One of the strong points of Flying Fish Records was its willingness to document worthwhile singer/songwriters that major labels ignored. If Flying Fish was impressed with a talented but unknown singer/songwriter whose only exposure was playing a small coffeehouse in Boston (or for that matter, St. Louis or San Diego), the Chicago-based label would see to it that the artist didn't go unrecorded. One of the obscure pop-folk artists Flying Fish documented in 1991 was
Linda Waterfall, whose decent but not outstanding
A Little Bit at a Time was influenced by the 1970s recordings of
Joan Baez,
Carole King,
Judy Collins and
Joni Mitchell. Introspective, acoustic-oriented originals like "Mirage" and "Something That We Already Know" demonstrated that the pop-folk singer, composer and guitarist from Washington had a lovely voice and impressive range, and one sensed that she had the potential to make a great album instead of one that was only decent. But regrettably, Waterfall's talent never rescued her from obscurity. ~ Alex Henderson