Ian Matthews - If You Saw Thro My Eyes, Lovely Copy

	£		91
	$		121

The Item For Sale Is:

Artist:       Ian Matthews

Title:        If You Saw Thro My Eyes

Release info: Vertigo (6360 034) 1971 Original UK Issue

Condition (Sleeve 1st) : M-/M-

Track List:

Desert Inn

Hearts

Never Ending

Reno Nevada

Little Known

Hinge

Southern Wind

It Came Without Warning

You Couldn’t Love

Morgan The Pirate

Thro My Eyes

Band Members:

Gerry Conway

Pat Donaldson

Tim Renwick

Keith Tippett

Richard Thompson

Andy Roberts

Sandy Denny

Produced By: Ian Matthews

Fantastic copy of an increasingly rare album on the hallowed Vertigo spiral label. This is Matthews first of two albums for the label (the other is coming soon in equally great condition) and musically it’s one of the more listenable albums on the label. It’s highly enjoyable intelligent singer songwriter folk rock with a full band backing, and what a band! Just take a look at the band line up above, if you have any interest in this field of music then these are the names you see on all of the top albums in the genre. If you’ve never heard this then just imagine if Fairport Convention had continued in the direction of “Book Song” or “Meet On The Ledge” from their second album instead of changing direction and heading of into traditional UK folk, top track is the excellent “Little Known” with it’s mysterious downer feel and fantastic guitar from Tim Renwick but the whole album is of a very high quality throughout and recommended to any fans of Richard Thompson, Nick Drake, Sandy Denny etc.

Condition:

Sleeve: Very very nice. It’s a standard gatefold design except that the record sits in the front half of the sleeve instead of the rear which is more usual. The entire sleeve has a lovely textured finish which is still in great condition over the entire sleeve, so often this finish is worn down to smoothness by overhandling but this still has a beautiful deep feel to it.

The front sleeve is pretty much perfect. There are no tears creases or writing anywhere and it’s extremely clean which is essential with this sleeve as it is a very dark illustration which shows marks easily but this really is as good as you’ll find and of course has a lovely feel when you pick it up thanks to the texture.

The rear sleeve is in equally pristine condition. It’s an even darker illustration than the front but thankfully it’s equally clean with no dirty marks at all, there’s also no tears, creases or writing anywhere, I can’t imagine you’re going to find a better example of this sleeve anywhere.

Inside the gatefold is to put it simply perfect, extremely clean with no defects at all.

The top seams are totally unworn apart from a 1 inch patch of wear on the top seam of the rear part of the gatefold, this really is the only defect to be seen on the entire sleeve but put it in a PVC sleeve (which I’ll supply) and at arms length you’ll never know it was there.

The bottom seams are totally unworn.

The spine is wide and square and clean with all of the writing clearly readable.

Record:

The record is also in really nice condition. It’s the usual thick Vertigo vinyl which like the sleeve is extremely clean and very flat and has obviously been played very sparingly over the years. When viewed under normal light there are no visible surface marks at all. Even when viewed under a very harsh lamp there are only a few very light hairline marks visible of the sought caused by simply taking the record in and out of the sleeve and which are totally inaudible even at high volume.

Both labels are perfect, very clean with no writing, tears or stickers and no visible spindle wear. The stamper codes in the run off grooves are 6360034 1Y/1 and 2Y/1. The spiral inner sleeve is also present in fine condition.

When played the record lives up to the high standard set by it’s visible appearance however it has to be said it’s not the best pressing in the world. Rather oddly certain Vertigo titles are notorious for having lousy pressings (Linda Hoyle is one that springs to mind and Dr Z is another which is always a noisy pressing) and this is one of those. Because of this there are some very low level background crackles between tracks at times, not between every track just at certain times and only evident at high volume. Despite this the sound is clear and clean and comes leaping out of the speakers with a vibrant feel which emphasises just how good the music is. Apart from the crackles already mentioned there is no surface noise evident for the entire album and it was a real joy to listen to such a great album in it’s original format in such great condition.

While this may not be the rarest Vertigo album it’s still not an easy one to track down, it must be a good 2 or 3 years since I last had a copy, and to find one in this sort of condition will be challenge indeed so this copy should not be missed!

If anyone needs any further information of photos please let me know.

If you do decide to bid for this item I wish you luck and if not, well, thanks for looking and remember to look at my other items for sale you may find something more to your taste there.

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