Soon an exclusive interview with Paul Buckmaster!

Thanks to Denny Bridges we've got a contact with musician/producer/sound engineer Paul Buckmaster. Soon we'll have an exclusive interview with him here.

Who is interested to ask him some specific questions, please contact me through my personal e-mail.

Paul Buckmaster on electric bass playing with Bridges and Minns in September 1970.

In the meanwhile, watch this interesting video from YouTube where Paul talks about his orchestral arrangements for the Grand Illusion song "Gates of Fire" realised in 2011.

no©2012 Luca Ferrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first) 

"I've left my heart in"... New Orleans. The dawn of Dave Tomlin.

At the beginning of his career, just some years before to form the Giant Sun Trolley and meet Glen Sweeney, Dave Tomlin worked as a session man playing the clarinet for some jazz bands.

Bob Wallis

One of them was leaded by trumpeter Bob Wallis (1934-1991), "a feisty British jazzman who had a handful of chart successes in the early 1960s, during the “trad” boom that directly preceded the coming of the Beatles and all the other Merseyside groups that decimated the number of UK jazz bands at that time".

"Wallis was a trumpeter with real drive and energy - one of his heroes was Henry Red Allen - as well as being full of life, remarkable for someone who suffered from ill health for most of his years. He played with his own band for much of that time, the Storyville Jazzmen, though earlier and later in his career he played with other bands as well.
Wallis was born in Bridlington, East Riding of Yorkshire, in 1934, where his father eventually became harbour master. At an early age he joined the local Salvation Army Band with his local friend, Keith Avison, who was to play trombone with Wallis for a number of years. By the age of 20 he had discovered the world of jazz and set up his own band in Bridlington which also played in nearby Hull.

"He went to Denmark for a short spell and made his first couple of records there - as vocalist with the “Washboard Beaters”. The skiffle craze was rampant at the time and the Wallis singing style was some of the most idiosyncratic ever heard. Once you grew used to the gravelly-voiced style, however, it became clear that the singing was essentially melodious and that Wallis could certainly carry a tune.

"Back in the UK, he went to London and played for a short time with Ken Colyer's Omega Brass as well as joining Acker Bilk. These bands were recording mainly for the specialist 77 Records label. Ultimately he joined up with Hugh Rainey's All Stars (Ginger Baker was their drummer at the time) and shortly afterwards the band changed its name to The Storyville Jazzmen, fronted by Wallis. In 1959 the band recorded an LP for Top Rank, “Everybody Loves Saturday Night” which entered the top ten album charts. A single followed and then the band moved to the more jazz-oriented Pye label where they made three albums and a number of singles which also had modest chart success.

" (...) When the trad boom ended in 1963, Wallis and the band, who had been TV regulars as well as having a long summer season at the London Palladium, effectively broke up. Wallis played with one or two other bands before moving to the Continent where he spent most of his remaining years, still blowing up a storm with reconstituted versions of the Storyville Jazzmen. Occasionally these bands included former colleagues, such as Keith Avison and Pete Gresham. Drummer Alan Poston was still playing with the band when it made its final recordings in the mid eighties. Clarinettist Forrie Cairns was also with the band for much of this time.

"Ultimately Bob settled in Zurich with a residency at the Casa Bar, where he finally found his spiritual home, much appreciated by residents and visitors alike. He continued to make records for European labels such as Storyville, WAM and Pebe, but the chart appearances were long gone. Nevertheless the band remained true to the Wallis ideals, with a driving style that owed much to his energy and fine sense of humour. Phil Kent, who was the bass-player with Bobs band during their residency in Zurich, is one of the few remaining members of the Storyville Jazzmen. He is still playing bass, and lives in Lydeard St Lawrence, near Taunton, Somerset.

