feel unworthy on a stage.
Pink Moon as a complete work is the real Nick Drake returned to his basic Identity.
A masterwork during a time of emotional turmoil, that when finished was delivered with no words spoken. Nick walked into the office of his record label, laid the Master reel boxes on the desk, picked up a magazine, and sat in silence reading before exiting the building. Some time passed before the receptionist investigated what the boxes contained.
Listen to blackeyed Dog By Nick Drake Just Guitar Music
Just guitar Music a man and his guitar and vocal is the basic mission statement of pink moon, with only the piano melody line on the song “Pink Moon” was his soul in take it or leave it fashion.
if you sit and listen to songs like “Road” or “Things behind the sun” You will hear one of the greatest guitarists ever. A one-man symphony. He Hid nothing and gave everything.
His life and his work speak the Secrets we need to calm our soul. His music is often Therapy, His Sorrow calms our anxiety and stress. I personally use it for that very reason. He is still here to inspire us we owe him so much, the least of which is to simply listen to the music of nick drake which is why I am sharing this here on guitardoor.
I think that’s all he wanted at the beginning and the end. Nick Drake June 19, 1948- November 25th, 1974 Pink Moon an Album that is more than just only guitar music but a poetic and guitar storytelling masterpiece.
Photo Credit
“nick drake – pink moon 1972” by oddsock is licensed under CC BY 2.0.
