KRIS NEEDS' piece about the TEB for Shindig!

One of the best piece about the TEB ever written, this special feature edited by Kris Needs for Shindig! magazine is very good one; a real qualified tribute to the band, "remained the most intriguingly strange and mysteriously evocative of all"...

 

 

 no©2020 LucaChinoFerrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first)

Dave Tomlin's "Lark Rise" included in a new 3CDs compilation.

 

Third Ear Band's "Lark Rise" will be included in a brand new 3CDs anthology titled "Sumer Is Icumen In: The Pagan Sound Of British & Irish Folk 1966-1975" released by Grapefruit as CRSEGBOX083. 

The record (for £ 19.99) is scheduled for 27 November 2020. 

This is the Grapefruit's press release:

"Released in 2015, Grapefruit’s 3-CD multi-artist British underground folk compilation Dust On The Nettles was widely praised, with a five-star review in The Times hailing it as “a delight from beginning to end”. 

 

A long-overdue follow up to that set, Sumer Is Icumen In tightens the mesh by focusing on the point when traditional folksong and the burgeoning late Sixties counterculture collided, largely courtesy of seminal acts like the Incredible String Band, Fairport Convention and Pentangle.
As Steeleye Span’s Martin Carthy commented at the time, the scene had a strong pagan feel, dark and elemental, and progressive folk bands like Dr. Strangely Strange, Comus and Third Ear Band (who performed with the druids in dawn solstice ceremonies at Glastonbury Tor) were active at the same time as folklorists like Mr. Fox pair Bob & Carole Pegg and fellow husband-and-wife team Dave & Toni Arthur, whose commitment to the cause saw them dancing naked at a coven led by ‘King of the Witches’, the notorious Alex Sanders. 

 

Showcasing all of the above names as well as a supporting cast that ranges from Mike Oldfield and Marc Bolan to unsigned bands who recorded demos in a barn, Sumer Is Icumen In features four hours of Albion hymns ancient and modern, including three previously unreleased cuts. “Housed in a stylish clamshell box, it includes a 40-page bookletwith track-by-track annotation, numerous band quotes and some very rare photos. 

The result is a secret glade in a darkly pagan woodland that’s peppered with invocations of corn gods, wicker men, bright Phoebus and other non-Christian deities; magickal tales of daemons, sorcerers, false knights and faerie queens; the medieval England myths, legends and traditions of the May Queen, John Barleycorn and the Green Man; paeans to the natural world and the rhythm of the passing seasons; fables of sanctuary stones, scarecrows and buried villages alongside dread stories of purgatory, sacrifice, rape, bestiality and murder."

no©2020 LucaChinoFerrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first)

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A TEB DAY-BY-DAY CHRONOLOGY: 2017-2024

[Note: this is the last part of three related to the period 2017-2022. The first part (from 1966 to 1971) is available HERE; the second part (from 1972 to 2016) is available HERE]. 

 2017

September

- "Brain Waves" CD reissue with Carolyn Looker's original cover and booklet notes by Luca Chino Ferrari. In the CD included also a bonus-track 

November

7th - Arranger, producer, musician Paul Buckmaster passed away at his home in Los Angeles.

Read the sad news on Ghettoraga Archive here: https://ghettoraga.blogspot.com/2017/11/paul-buckmaster-passed-away-yesterday.html

Obituaries by the press here: https://ghettoraga.blogspot.com/2017/11/paul-buckmasters-obituaries.html

Paul Buckmaster at Air Studios during E. John's "Made in England" sessions, February-April 1994 (photo by John F. Higgins)

2018

November

23rd - "Third Ear Band" reissued in a 3 CD remastered and expanded edition by Esoteric Recordings. Booklet notes by Luca Chino Ferrari.

A philological analysis by LCF here: https://ghettoraga.blogspot.com/2018/12/the-third-ear-band-cds-unrealised.html

 2019

January

- "Music from Macbeth" original album reissued in a remastered and expanded CD edition by Esoteric Recordings (PECLEC 2656). Booklet notes by Luca Chino Ferrari.

 

March

29th - "Alchemy" original album reissued in a remastered and expanded 2CDs edition by Esoteric Recordings (PECLEC 22668). Booklet notes by Luca Chino Ferrari.

Read a critical review by LCF here: https://ghettoraga.blogspot.com/2019/05/alchemy-remastered-edition-critical.html

- A 3CDs anthology boxset of British folk is published by Cherry Red records/Grapefruit with the title "STRANGERS IN THE ROOM ~ A JOURNEY THROUGH THE BRITISH FOLK ROCK SCENE 1967-73".

Among great musicians and bands as Michael Chapman, Pentangle, Trees, Fairport Convention, Steeleye Span, Dando Shaft, C.O.B., Strawbs, Heron, Bridget St. John, on disc  2 also the Third Ear Band with "Fleance".

