Fairport Convention were at the very top of their game for their 2025 Winter Tour and they’ve decided to share a few highlights of their show on Roadworks, a new live album.  It’s a very special souvenir – but it’s only available during the current Spring Tour, or at Cropredy…

ON TOP FORM…

Fairport were on top form for their 2025 Winter Tour.  Drummer Dave Mattacks was back in the lineup, adding his usual power and glory to the band’s peerless musical chops.  They had the 40^th Anniversary of their 1985 ‘comeback’ album, Gladys’ Leap to celebrate, and they’d also given their setlist a pretty radical shakeup.  Their shows were special, by any definition of the word, and, thankfully, they had the presence of mind to record a few of them so that we could all share in the highlights.

Recorded during Fairport’s performances at the Taliesin Arts Centre, Swansea, the Lowther Pavilion, Lytham St Annes, Bridgnorth’s Castle Hall and at the Royal Spa Centre, Leamington Spa by Sound Engineer/Tour Manager Tristan Bryant, and mixed by James Wood, Roadworks is a very special souvenir of the tour.  And – whether you were at one of the shows or whether you weren’t – Roadworks is an indispensable addition to your Fairport collection, believe me.

GET IT HERE!

The album is available as a digital download (and can be ordered here) but, if you’re after a physical copy of Roadworks, CDs can only be purchased either from the Merch stand at one of the shows on Fairport’s ongoing Spring Tour or at this year’s Cropredy Festival.  And, if that isn’t reason enough to get yourself along to one (or more) of the shows then, frankly, I don’t know what is.

Roadworks is a 14-track collection and it features many of the most memorable highlights from the 2025 setlist.  Chris Leslie’s flawless a capella vocal intro to I’m Already There, one of his epic sea voyage songs, gets the show on the road.  His mellow voice resonates around the room; DM’s cymbals swish and Peggy, Simon and Ric all enter the fray.  Attention is paid to every tiny detail of the sound and even to most acutely-attuned listener will hear something new with every listen.  The flutters of the bow on Ric’s violin strings, the deliciously-meandering basslines from Peggy, or DM’s meticulous drumfills – they’re all here to be discovered and savoured.

WELCOME RETURNS

Claudy Banks was a song that made a welcome return to the Fairport live repertoire in the 2025 setlist shakeup.  The song was brought to general attention by Shirley Collins, when she proposed it as a track for her seminal 1971 album, No Roses.  Simon was there then and, when the time was right, he revisited the song; it’s the opening track on Fairport’s 1990 album – The Five Seasons.  Fairport have always done it full justice and the version included here is a cracker.  Simon tells the song’s story of parting and reconciliation with confidence and passion and the band are wonderfully restrained – at least until the song’s estranged couple are reunited, when a joyful crescendo breaks out.

A Ric tune that appeared originally on the 1988 album, Red And Gold, The Rose Hip is another number that made a welcome return in 2025.  Ric and Chris combine to give the tune a twin-violin twist; DM adds richness with his keyboard part and Simon’s guitar accompaniment is as tasteful as ever.  Listeners are advised: close your eyes, sit back, and absorb every single sweet note.

BOMBASTIC GLORY

Fairport’s revived version of Sandy’s Rising For The Moon is a folkier affair than the 1975 original, and it’s equally enjoyable.  Chris delivers a beautiful vocal, DM and Peggy mesh nicely together and Ric builds imaginatively on Swarb’s original violin solo.  It’s a song that I can’t resist singing along to!

Fotheringay is another Sandy classic, and it’s become a Fairport live staple in recent years.  It’s something of a showcase for Simon’s vocal and guitar-picking skills and here, once again, he’s outstanding.  And Ric and Chris deliver another twin-violin assault that adds a further layer of sweetness.

DM’s arrangement of The Hexhamshire Lass was a real high point of the 2025 shows and it’s preserved here in all its bombastic glory.  Simon’s crunching electric guitar, Chris’s pristine vocals and the twin melodic attack from Ric and Peggy are all phenomenal – and just listen to what DM is up to as he whizzes around the kit.  The cries of admiration from the audience are unsurprising – and they’re thoroughly deserved.

THE SPARKS REALLY FLY

The Hiring Fair is, of course, a Cropredy anthem and it’s impossible to hear Fairport perform it without imagining oneself in that Oxfordshire field on a warm August evening.  But the song is almost equally effective when it’s performed in a warm theatre on a winter’s evening, as Fairport demonstrate here.  DM’s lengthy piano intro sets the scene, before Simon’s acoustic guitar grabs the attention.  It’s a song that has grown with Fairport over the years and I love to be swept away by each member’s individual contribution.  Simon’s expressive vocals, Chris’s tinkling mandolin, Peggy’s fluid bass and Ric’s soaring violin never fail to reignite happy summer memories.

