The Woods Band's only album sounds a good deal like early
Steeleye Span, as might be expected since it was fronted by
Terry Woods and
Gay Woods, who had comprised two-fifths of the lineup that played on
Steeleye Span's first album. Though the Woods Band lacked a singer on the order of
Maddy Prior or an instrumentalist on the level of
Martin Carthy, it's still a pretty good record, and it's not as if
Gay Woods isn't a very good woman British folk-rock singer herself. Too, it's not just a
Steeleye Span spinoff, with a considerably more rock-oriented sound than
Hark! The Village Wait, the
Steeleye Span debut album on which
Terry and
Gay Woods played. Split evenly between traditional tunes and originals (with
Terry Woods the principal songwriter), tracks like "Noisey Johnny" and "Lament and Jig" are very much in the rocked-up jigs'n'reels format that was a cornerstone of British Isles 1970s folk-rock. However, "Dreams" (originally recorded as "Dreams for Me" in an acoustic folk arrangement by
Terry Woods' band
Sweeney's Men in the late '60s) is very much in the quality harmony folk-rock style of the
Sandy Denny-era
Fairport Convention.
Gay Woods proves herself an able interpreter of the sad trad folk ballad on "January's Snows." More surprisingly, "Promises" is decent
Band-like folk-rock with bluesy licks that owe much to the style of
the Rolling Stones at their most laid-back; "Everytime" follows the same mood, but in a duller and overlong fashion. ~ Richie Unterberger