Jon Plum’s “Alice”: A Tragic Ballad of Irony and Obscurity

I can’t remember how I found “Alice” by Jon Plum, but I’ll never forget what it felt like to hear it for the first time.

“Alice” is a psychedelic pop ballad released in 1969 by Jon Plum, a British duo consisting of musicians Jon Kennett and David Plummer. Together, these two perfectly captured the baroque pop and psychedelic rock sounds characteristic of their time. Despite their clear talent, they only released seven other songs between 1969 and 1971 before fading into obscurity.

Whether they chose to split or were simply abandoned by the industry remains a mystery, as no other information about this band exists. For all anyone knows, they could have been an elaborate ruse from a single artist and never existed in the first place — or a quirk of the industry like Edison Lighthouse, a real-not-real band.

“All alone there, Alice cried” 

The song tells the story of Alice, a heartbroken girl who moves to the country in hopes of finding her one true love. This attempt fails and her isolation drives her further into depression until she meets her untimely end in the middle of a field. As the song fades into silence, the singer — almost as if trying to avoid Alice’s fate — belts out the chorus:

“With head as heavy as a millstone and her eyes a raging glacier, she went out to find her love but all in vain.” 

Alice’s story is grim, but it’s what surrounds “Alice” that makes this one of the most haunting songs I have ever known. 

“All around the hills were shadowed black…”

Everything else about “Alice” reflects this eerie sense of abandonment: the uncredited orchestra, the album art of an empty circus on an intensely foggy day, even the band itself, as Jon Plum produced only a handful of songs before fading into obscurity by the mid 70s.

The only physical recording someone can find of this song — excluding music historians and time travelers — is in Circus Days, an anthology of psychedelic pop songs all defined by the fact that nobody remembers them. 

“She went out to find her love but all in vain…”

In this cumulation of anguish and loneliness, I had to ask myself a question, one that has filled me with dread from the moment I picked up a pencil and began drafting my first story: Is writing worth it if everything I do will eventually be abandoned and forgotten? 

Then, I realized that can’t be true, because I know “Alice.” 

Only a handful of people may have found this song since its release. I, however, was one of them. Her story found a part of my soul that was lost in the dark and brought it back into the light. Out of the 22K people who’ve listened to the song on YouTube, I wager I’m not the only one who feels this way. 

She changed me for the better, and that alone makes every ounce of hard work it took to produce this song worth it. Furthermore, if I can change but one person and make their lives better, then my stories are absolutely worth it, too. 

“And Alice walked along…”

“Alice” is an underrated gem that deserves to be heard by any psychedelic music enthusiast. She may have been forgotten at one point, but in that tragedy, there’s an ironic hope; eventually someone found her again, and it’s because she was there that someone’s life could change for the better. 

An artist doesn’t need to be someone in the world if they already mean the world to someone. That alone makes “Alice” worth remembering.

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For more reviews of songs, albums, and shows explore MockingOwl Roost:

• Paddy McAloon’s I Trawl The Megahertz – Music Review
• The Brothers Osborne at Birmingham’s O2 Academy Theatre – Concert Review
• Throwback” by Roy Shakked – Music Review
• “Everything’s Gonna Be Alright” – Music Review

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