"When it became clear in 1990 that his ill health was not going to improve, he returned to England with his wife, Joyce, where he died in hospital in 1991. His long battle with illness was over but his records attest to the fact that Wallis was one of the great British jazzmen of his time. His son, Jay, carries on the family tradition of playing trumpet" ("All about jazz" Web site, http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/musician.php?id=11743).

The CD cover where the tracks are taken.

From one of the rare Bob Wallis' sessions survived, here we have three tracks recorded in London on May 20th and June 1st, 1959 with Dave Tomlin on clarinet, Avo Avison (trombone), Pete Gresham (piano), Hugh Rainey (banjo), Brian 'Drag' Kirby, Kenny Buckner (drums) and Bob Wallis on trumpet.

Funny to know that Dave had forgotten these jolly recordings and it's been a pleasure for him to listen to them...

Download the tracks at Rapidshare:
"Maryland, my Maryland" (4:35) 11.00MB

https://rapidshare.com/files/1748473605/Maryland__my_Maryland.mp3 

"Big House Blues" (5:46) 13.83MB
https://rapidshare.com/files/3978886154/Big_House_Blues.mp3 
"Savoy Blues" (5:09) 12.36MB
https://rapidshare.com/files/837947095/Savoy_Blues.mp3 

no©2012 Luca Ferrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first) 

The same old rotten story: a 'new' Italian tribute to the TEB full of commonplaces and omissions...

It's the same old story, here, in Italy, when the so-called music journalists try to write something of significant about rock music: they are able just to write obviousness, commonplaces, repeating supposed legends taken from the same overused rotten sources... 

All in all, as they say, nothing of new under the sun, dear expert & brave Third Ear Band's fans!

This time, but just if you can read Italian, you can have a lot of assorted trite amenities - totally free!!! - at http://www.ondarock.it/rockedintorni/thirdearband.htm.
Sorry, but this is the standard we can have here, in Italy...

no©2012 Luca Ferrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first) 

Lyn Dobson's Four Elements.

Lyn Dobson, the last winds player of the TEB, among his countless projects, in July 2005 recorded his personal vision of the four archetipal elements - musical landscapes inspired by his eccentric  theatrical vocalist jazzy/folky/ethnic soul.

He asked me to help him to get a deal in Italy, but I had bad luck and nothing happened (but if someone's interested please contact me...).

Lyn and Ursula Smith playing on stage at Genova's Psycho Club (January 1990)

So you have now the chance to listen to three of these very fascinanting tunes and have an idea of Lyn's soundscape ideas of it. Not just the TEB's 1970 legendary four elements, of course, but a sort  of catching ragamelodic thing...

TITLE: "The Elements"

TRACKLIST:

"Air" (9:41)

"Fire" (10:29)

"Earth" (10:25)

"Water" (10:21)

Recorded in Crete on July 7th, 2005

Lyn Dobson: vocals, sitar, flutes, sax, keyboards, programming

Download it at:  
 https://soundcloud.com/teb-archive/lyn-dobsons-elements-fire
("Fire") 25.50 MB

https://rapidshare.com/files/3941370084/Lyn_Dobson_s_Elements_-_Earth.mp3 ("Earth") 25.10 MB
https://rapidshare.com/files/3360194560/Lyn_Dobson_s_Elements_-_Water.mp3 ("Water") 26.15 MB

Some recent videos with Lyn (interviewed by Mike Collins) on You Tube at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyYTlvGj3U8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ceOVMjgPlfs

no©2012 Luca Ferrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first)

A very good review on TEB's "Music from Macbeth" by Robert Barry of "Electric Sheep Magazine" Web site.

On May 25th, 2012 Robert Barry from the site "Electric Sheep. A deviant view of cinema" writes a very good piece on TEB's "Music from Macbeth" (http://www.electricsheepmagazine.co.uk/features/2012/05/25/full-of-sound-and-fury-the-tragedy-of-macbeth/).

It's so rare to read something of new & deep about that wonderful, gloomy music...

