Peel Back: Louden Wainwright III, Microdisney and Tortoise

This month's Peel Back...feature in my Dandelion Radio show delved, as usual, into the Peel session archives to unearth tracks played by John Peel in August 1976, 1986 and 1996.

Sometimes in these adventures I like to include something I've not heard before, or at least don't recall hearing, which is the case with Louden Wainwright III's Prince Hal's Dirge. I was always aware of Peel's admiration for Wainwright and listening to this track gave him some idea of why. It follows the young Hal - the later Henry V - though his early, bawdy years in taverns prior to his transformation into one of England's most celebrated monarchs. It's basically the depiction we get of the prince in Shakespeare's Henry IV and the track's good enough to rank alongside such other Shakespeare-referencing gems as The Band's Ophelia and Lou Reed's Romeo Had Juliette (not that there's much Shakespeare in that one).

The second track is one that's, conversely, been part of my life for years. Microdisney's And He Descended Into Hell session recording is my favourite version but I couldn't find it so listeners have had to make do with the recording from the damn fine Crooked Mile album. Cathal Coughlan relates a trail of one of society's forgotten victims who would remain forgotten if he didn't sing about it in his characteristic brogue. 

I made a bit of a pig's ear with the last of the three tracks this month, announcing it but not playing it, so I placed it at the end of my FSK show instead. A cunning ruse to get you to listen to both shows? As usual, the simplest reason is the right one: cock-up. Anyway, you can hear Tin Cans & Twine by Tortoise, the version from their self-titled album, here.