Dingly Dell

Production

The album was produced by and mixed by Bob Johnston, who had also worked on the earlier No. 1 album Fog on the Tyne. However, the band were unhappy with the album, and remixed it themselves shortly before it was released.

Release and chart performance

Dingly Dell was released in September 1972. It spent ten weeks in the UK album charts, entering at No. 5 and never going above this position.

Two songs from the album were released as singles, "All Fall Down" and "Court in the Act". The former was a minor success, charting at No. 34 in the UK, while the latter failed to chart.

On its original British release, it appeared in a matt pale sepia cardboard sleeve, blank apart from the name of the album and the band, with all the information contained on the inner sleeve and a sepia poster of the band inside. This was at their insistence, on the grounds that it was the music which mattered.

Reception

The album was in general not as well received as previous Lindisfarne releases. The band's official website describes it as "a disappointment", although it praises the single "All Fall Down". Some contemporary reviews were relatively positive, including one from the Milwaukee Journal. Bruce Elder, writing for Allmusic in 2004, gave the album a rating of four stars. He described the band's playing as "spirited" and the songs as "enjoyable", and suggested that the rock press "savaged the album unfairly". Live Music Magazine considered that the album "had a very crisp sound, very upfront, and more of a mainstream hard rock sound", but felt that "this was not the move that the critics had wanted or expected of the band", and that "the songwriting didn't match the prior two albums".

All tracks credited to Alan Hull except where indicated

1. "All Fall Down" - 3:47
2. "Plankton's Lament" (Cowe) - 1:55
3. "Bring Down The Government" - 1:30
4. "Poor Old Ireland" - 3:02
5. "Don't Ask Me" (Clements) - 3:37
6. "O No Not Again" - 3:24
7. "Dingle Regatta" (Traditional) - 1:04
8. "Wake Up Little Sister" - 2:53
9. "Go Back" (Cowe) - 3:02
10. "Court in the Act" - 3:17
11. "Mandolin King" - 2:37
12. "Dingly Dell" - 6:19

Bonus track on CD reissue:

1. "We Can Swing Together" (Live) - 17:58

Personnel

Alan Hull - vocals, acoustic, electric and 12-string guitars, keyboards, bass

Ray Jackson - vocals, mandolin, harmonica

Rod Clements - electric bass, acoustic, electric and 12-string guitars, violin

Simon Cowe - lead, acoustic and 12-string guitars, mandolin, harmonium, vocals

Ray Laidlaw - drums