"Full of sound and fury: the Tragedy of Macbeth

Back in the early 70s, the Third Ear Band were the festival band. Wherever there was mud, cider and an outdoor PA system, there would be Glenn Sweeney’s merry band with their strings and their hand drums, wigging out on some epic jam which somehow managed to blend together the collective folk music of half the world. Curiously, only when they were asked to provide an explicitly period soundtrack did they find it necessary to add an electronic synthesizer to their line-up. Simon House, later of Hawkwind, joined the group for the Macbeth soundtrack and left shortly after. He played a VCS-3, a keyboard-free analogue synth beloved of Brian Hodgson and Delia Derbyshire (not to mention Karlheinz Stockhausen), and designed in London by the composers Tristram Cary and Peter Zinovieff (with engineer David Cockerell).

This sudden addition of electricity to the previously acoustic group seems to suggest an understanding that the sheer macabre weirdness of Shakespeare’s play – especially as interpreted by Roman Polanski and Kenneth Tynan – demanded something other, some element of fantasy that went beyond what could be notated on manuscript paper.

For a group whose previous compositions averaged close to 10 minutes in length, the Third Ear Band are here remarkably restrained. The extended prog-rock ragas of Alchemy and its eponymous sequel are here compressed to clips of but a few seconds’ length. And for most of the play’s first act, they stick to a fairly straight medievalism, the pentatonic melismas of Paul Minns’s oboe doing a serviceable imitation of a twelfth-century shawm. The only note of something sinister – and obviously anachronistic – comes from the bass playing of Paul Buckmaster: one minute plunging into psych head music, the next evoking the drones of the tambura in Hindustani classical music. This soundtrack was Buckmaster’s only recording with the Third Ear Band, a performance turned in between arrangement work on Leonard Cohen’s Songs of Love and Hate and Miles Davis’s On the Corner.

As Shakespeare’s story grows darker and weirder, so too does the music. While Macbeth contemplates murdering Duncan, a fizzling hum of shuddering VCS-3 and scraping guitar noise underscores the famous ‘Is this a dagger I see before me?’ soliloquy. Upon the deed itself, a wild dervish of free improvisation. As the film draws towards its conclusion, with the army approaching upon the hill and mist engulfing the screen, a thick fog of dissonance drifts in likewise, seemingly emerging directly from precisely the kind of snaking modal oboe line which had once seemed to speak of happier times. As Macbeth finally meets his end, high tremolando violin merges with more VCS-3 in a pitch of piercing tinnitus.

The Third Ear Band’s music for this film has been compared to both the chamber music of György Ligeti and Masaru Sato’s soundtrack to Kurosawa’s Throne of Blood (1957). The Tragedy of Macbeth has often been called the bloodiest of all Shakespeare films. With its murderous tones, forever teetering on the edge of some horror, this music may be bloodier still".
©2012 Robert Barry

The original Kurosawa's film poster

Interesting the connections with Ligeti's music and, above all, Masaru Sato's soundtrack for the Kurosawa "Throne of Blood", a 1957 transposition of the Shakespeare's tragedy.

You can watch &  listen a very significative excerpt from YouTube here: 

Also you can watch/listen to the soundtrack through some film's excerpts at the YouTube page: http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=kurosawa+throne+of+blood&oq=kurosawa+throne+of+blood&aq=f&aqi=g-L3g-mL2&aql=&gs_l=youtube.3..0i19l3j0i5i19l2.1970.8920.0.9237.24.23.0.1.1.0.161.2620.5j18.23.0...0.0.WBUkEwiE0-k

no©2012 Luca Ferrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first)   

The (Chief Druid) DAVID LOXLEY interview!

We have here a very exclusive precious interview with DAVID LOXLEY, Chief Druid of the Ancient Order of Druids (London) and designer/writer involved with the London underground and the TEB in the '60's-'70's. Loxley assembled the "Alchemy" cover and designed lot of posters and flyers for gigs and festivals, drawing graphics for magazines as "Albion" directed by Steve Pank. 
In this short interview he reveals the origins and meanings of the TEB's first album cover and the connection between the band and the Druids...

