Bristol folk

Al Jones
Al Jones moved to Bristol in 1966 when his job with Pye Electronics brought him to Filton.
Almost on arrival, his landlady pointed him toward a local folk club and Jones immediately
involved himself in the Bristol folk scene. He linked up with Ian Anderson and harmonica
player, Elliot Jackson, going out under the name of Anderson, Jones, Jackson. When the
Troubadour opened in 1966, Anderson, Jones, Jackson was the first group to play there,
becoming a regular fixture with a residency. When the Folk Blues Bristol and West club,
started by Anderson in 1967, moved from the Troubadour to the Old Duke in King Street,
the group maintained a residency there and also supported national artists.

Meanwhile, back in December 1966, the trio made an EP for Saydisc, with the recording
taking place at the Quaker Meeting House in Frenchay. The session included Noel (King
George V) Sheldon, another Folk Blues Bristol and West resident, who still plays around
the Bristol area occasionally. With their first record under their belts, the trio played further
afield, appearing at Les Cousins folk club in London. In early 1967, Jones played on two
tracks on Graham Kilsby’s In a Folk Mood EP – these were Chastity Belt, which was
recorded live at the Troubadour, and Man of Constant Sorrow. Around this time Jones
replaced Barry Back in the Alligator Jug Thumpers for a tour of Devon, but no-one seems
to remember for sure quite when this was. Of this period, Ian Anderson explains:

We recorded the Anderson, Jones, Jackson EP in December ’66, got voted Bristol’s
most popular group in the Troubadour Poll in spring ’67, then Al started heading off
regularly to London at the invitation of John Renbourn. But not before … we’d been
offered an album by early Fleetwood Mac [and] Chicken Shack producer Mike Vernon
at Decca – one of those mirage deals that never actually came off.151

In 1967, Jones moved to London and his friendship with John Renbourn led to rumours that
he was to join Pentangle. After exposure on the London scene, including a certain amount
of tutting from blues purists when Jones played his Buddy Holly medley, he was signed, on
the suggestion of Ian Anderson, by Sandy Roberton’s September Productions, who got him
a one-off deal with Parlophone, then the home of the Beatles152. Anderson says:

Sandy Roberton had asked me about other artists I’d recommend for him to produce,
so I’d naturally introduced him to Al Jones who got an unsatisfactory Parlophone
album out of it. One or the other of us introduced Sandy to Keith Christmas and Keith
in turn introduced him to Shelagh MacDonald. So there was quite a chain of events
from my signing that helped put the Bristol scene on the discographical map in the
early ’70s.153

The recording sessions for the Parlophone LP took place between 5th and 13th March 1969
at Sound Techniques Studios in London and included Percy Jones from The Liverpool
Scene, Harold McNair and Gordon Huntley, the latter of whom went on to enjoy a number
one hit single with Matthews Southern Comfort. March was a fairly productive month for
Jones and a gig at Les Cousins was recorded on the 17th. Two more tracks were recorded
in April 1969 at the same studio as the album and these were put out on a 1970 RCA Victor

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