"River Man" is the second listed song from Nick Drake's 1969 album Five Leaves Left. According to Drake's manager, Joe Boyd, Drake thought of the song as the centrepiece of the album. In 2004, the song was remastered and released as a 7" vinyl and as enhanced CD single, including a music video by Tim Pope.
| "River Man" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Single by Nick Drake | ||||
| from the album Five Leaves Left | ||||
| B-side | "Day is Done" | |||
| Released | 13 September 2004 | |||
| Recorded | 1969 | |||
| Genre | Folk baroque, baroque pop | |||
| Length | 4:21 | |||
| Label | Island (UK), Elektra (US) | |||
| Songwriter(s) | Nick Drake | |||
| Producer(s) | Robert Kirby and Joe Boyd | |||
| Nick Drake singles chronology | ||||
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| Music audio | ||||
| "River Man" on YouTube from Peel Sessions | ||||
On 5 August 1969 Drake recorded the song for BBC's Peel Sessions, in his only session for the show.[1]
Musical structure and lyrics
editThe song is in a 5/4 time signature and is one of the few songs Drake wrote to be played in standard tuning. The string arrangement was composed by Harry Robertson (aka Harry Robinson) after Drake's friend Robert Kirby felt he couldn't compose it alone, although he did most of the arrangements on Five Leaves Left.[2]
Drake did not reveal the identity of the 'Betty' character in the lyrics, although Trevor Dann speculated that she may have been drawn from Betty Foy, a character in Wordsworth's "The Idiot Boy", a poem Drake had studied while attending Cambridge.[3] However, the only similarity to the poem is the existence of a Betty.[4]
Track listing
edit- 2004 CD
- "River Man"
- "Day Is Done" (by Norah Jones and the Charlie Hunter Band)
- "River Man" (video by Tim Pope)
- 2004 7"
- "River Man"
- "River Man" (demo version)
References
edit- ^ "BBC – Radio 1 – Keeping It Peel – 05/08/1969 Nick Drake". www.bbc.co.uk.
- ^ Raggett, Ned. "Five Leaves Left". Allmusic. Retrieved on 19 September 2006.
- ^ Dann, Trevor. Darker than the Deepest Sea: The Search for Nick Drake (2006), (Hardback) Portrait. ISBN 0-7499-5095-1
- ^ A Tentative, Yet Serendipitous Discovery Upon Reading Wordsworth by Donnah Boyce