Question about Country Boy

[Alan]

Anyone who managed to read my post on the new CDs thread and is still awake will see that I commented on the general chronological order of the tracks. There’s one apparent lapse, that I’m guessing was forced by the need to keep the break between CDs 2 and 3 consistent with the break between the sides of "Bantam Cock."

But this means the two versions of "Country Boy," recorded in September and December 1971, actually follow the "Bantam Cock" album, recorded in early 1972.

So what, you say? (Well, you probably say belt up, you dolt, but I press on . . .)

If these tracks were in strict recording order, it would be clear that the music of "Country Boy" — a rarish religious song, released as a single in February 1972 with the usual OTT Geoff Love arrangement (oops, revealing my prejudices) then reappeared later that year on "Bantam Cock," with new words as the thoroughly secular "The Girl with the Fragile Eyes."

I’m just intrigued as to why Jake would do that — although it is a great tune. It’s not as if its first appearance was obscure: it was his third English single. And given his religious beliefs, I wonder whatever prompted him to dump lyrics about Jesus, especially when he retained such lasting affection for his other, earlier Christmas tracks.

Any thoughts?

Alan B.

[Paul]

I have a radio recording (date unknown, but probably November 1972 or 1973) in which Jake plays Country Boy with a double bass and second guitar accompaniment. He speaks fondly of the song, and jokes that he was asked by the BBC to write it as the British entry for the ‘European Hymn Contest’ (‘err..it lost!’). I have not been able to find out whether there is any substance at all to the commission.

This is not the only time Jake re-uses a melody: a substantial part of the dismal ‘Slowly Our Eyes’ (surely the weakest song on Jake in a Box?) metamorphosed into the more famous and successful ‘Isabel Makes Love’. I like ‘Girl With the Fragile Eyes’, although I do not feel I understand it nearly so well as Country Boy.

[Author]

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