Just Another Diamond Day

Released

As an album of songs written during times of travel and change, Just Another Diamond Day couldn’t be more unprepossessing. Having roamed across Britain, to Scotland, in horse and carriage, to get to folk singer Donovan’s proposed musical commune, Bunyan and companions arrived to discover he’d abandoned the idea. But Bunyan had been writing songs on the way – gentle, muted songs, sitting somewhere between everyday folk melodies, and lullabies for children – that, when recorded by Joe Boyd across three days, achieved a kind of hymnal purity. It’s partly in Bunyan’s voice, a whispery hum that’s as graceful as it is shy; the album’s other musicians, including members of Fairport Convention and Incredible String Band, support Bunyan’s finger-web guitar figures playfully, but without whimsy. The album disappeared when released in 1970, but slowly accrued legend. It’s now a classic of its time – deservedly so.

Jon Dale

Suggestions
Grapes cover

Grapes

Muffin
Today Wonder cover

Today Wonder

Ed Kuepper
Bubblegum cover

Bubblegum

Mark Lanegan Band
The Good Son cover

The Good Son

Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds
Mid-Eighties cover

Mid-Eighties

Robert Wyatt
Astral Weeks cover

Astral Weeks

Van Morrison
Alphaville cover

Alphaville

Government Alpha
Chau cover

Chau

Jorge "Flaco" Barral