Online review by The Guardian
In the 1960s, when the British folk and rock scenes collided, the Incredible String Band enjoyed massive success before falling from fashion, dismissed as representing the worst in twee hippydom. It was understandable, but unfair. Despite the sometimes dodgy trippy lyrics they were fine songwriters, with influences that veered from American country and gospel to Celtic and Indian themes. This was the second concert in a weekend curated by Joe Boyd, a producer responsible for a lot of great 60s music, and he had one major problem – founding String Band member Robin Williamson refused to appear "because he doesn't want to look back".

Strangely, it didn't matter. The other key band member, Mike Heron, was there, along with Clive Palmer, and they were joined by a remarkable cast. Richard Thompson, who had played on the same stage the previous night in a rousing Fairport Convention retrospective, reappeared for a delicate treatment of Williamson's October Song, and was joined by his daughter Kami to revive Heron's cheerful Painting Box. Robyn Hitchcock, a devoted Incredibles fan, was backed by Thompson for the charming and personal First Girl I Loved, while another devotee, Green Gartside (of Scritti Politti), joined Kami for God Dog.

Elsewhere, Alasdair Roberts negotiated the twists and turns of Williamson's epic Maya, and there were strong performances from Lavinia Blackwall of Trembling Bells and US banjo player Abigail Washburn, stomping through Log Cabin Home in the Sky. As for the original String Band members, Palmer played banjo and demonstrated the band's early blues and jug band influences, while Heron cheerfully revived his own work, including the quirky A Very Cellular Song, but failed to do justice to Williamson's powerful The Circle Is Unbroken. Their playing and singing was more ragged than that of their guests, but again, it didn't matter. The old songs sounded magnificent.


Online review by americana-uk
For the Incredible String Band main event I'd somehow managed not to notice that Robin Williamson was not taking part, which was a bit of a shock as I admire his song writing and performing immensely. Mike Heron and Clive Palmer were two thirds of the original album line up, but Robin was a major player then and of course was really half the band from that point onwards (Heron being the other half). There are a vast number of others standing in and supporting the overall sound, some more obvious than others including - Robyn Hitchcock, Richard Thompson with Teddy and Kami in tow, Dr Strangely Strange, Trembling Bells, Scritti Polliti, Abigail Washburn. I was very curious to see how it would all come off. Clive Palmer seems to be both old and somewhat frail, Mike Heron is more agile and also more obviously enjoying the event.

It seems that Robyn had been cast as Robin for the night, and he does do a passable imitation, or perhaps evocation, of Williamson's style of singing. Things start rolling appropriately enough with the ensemble on stage for When The Music Starts. And we're clearly in for an evening of great versions of the Incredible String Band's songs. There are a few jolts along the way - I can't fully shake the feeling that many of Robin's songs are so very personal and imbued with his spirit that maybe they will survive as poetry rather than as sung works. Richard Thompson performs an acoustic October Song, and does claim that for his own making it sound like a sibling for his own Poor Ditching Boy of the same era.

Amongst many fine performances it seems unfair but also necessary to highlight a couple, so the first will be Dr Strangely Strange whose performance of Air really evoked the Incredible String Band in the medley of instruments and voices. Trembling Bells, a band I was previously unaware of and seem to be cast in the Fairport Convention/Pentangle mould, did several songs. On Greatest Friend the lead singer/recorder player gave me some hope for the future as she stuck with the recorder part when she could so easily have looped it. Their performance of Cousin Caterpillar with the Stranglies is a great moment, as is their solo performance of Cold Days of February, featuring some really nice flute and slide guitar, the guitarist’s intense concentration and masses of curly hair hanging over his hidden face briefly brought a young Richard Thompson to mind, and left me with the intention to explore this band's work further. And it would be a hard heart that didn't thrill to Richard Thompson and Robyn Hitchcock’s version of Firt Girl I Loved, with Robyn almost conjuring that other Robin into the room.

A fine moment in the second set is the pairing of Clive Palmer playing a banjo dance tune followed up by Abigail Washburn - "this is the banjo section" she states before playing and singing Good As Gone, another of Robin's songs, this time about his desire to wander and explore the world, a desire which of course he fulfilled. These are mystical moments which both see a single performer on the stage and a silent attentive house.

In the whole evening though it is A Very Cellular Song which is truly a thing of beauty, the stage crowded again with all the performers, which means there are enough band members for all the required shakers, duck calls and swaney whistles to be present. There's still space for a board on which Abigail Washburn can perform a clog and high step dance - and at last, good as many of the foregoing songs have been, the fragile idea of the Incredible String Band takes a concrete form. This dizzying melange of too many instruments, too many voices and a wildly exuberant step dancer at once embody the song's giddily colourful celebration of life from the smallest single celled creature upwards. It took a while, we'd glimpsed it on occasion before, but here it was at last the spirit of the Incredible String Band not polite, not frozen in the headlights, and thank all mercies not respectful, but a vibrant creature alive with joy and sensuality.

Some of the energy carries forward for Nightfall, and it's there again in full for the final closer, the final exuberant outpouring of positiveness, Everything's Fine Right Now and of course it is and was and will be again.

It's been quite a weekend, with the first night slightly outperforming the second for me. Both had had to struggle with how to replace a band member - Sandy Denny for the Fairports and Robin Williamson for the Incredible String Band night, and I guess on Saturday the impossible had more nearly been achieved. Which is not to belittle the Very Cellular Songs night - these days the Incredible String Band are once more a niche interest, known to a minority and their whole opus known well by even fewer and this night surely has redressed this balance even if by a little.