Nick Drake: The Life

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Despite his disappointment at not having worked on it, he supported Nick’s prerogative in eschewing arrangements and later stated: “I think it’s his greatest work, by far. above all, i find that this book answers some of the mysteriousness surrounding nick's life, death, and music. I suppose a part of it is because of the way it was made, and because of Nick, and the stories surrounding him. One can almost see him, sitting in the corner at gatherings, stoned, listening intently to the words and songs circulating in his own head, disengaged from everything going on around him, then standing up and leaving without a word – as he was increasingly wont to do. This biography is still well written and makes me wonder how a great artist can live once a happy live but falls apart when trying to make a living out of his music.

Nick Drake: The Life by Gabrielle Drake | Hachette UK Nick Drake: The Life by Gabrielle Drake | Hachette UK

It's hard to "like" books about nice young men from ordinary backgrounds who happen to be brilliant musicians and also suicidally depressed and so kill themselves. There was also a failed first suicide bid involving Valium, as well as one session of ECT, and countless medical appointments and in-patient spells in various institutions. That image of Nick Drake as too beautiful for this world (like the Van Gogh of Don McLean’s song Starry Starry Night) has proved enduring even if, as Gabrielle tells me, it misses the stubbornness and steel of her brother: “I used to find him incredibly frustrating, obstinate and difficult, but I cannot remember ever not loving him or not admiring him,” she says. The remaining years of Molly and Rodney’s lives were dominated by their son’s death, she says: “They talked, I know, to parents in similar situations, trying to help them.

Had he not failed, had he realised how much he was really on the brink of success it probably wouldn’t have satisfied him to go on doing that. Patrick Humphries' illuminating text includes exclusive interviews with friends, colleagues and musicians who knew and worked with Nick.

Nick Drake: The Biography by Patrick Humphries | Goodreads Nick Drake: The Biography by Patrick Humphries | Goodreads

As is so often the case, it took a few years for his genius to be recognised, for his name to be cited by young musicians as a hero and an influence, his slim body work lovingly repackaged, his reputation secured. He was born in Burma, where his father, an engineer, worked for the Burma-India Trading Company, but moved to leafy Tanworth-in-Arden when he was four. The man who resorts to pot as the solution to his problems becomes bemused, befuddled and vegetable-like,” lectured Drake senior, the self-assured old Burma hand and managing director of an engineering company. The book closes with a psychiatrist’s letter reassuring them they could have done no more to prevent his death. Young musicians all over the world would have envied Nick, yet by Julian’s account, “He was so congenitally mellow that it seemed normal for him.While the lives of other musicians who died before their time, such as Jim Morrison, John Lennon, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and Gram Parsons, have been amply documented, there has never before been a biography of Nick Drake. from an overdose of antidepressants, it was, to all who knew him, a terrible shock – but not, perhaps, a complete surprise. However, his third album seemed a stark cry for help, the voice of a man teetering on the edge of sanity. A man who was a very able athlete at school, with much potential in sprinting in particular, but also featured as a rugby player too. Not only because of the (unexpected) picture of Nick outlined, but also because it pictures nicely how it was to grow up as a teenager in rural England in the 60's.