Joan Armatrading - BBC Sessions, Volume 1: 1973-1977

If you think I've posted a "BBC Sessions, Volume 1" by Joan Armatrading, you're right. I first gave that name to a 1981 BBC concert she did. Then I found a 1977 BBC concert by her, and renamed the ones that came after that. Now, I've discovered a bunch of BBC studio sessions she did earlier in her career, so all the BBC albums by her after this got renumbered again. Sigh! Sorry. I wish I got all this right on the first go round.

In this case though, I had good reason for not posting the material in this album earlier, because most of it simply was beyond my reach. 

I've known for some time that Armatrading performed no less than eight studio sessions for BBC DJ John Peel from 1972 to 1976, playing three to four songs each. You can see the details here:

Joan Armatrading | John Peel Wiki | Fandom

That should have been enough material for one BBC studio sessions album, maybe two. Unfortunately though, the vast majority of those performances either weren't saved and have been lost, or they only exist in some private vault. The only session I could find was the last one, from 1976. I also found a couple of performances she did in the 1970s for the BBC TV show "The Old Grey Whistle Test," but I decided that wasn't enough to make an album.

But in recent weeks I've been in touch with a musical associate who has been sending me lots of great material for the BBC radio show "Top of the Pops." It turns out that some of the otherwise lost performances she did for John Peel's show were rebroadcast on Top of the Pops. Those have been saved in pristine condition. I think this is a great find because it includes two songs she wrote, "Some Kind of Love Song" and "Freedom," which as far as I can tell not only are still officially unreleased and unbootlegged, but there's virtually no mention of their existence on the Internet (other than the fact that they'd been performed on Peel's show). 

Please don't forget to redownload all the Armatrading BBC volumes after this one, since they are newly renumbered, with resulting changes to the cover art and mp3 tags. 

This album is 45 minutes long.

01 Child Star (Joan Armatrading)
02 talk (Joan Armatrading)
03 Gave It a Try (Joan Armatrading)
04 Lonely Lady [Edit] (Joan Armatrading)
05 Alice (Joan Armatrading)
06 Freedom (Joan Armatrading)
07 Some Kind of Love Song (Joan Armatrading)
08 No Love for Free (Joan Armatrading)
09 Down to Zero (Joan Armatrading)
10 Help Yourself (Joan Armatrading)
11 Kissin' and a Huggin' (Joan Armatrading)
12 People (Joan Armatrading)
13 Love and Affection (Joan Armatrading)
14 Steppin' Out (Joan Armatrading)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/TDVGP6aX

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/5rERMrdit7mPEkY/file 

The cover image is a photo taken during her "Old Grey Whistle Test" TV appearance in 1973, which make up the first three tracks here. I used the Krea AI program to improve the detail.