Light in the Attic Records
Bob Dylan and Devendra Banhart named her as their favorite singer. Nick Cave lists her among his faves. Enid native Karen Dalton was part of the early-Sixties Greenwich Village folk boom, but played the part of wallflower when it came to recordings, producing only two in her lifetime.
Her 1969 debut, "It's So Hard to Tell Who's Going to Love You Best," was reissued a few years ago, and comes with a DVD if you buy the UK version. The newly remastered follow-up, "In My Own Time," recorded in 1971, is a much different animal.
Where the debut was mostly solo, Dalton was tricked into recording it; such was her state of mind at the time. This time, Dylan sideman Harvey Brooks produced it with a full range of musicians, and the sound travels from spare folk to soul, blues, and jazz, with the leadoff track sounding like Dalton fronting Fairport Convention.
A must for fans of Oklahoma musicians and idiosyncratic vocalists.
- Tory Troutman
