A Room Full Of Tuneful Number 17 In 1997, Robert Sarazin Blake dropped out of college and hit the road. The folk music of his father’s house had combined with the DIY punk ethos of the day and produced his first batch of songs, Another Irrelevant Year. On the heels of Richard Manning, Billy Bragg, and Ani Difranco, Blake’s 18-year-old release is an early document of the folk-punk movement. On his first US tour, Blake played 30 shows around the US planting seeds as he developed touring, not as an economic model, but as a lifestyle. He hasn’t stopped. Eleven full length albums into his career, he’s continued to write pulling from folk roots, his travels, his contemporaries, and the quiet spot in the back of his mind. The writing has evolved, mellowing with experience and expanding with reference, but the essence of the work has remained the same-strong narratives solidly built on the folk foundation and fully in the immediacy of the now.