| Spriguns of Tolgus | |
|---|---|
| Origin | England |
| Genres | Electric folk - folk music |
| Years active | 1972-8 |
| Associated acts | Steeleye Span |
| Past members | |
| See: Band members section | |
Spriguns of Tolgus (aka Spriguns) was an electric folk group formed in 1972. They managed to obtain a record deal with a major label and the attention of some most significant figures in the folk rock world. They produced four albums with growing originality and recognition, but were unable to attain mainstream success and disbanded in 1978. Their lead singer, Mandy Morton, continued her solo career in Scandinavia and the band have now obtained a cult following.
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Mike and Mandy Morton formed Spriguns of Tolgus as an acoustic duo at their own folk club in Cambridge, England in 1972. They took the name Spriguns from a malignant Cornish pixie, and Tolgus from a tin mine in Cornwall.[1] Initially the band relied on traditional songs, particularly ballads, from England, Scotland and Ireland and were similar in sound to Steeleye Span.
The Mortons were joined by Rick Thomas (fiddle) and Chris Russon (electric guitar), producing soft-focus electric folk on a self-financed tape recording Rowdy, Dowdy Day (1974). This drew them to the attention of Steeleye Span's Tim Hart, who produced their first vinyl album Jack with a Feather (1975), contributing the song ‘Seamus the Showman’, beside traditional material such as the Child Ballads ‘Flodden Field’ and ‘The Twa Magicians’ (the last of which Steeleye Span had recorded the year before) and the Irish songs ‘Let no man steal your Thyme’ and ‘Curragh of Kildare’.[2] The album, despite a very short run of pressings, together with Hart’s involvement, helped increase the band’s profile sufficiently to gain attention from a major label.
In 1976 they signed with Decca, shortened their name to Spriguns and recruited a new band of Dick Powell (keyboards), Tom Ling (fiddle), and Chris Woodcock (drums), which gave them a fuller and rockier sound. The resulting album Revel, Weird & Wild (1976) was again produced by Tim Hart.[3] It relied exclusively on material penned by the band, particularly by Mandy Morton, but many of these were reworkings of traditional material.
For the next album Time Will Pass (1977) only Powell and Ling were retained and Australians Wayne Morrison (guitar) and Dennis Dunstan (drums) were recruited. This was a relatively lavish attempt to break through into the mainstream, with orchestral arrangements undertaken by Robert Kirby, who had worked with Nick Drake and the Strawbs and production by Sandy Roberton, who had overseen Steeleye Span's early folk albums.[4] The band now sounded very much like a conventional rock outfit with folk overtones and Mandy Morton was the only songwriter.[5]
The Mortons left Decca in 1977 for reasons that remain unclear and established their own label, Banshee Records, in 1978. A new band was formed, retaining Tom Ling but adding Byron Giles (guitar) and Alex Cooper (drums). Mandy Morton became the group's focus and their last album under the name Spriguns was Magic Lady (1978), credited to ‘Mandy Morton and Spriguns’. The album’s title was a tribute to Sandy Denny, who died during recording and as a result the content was similar in style to Denny’s solo work. It was recorded at Spaceward Studios, produced by Mike Kemp and benefited from guest appearances by several respected figures in the electric folk world, including a return for Tim Hart on dulcimer and backing vocals and guitar work from former Gryphon instrumentalist Graeme Taylor.[6] This last album is generally considered the finest work the band produced.[7]
In 1979 Mandy Morton signed for Polydor Scandinavia in 1979, where she gained quite a following, gradually moving away from her folk roots and in the 1980s touring with a conventional rock band. She produced the album Sea Of Storms (1979) before Mike and Mandy split and Mike returned to Cambridge. After producing Valley Of Light for Banshee in 1983, Mandy returned to England to work for BBC Radio Cambridgeshire in 1986.[8] Dick Powell is the leader of Cambridge dance band The Melodybeats, and is writing songs and poetry and short stories as well as teaching. Tom Ling plays in Cambridge bands. Wayne Morrison and Dennis Dunstan are back home in Australia having fleetingly lived in California where Dennis worked for Fleetwood Mac for some time as Head of Security.
Mandy Morton’s song writing and fey laid-back singing was central to the sound of the band. Initially they seemed to be a clone of Steeleye Span, but the greater experimentation, production values and confidence of the later work, in which Mandy Morton began to produce her own material, is closer to bands like Trees or Mellow Candle in style, relying on long guitar solos, similar to those of some progressive rock bands. The material was often dark in nature, focusing on black magic, war and death, which prefigured the obsessions of some later dark wave bands. Their rare albums became particularly sought after by record collectors and began to be re-released as CDs from the 1990s.[9]