Evening Blue

Artists

Album Info

Release Date: 2017-02-03

Label: HiddenMasters

It took over five years to piece together the first hardback book, limited edition set to chronicle and celebrate Chris Wood’s life in music - from co-founding Traffic and collaborations with John Martyn, The Wailers’ Tyrone Downie, Nick Drake, Free to his own solo work.

Critically lauded around the world, "Evening Blue" is a limited edition of 1000 copies issued February 3, 2017 - curated in close collaboration with Steph Wood who administers her brother’s estate.

With 66 tracks, the set comprises of a lavishly illustrated 212-page vinyl-sized book with over 420 images, the majority not been seen before. 4CDs and a vinyl LP are included in the book covers. Text was abridged and edited from Dan Ropek’s biography of Chris which includes interviews with the late Paul Medcalf and Jim Capaldi as well as many of Chris’s friends and musical colleagues.

HiddenMasters also include their exclusive interviews with Steph Wood and Anna Capaldi-Gilbey; studio engineers Terry Barham and Brian Humphries; musicians Mike Kellie, Dick Cuthell, Steve Winwood, Poli Palmer, Pete Bonas, Maps (James Chapman), Gordon Jackson, Jess Roden, Bobby Whitlock, Shawn Phillips and others as well as photographers Brian Cooke, Barrie Wentzell, Gered Mankowitz, Dina Regine, Dan Cuny, David Miller, Richard Keith Wolff alongside Muscle Shoals Swampers David Hood and Charles Rose.

The 4 CDs includes music drawn from Chris’s entire career with his solo recordings taking centre-stage. We also featured alternate takes and mixes as well as previously unheard compositions and never-before-heard home demos and other sketches.

Naturally, there was music from Traffic as well as recordings by Gordon Jackson, John Martyn, Dave Mason, Jim Capaldi, Bobby Whitlock, Airforce, Martha Velez, Nick Drake, Shawn Phillips and others.

Evening Blue also features Chris’s previously unheard collaborative work with The Wailers’ keyboard player, Tyrone Downie as well as Rebop Kwaku Baah, Remi Kabaka, The Sky, Dr John & Jeanette Jacobs. Tracks from the only known-to-survive recordings by the short-lived Mason, Capaldi, Wood & Frog line-up were also included as was a brand new 2015 collaboration – Maps with Chris Wood.

And… Chris’s never-released solo LP on 180gsm vinyl. Long thought lost, the ¼” masters were discovered by chance in an outbuilding in the West of England during the late-spring of 2013.

Over half the music featured on Evening Blue had never been heard before. And, other than in three instances (where the analog reels no longer existed), all the recordings were sourced from the original 2″ and 1″ multitracks or ¼” masters and cassettes captured at 24bit/96Khz.

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