As every TEB fan knows you designed the beautiful “Alchemy” album cover. I’ve discovered the picture was taken from an old book about alchemy titled "Atalanta Fugiens", edited by German Michael Meier in 1617. Can you tell us the genesis of it, the reasons behind it, the real meanings?
"I didn’t really design the cover, it kind of happened with parts of it coming from different people. I put all the ingredients together. The main drawing is from a book written and illustrated in 1617. I think this originated from Glen or Steve Pank. I thought this was a bit too medieval.

One evening in my flat a girl from California drew a doodle of some snakes, and left them there as a gift. I redrew them and put them in the corners of the medieval image to make it look more celtic looking.
The image itself I have never interpreted for anyone before, but it has a very deep meaning, which could be the subject of a book and not just an answer, so here goes with an answer with a book hidden in it. 

The picture has a courtyard with a tunnel entrance with a man in the middle about to crack an egg on a table. This is a totally symbolic image. On a material level the courtyard is a womb, if it was the Great Pyramid in Egypt it would be the chamber of transformation. The tunnel is the entrance to the womb, it has an egg in it waiting for a sperm to fertilise it. 
 

The original 1617 engrave

The image was meant to be interpreted on the mental level according to the upper room or womb. The brain is a courtyard with an egg in it called the Pineal gland. On an abstract level this gland has the same function as the egg in the physical womb. The tunnel is the Pituitary gland or the entrance for light to enter into the courtyard or brain and fertilise the Pineal gland. Both of these eggs, abstract and material are functionaries of the moon. The Great Pyramid at Giza has two entrances, one for the physical seeds to enter (mummies) and one for the light to enter, the physical body is the same.

Detail of the egg from the original cover

The egg is the sleeping Beauty which will only wake up for the light. In the same way that the physical sperm has to give up everything or die into the egg in order to be resurrected into a new world as a baby, then the Pineal gland will only operate as an entrance to another world if the Pituitary gland which is ruled by Mercury gives up all of its light to the Pineal.

The Sword held by the man is not a weapon, but a symbol for something which cleaves the air. Light or electrons cut through space like a sword or a word and represent light and the present tense. The Moon will only give itself up to the Sunlight and than reflect it onto the land. To be enlightened the man must give up everything, judgements, what he thinks he knows and become nothing in order to be accepted by the egg, in return for this death he will be resurrected by the present tense which is the womb with an egg in it.

I think I have gone on long enough, so lets just finish by saying that the cover represents the real mysteries of Sex or creativity in the present tense".

Which meanings have the snakes around the border of the cover? In an old interview the same Glen Sweeney stated that they are there to protect the band and its music...
"The serpents at the corners of the cover had no real meaning intentionally. Originally they would have been used to protect the four corners of the world, north south east and west. The serpents lift the slightly flat image of the main picture and provide some contrast to project the cover a bit more".

 

Do you remember when/where/how did you meet Glen and the other guys of the band? 

"I cannot guarantee my memory for some of these questions but I think I first saw Glen at a club called the UFO club in Tottenham Court Road in London in 1967 or thereabouts. At the time this was the place to be, but it was still quite a small scene with enormous potential for the future of social change. Glen was playing in a band whose name I cannot remember, It was a sort of free form spontaneous jazz group, I think [maybe the Hydrogen Jukebox?]".

What was you doing at the time? Which was your role in the London underground?