June

31th - "The Magus" original album (originally edited in 2004 in CD only) is reissued by Tiger Bay in a 12" vinyl edition format (as TB6430).

September

27th - "Alchemy" vinyl 180gr edition released by Esoteric Recordings (PECLECLP 2668).

2020

June 

Luca Chino Ferrari's book on the TEB titled "Glen Sweeney's Book of Alchemies. The life and times of the Third Ear Band, 1967-1973" is published and distributed by November Books (Recommended Records).

Read the publisher's press release  HERE.

 September

- Original "Music From Macbeth" is reissued in a vinyl edition (with insert) by Spanish label Munster Records. Liner notes by Fernando Naporano.

Read LCF's review of the record here: https://ghettoraga.blogspot.com/2020/09/macbeth-vinyl-edition-out-now.html

- Two extraordinary videos of the TEB from a TV appearance in October 1972 taken from ILEA (Inner London Education Authority) archive, appeared on a YouTube channel. The peculiarity of these excerpts is that this is the only existing video thing of Mike Marchant and Peter Pavli with the band.

Read a review and watch the videos here: https://ghettoraga.blogspot.com/2020/09/extraordinarly-amazing-teb-tv.html

 

2022

June

Discovered 24 previously unseen shots of the Third Ear Band from the July 1969 Hyde Parlk free concert (a.k.a. Rolling Stones Hyde Park Concert) held by the Milan archive of Giuseppe Ferraina. Author the Italian freelance photographer Pino Callà. A reconstruction of the discovery on the page: https://draft.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/5680781505960561597/2733485890161343697

 

 2023 

20th January-23th February

An exhibition of the 24 unreleased photos taken at Hyde Park in 1969 is promoted at Ferraina's photo studio in Milan.

 

  2024

June

 

A wonderful live concert at Essen (Germany) recorded by German TV in June 1970 is released by M.I.G- Music in vinyl limited edition.

Read Luca Chino Ferrari album release at https://ghettoraga.blogspot.com/2024/05/my-liner-notes-for-recording-at-essen.html

 

no©2017-2022 LucaChinoFerrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first).

"What's this ear?". A Glen Sweeney and Paul Minns short interview on an old issue of Disc & Music Echo.

I've just found in the Web an old copy of "Disc & Music Echo", the British magazine born in the Fifties.

In this issue (April 22, 1972) there's a short interview with Glen Sweeney and Paul Minns about the "Macbeth" recordings.

Nothing of particularly revelatory, but it's interesting for some little known details of that experience, most of all for the relation with filmmaker Roman Polanski.

Also, here there's the proof that Stanley Kubrick was interested into involving the band for the soundtrack of his masterpiece "Clockwork Orange", even if different than the usual Glen's memory. 

In fact, Glen told: "I heard that Stanley Kubrick was thinking of doing the science fiction  novel "Dune". It's a fantastic book, vaguely Eastern and right up our street. However, even if he does do it, we had a bit of a run-in with Stanley, so I don't know how we'd stand. He wanted us to do something  for "Clockwork Orange" for free. We said no chance, but it turned out all he wanted to use was our second album "Air". It was to be played through the scene  in which someone turns sadistic. It has been rumoured that several people have gone mad after hearing that album!"

no©2020 LucaChinoFerrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first)

Munster Records announces "Third Ear Band" reissue in vinyl format.

After being published "Macbeth" soundtrack, Spanish label Munster Records (http://munster-records.com/) is going to release the vinyl edition of "Third Ear Band", the extraordinary album known by fans as "Air, Earth, Fire & Water" (in the Seventies) or "Elements" (later).

More details soon.

 no©2020 LucaChinoFerrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first)

If you want to hear the magic music...

Few days ago someone wrote on Facebook:

"If you want to hear the music of the spheres and listen to the vibrations of the planets, you must do it with the third ear or with silence. This is a "unique" piece... test pressing and cover proof and there is no other copy."

Right. 

But also this one is a unique piece of that record: a non-plasticized cover proof with white inner sleeve  made by MASO just before the official pressing...

MASO gave one copy each to the musicians and one to me. On the front cover of mine, the Thirds left their signs. 

Lyn Dobson wrote: "Gracie per tutti Luca." Neil Black: "To Luca, the fifth Man." 

Photographed by Annette Jarve, at the time with Lucia Baldini the main graphic at MASO, this is a controversial cover. Glen didn't like it, even if all of us was conscious Annette tried to get a different, not stereotypical picture of Stonehenge. Nevertheless, anyway, the final result was not too satisfying.

no©2020 LucaChinoFerrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first)

Third Ear Band on Shindig! October issue!

Here's the cover of the last new issue of the Sixties/Psychedelic/underground British magazine Shindig!, this month featuring the Third Ear Band. 

Rock journalist KRIS NEEDS dedicates a long piece to the band and hopefully to the book... 

no©2020 LucaChinoFerrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first)