Linda Hoyle [Affinity] in her 1971 album Pieces of Me [FLAC limited time only] plus 2015's The Fetch

 

I was rooting around for stuff to discover and noticed this one, from the singer of well-known one-off UK band Affinity.  Amazingly, it turned out the compositions are mostly from Karl Jenkins-- of Soft machine fame, of course.  And I really love his stuff from the albums he mostly wrote, like Rubber Riff and Cockayne.  

But back to Pieces of Me.  You can see it databased here.  Sadly, this is Linda's only album from this time period.

British jazz rock singer, songwriter and art therapist, born Linda Hoile, in Hammersmith/London 13 April 1946.

As you probably are aware, Karl wrote some amazing music for the band Soft Machine, but also for library albums.

Paper Tulips sounds like a poem (presumably, written by Linda) which was set to music by Karl and moreover arranged by him:

Morning of One takes up the same heartbreak theme and is just as amazing:

There is also a cover of Laura Nyro's Lonely Woman, and a Nina Simone song.  An amazing album, sadly forgotten and neglected despite its strength.  Surprisingly then nothing more from Linda-- until the mid 2010s when she came back with Fetch, which without Karl is not as strong. I included that one for comparison purposes. As a sample, Cut and Run (lyrics by Linda, music by Mo Foster):

What's even more remarkable about this already amazing work is the fact Karl Jenkins, so far as I know, never wrote this kind of lushly produced ssw stuff again, moving on as he did in the 1970s to the fusion sounds of Nucleus and Soft Machine, plus the libraries.  We can assume too that Linda returned or proceeded to an ordinary life after this was released.

But thanks so much for this little lost gem, Linda and Karl...