Between 1979 and 1985, Fairport enjoyed (?) a period of semi-retirement, a period that was brought to a spectacular end by the release of the Gladys’ Leap album.  The band’s 2025 Winter Tour was, in part, a celebration of that album’s 40^th anniversary.  The Hiring Fair, a track from the album, has been a regular feature of Fairport’s repertoire ever since the album’s release, but Instrumental Medley ’85 hadn’t seen light of day for many years.  A rare (but short) DM drum solo provides the cue for Peggy to remind us all, yet again, why he’s considered to be one of the finest bassists on the planet.  And, when Ric and the rest chime in, the sparks really fly.  Peggy blows the Swanee whistle, and Fairport are in full-flow.

WOOD AND WIRE

Songwriter Rob Beattie has long been a regular source of material for Fairport and Moses Waits, a track from 2020’s Shuffle And Go album is, surely, one of his best.  Simon’s voice is the perfect vehicle for Rob’s lyrics and it’s almost possible to touch the sympathy he expresses for the song’s exploited subject.  And, yet again, Fairport have the instrumental balance just right; the combination of the plucked and bowed violin strings evoke the poolside setting of the song’s lyrics and, when Chris’s whistle is added to the “Jambo Bwana” refrain, the picture is complete.

Chris’s Banbury Fair was slotted into the setlist for Fairport’s 2024 Autumn Tour and it’s now an established feature of the repertoire.  Chris clearly enjoys singing it and his lyrics tell a nice story, too.  Banbury Fair is taken from Fairport’s 1999 album, The Wood And The Wire, and it’s followed here by the title track from that album.  The song is another of Chris’s and it’s one that surely resonates with anyone who’s had the desire to own – or, better still, learn to play – a stringed instrument.  Fairport are in a folky mood for this one; DM patters his drums, acoustic instruments take the lead and Simon, Peggy and Chris harmonise beautifully.  And, every time that I hear the song, I’m reminded of Banbury’s much-missed music shop, One Man Band – the shop that featured on The Wood and the Wire’s cover photo.

BABBACOMBE LEE

It’s hard to believe that 15 years have passed since Fairport made the decision to resurrect Babbacombe Lee for their 2011 Winter Tour (and, subsequently, for that year’s Cropredy).  Since then, snippets from the 1971 album have surfaced fairly regularly during live shows.  In 2025, it was Cell Song – always a personal favourite – that announced the Babbacombe Lee interlude.  On the original version, Swarb delivered one of his finest ever vocal performances and, here, Chris reproduces that performance wonderfully.  DM plays electric piano – just like he did on the original album.  Simon’s guitar provides the depth and Ric revisits Swarb’s mournful violin part note-for-note.

And, where Cell Song goes, Hanging Song just HAS to follow.  “Wake up, John, it’s time to go,” sing the front line, and then: we rock.  Simon, Peggy and DM supply a solid drive and Chris and Ric get together to deliver Swarb’s bits.  And it’s exhilarating.

VENTURING INTO DEEP SPACE

It’s a final slice of classic Fairport that brings this magnificent live album to its close.  DM once commented (in his hilarious liner notes to Fairport’s 1981 ‘official bootleg’ cassette, The Airing Cupboard Tapes) that, of the 137,422 performances of Sloth, sadly, only 28,156 had been recorded for posterity.  Well – there have been a few performances of the song since he wrote those words and, perhaps, the same proportion of those more recent versions have made it into live recordings.  But – let me say – the version that wraps up Roadworks is an absolute doozie. 

Sloth has inherited a new lease of life since it was dusted down for the 50-year celebration of the Full House album and, here, it’s presented as a 10-minute epic.  Once again, Chris pays respectful tribute to Swarb with another outstanding vocal performance.  The solos come thick and fast, with Simon setting the ball in motion, before Peggy blows off every sock in town with a masterful bass solo.  Simon sings the interlude “She’s run away…” verse, before Ric takes us deeper into space than even Artemis II is about to venture, with a violin solo – complete with spacey howls down the instrument’s pick-ups – that only HE could deliver.  And, throughout, the band simmer and surge. 

If you want to experience Fairport at the top of their game, this is where you’ll find them.  Roadworks is an indispensable souvenir of a landmark tour and an indispensable example of what Fairport do best.  Don’t miss it. You will have to get to a show, or to Fairport’s Cropredy Convention 2026 to snag a copy though. All tour dates for the band are here.

Check out Instrumental Medley ’85 from 2025’s Cropredy Festival.

Fairport Convention: Website

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