Enough with the politics already.
This album has been on my desert island list ever since I first heard it. It is unique in many ways, not least of all because it is a live album that has the definitive versions of Hardin's best songs: "The Lady Came from Baltimore" "Reason to Believe" "You Upset the Grace of Living When You Lie" "Misty Roses" "Black Sheep Boy" "Don't Make Promises" "Danville Dame" "If I Were a Carpenter" "Red Balloon" "Smugglin' Man" are all here. Unencumbered by the arrangements they were framed by on his first two albums, the songs all sound more open and loose in this small concert setting.
Recorded at Town Hall in New York City of April 10, 1968, Hardin is framed here in a quintessential folk jazz setting, backed by Mike Maineri's vibes, Eddie Gomez's acoustic bass and Donald MacDonald's drums (with Warren Burnhardt on piano and Daniel Hankin on second guitar).
Rooting around on the internet, I found a guest post on the blog, Said the Gramophone, by Austin-based singer songwriter Will Sheff in which he draws a comparison between Hardin and jazz great, Chet Baker. It's one of those things that, once you see it, seems so fundamentally obvious you can't quite understand how you didn't think of it yourself.
I do believe that if you mix Chet Baker with a dash of Nick Drake you end up pretty close to Tim.
The highlight of Tim Hardin 3 is the LP's closing track. Leaving the guitar for the piano and announcing a "change in the program... if you have programs," Tim introduces a song "written to, for, and about... Lenny Bruce."
It is the sound of one junkie singing to another.
The bulk of Hardin's amazing catalog was written in the first year and a half of his career. After that, Tim descended quickly into the heroin addiction that would eventually take his life.
Tim with Phil Ochs and Ramblin' Jack Elliot
Tim in Colorado with fellow folk junkie, Karen Dalton
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