"At the time I was very young and did not see myself as having a particular role other than helping out where I could. I had just dropped out so to speak, a concept which would sound alien today. I was into having a good time. My flat was raided by the police but rather than arrest me for something they just said we will be back in 30 minutes and if I was you I would not be here, so me and my brother ended up 30 minutes later walking down the road to somewhere or nowhere. We asked in a bar if anyone knew of anywhere to stay, and we were sent to Steve Pank's flat, who kindly put us up for about a week. That is how I met Steve Pank who I have known for forty something years. At the time if it was happening anywhere it was in Portobello Road, Steve had a magazine called "Albion" which I did some drawings for and
later on I helped him run a club in a church hall, for which I did the posters and handouts and any other menial tasks. This club never advertised who was playing because most of the people who came to jam did not tell their managers or record companies, even Steve did not know sometimes if anybody was coming to play or not. Some of the musicians and acts were very well known, and people just turned up to see whatever happened. The council eventually closed us down for making to much noise, or that was the reason given. One of the bands who played regulary was the Third Ear Band who Steve introduced me to them".

Can you tell me which was the real connections of TEB with the Druids?
"The real connection between TEB and druidism was or is, well I am not sure. I was interested in druidism so I joined a group, Steve Pank was also interested so he joined also. TEB music like a lot of freeform jazz at the time was about being in the present tense, opening up the door to another state of being. Some freeform jazz branched out into various kinds of indian or oriental music and created fusion music. Some of this music had spiritual connotations and meditation was also becoming popular. The TEB was a fusion between freeform jazz, indian music, meditation and folk music played on classical instruments. It was probably the first band of its kind but it was still about getting into the present tense or another state of being. The Druid Order is about the same thing in another context, linking up with another state of being or going beyond time and space searching for reality. So I guess although some of the connections are physical the real connection is abstract".

What do you think about TEB experience? Some people asks me if TEB music was devoted to the black magic... What can you tell about it?
"My previous answer answers most of this question as well. TEB has nothing to do with black magic. If black magic is superstition then no they were not. Black magic is just going against the light, every habit and resentment which we are stuck in is black magic, every desire to get revenge or hurt those whom we thought or did hurt us is black magic, war is black magic if it is based on an illusion and personal pride. Primitive people need a devil to blame otherwise they would have to take responsibility for their own actions. The devil is needed by immature people. If the devil existed he or she would be your best friend, supporting you to be in the past tense and stuck with the fantasy that you can have it all now and take it with you. It is if we are large enough a great honour to take the blame for the negative thoughts of others who cannot face the reality of their own failure to support the light. I think I will stop there as i am starting to sound like a born again preacher!" 

What are you doing now? I know you’re still a Chief Druid…

"At the moment, I am still a Chief Druid which takes up some time, I have semi retired, I still do some design work, some writing, some physical work, making things etc. It is my second dropping out and I am looking at ways to earn some money without having to work all the time. So that ends my answers on a very practical note". 

Loxley at the Spring equinox Druid ceremony on London Tower  Hill in 2010. Note Carolyn Looker at the core of the picture (photo: Steve Pank).

REFERENCES TO DAVID LOXLEY IN THIS ARCHIVE

about the "Alchemy" cover

http://ghettoraga.blogspot.it/2009/12/origins-and-meanings-of-alchemy-cover.html

about TEB alchemical iconography 
http://ghettoraga.blogspot.it/2011/12/origins-and-meanings-of-teb-alchemical.html 
about "Albion" magazine  
http://ghettoraga.blogspot.it/2010/07/first-teb-ad-on-magazine.html 
about the connections with Druids 
http://ghettoraga.blogspot.it/2009/12/trird-ear-druidic-band.html

WRITINGS BY DAVID LOXLEY IN THE NET
about the Ancient Order of Druids 
http://www.stonehengecampaign.org.uk/scdruids.htm#aod

Loxley wrote also an introduction for a Graham Howe's book titled "The Mind of the Druid" (Skoob Esoterica, UK 1990).

no©2012 Luca Ferrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first)   

An autobiographical documentary movie about Roman Polanski's life.

An autobiographical documentary movie on Roman Polanski's life directed by Laurent Bouzereau is at Cannes Festival in those days.

