Nick Drake: The Life

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So I wanted this book to stand as a serious biography, irrespective of the fact that it was about a ‘pop’ musician. Drake’s third and final album Pink Moon is a bleak, minimal affair, seemingly wrenched from the depths of mental illness.

There were five or so covers during his lifetime – very few, and none that would have brought in any money. What I think I was – perhaps clumsily – trying to express was the fact that the counter-narrative that he was ‘getting better’ towards the end of his life is not borne out by evidence. It builds on everything that has gone before and adds so much detail it can seem, at times, overwhelming.Did you find it funny – which is the wrong word – that towards the end of his life he seemed to be on a bit of an up? Although he was an English singer-guitarist whose unconventional tunings and numinous lyrics set him apart, even in a crowded folk revival field, a chasm had opened up between the promise of his talent and his meagre public profile. But he’s a very fine guitarist, it goes without saying, and probably put just as much work into his style as Nick did.

At Cambridge you have a chance to fight your weaknesses and overcome them (and fight like hell you MUST), to discipline yourself from inside, and take a more active interest in your fellows (another weakness of yours – I am being very blunt, aren’t I?But the realisation that a lot of it was actually repetitive and that, whilst different anecdotes have slightly different weight, ultimately you only need one of them to give the picture, was liberating. Nick poured so much interest and energy and passion into the creation of his records, not only in writing the songs but also, as Richie was saying, being assertive in the studio – not in a dogmatic, unpleasant way, but he dug his heels in, he knew what he wanted and he got what he wanted – that I find it perplexing that he was so casual about their artwork. It was around double the length of the published version, and eliminating material from it was, I thought, going to be impossible because it was so intertwined. This is an example of how, although Nick Drake’s image is of somebody who barely said anything and didn’t assert himself, he stood his ground and insisted that the instrumentals were on there. In another letter he admitted: “The material on Pink Moon has always bewildered us a little (except From the Morning, which we love).

I’m sure that our various conversations have made clear my general feelings … As far as performing is concerned, I am certainly no more than amateur. I thought it was self-destructive, a capitulation, as if he were saying: ‘Fuck it, I don’t care whether people listen to it or not.He didn’t do much to publicise himself, although he did play more concerts than is usually reported, about forty. At the end of 1974, shortly after his death, his royalty statement for 1972-1974 was finally organised. Rodney had written nothing that any concerned parent wouldn’t have thought under the circumstances, but he and Molly perhaps didn’t grasp the intensity of their son’s commitment to his music or – as they later conceded – his brilliance.