It is titled "Roman Polanski: a film memoir" (90'), but hardly the famous filmaker will remember there his experience with the Third Ear Band for "Macbeth"...
Anyway, we'll check it out... 

Polanski directing "MacBeth" in Northumberland in November 1970.

no©2012 Luca Ferrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first)   

A review of "Hymn to the Sphynx" from "Prog Archives" Web site.

This recent quite interesting review of "Hymn to the Sphynx", written by "Sean Trane",  has been published by "Prog Archives" Web site 
(http://www.progarchives.com/Review.asp?id=743932): it'd be good if some TEB fans would like to review records, facts, things for this archive too!

"The present double-disc collection is a weird throw-it-all-together compilation, mixing some already-released first-era TEB material and some studio and live second-era recordings. The main interest of HTTS is the band's history in the booklet. A fairly ugly artwork disgraces this confusing compilation album as well, and while the music is mostly about the second-era, the pictures in the booklet are solely about the first-era, which kind of induces (willingly?) in error.

I'll first spend a few lines over the Abelard & Heloise suite, which had received a few months before its own release, and it represents quite well the TEB's first line-up. If you want to know more about A&H, read my review on that album's page. Of course, you'll find much more info about the piece and its background in the booklet of the present collection. To be honest, I'd have preferred the A&H suite to be released with the BBC sessions (are they still available?), rather than the second-era stuff present on HTTS.

Coming to that second TEB life, the studio tracks (recorded in 90, as part of the Magic Music album) on the first disc present relatively lengthy (5 to 9 minutes) ragas, that while being interesting, are mostly diluted via the electronic violin gear of Neil Back, while Dobson's saxes are in the line of what Minns did. But drummer Sweeney is the only remaining original member on this session. The trafficked violin gear was able to produce some electronic loops, sometimes approaching the future techno music stuff, even developing a slightly industrial feel, especially on the session-closing Midnight On Mars. The booklet tells us not to confuse the music of this session with the Materiali Sonori album of the same name, but you'd have to be a real TEB expert to tell a difference. To be honest, it's quite a relief when the A&H suite comes around.

As for the live recordings of the same year (featured on the second disc), it features the same line-up as the studio session; but they don't sound as "electronic" or "industrial" as those studio tracks, although the extended raga gives it a family resemblance. The set features a couple of tracks from their future album (most notably the very Indian-sounding Sun Ra Raga), one from the previous Live Ghosts, and more important their first-era compositions of Egyptian Book Of The Dead and Pyramid Song (both from their debut, the latter featuring some Dobson-scat vocals), which is an interesting exercise in comparison between the two eras - quite different versions, and the original being superior, but these are not without charm. It's unclear to me whether these live tracks are the ones that came out on the Voiceprint label's 96 release TEB Live, in which case this would render the present compilation almost utterly useless. Not sure the Mooncrest label did you a favour to you by releasing this one, because even parts of the liner notes seem to be paraphrasing Joynson's Tapestry Of  Delight book TEB entry. I'm rounding this up to the upper third star".

no©2012 Luca Ferrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first)  

A short essay on the TEB's music by 'folkorganic' musician Sedayne

Here's a short essay published on TEB's fan Facebook page (read it at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Third-Ear-Band/156660855584) written in March 2012 by folkorganic English musician (and old TEB fan) Sedayne.

Stone circles in Swinside, Cumbria (England)

"The Third Ear Band define the essense of Folk Music in an Indo-European sense; they seem to embody A L Loyd's notions of a Dreamtime of migrations of melismatic modal hunter-gatherers following the retreating ice-sheets across ancient continents before borders had ever been dreamed of.

These ancient cultures made Very Big Monuments like Thornborough, Avebury and Stonehenge that were Bigger than Themselves and, by implication and perspective, Bigger than Nature too. These monuments and stone circles sought order in the chaos of the natural world, they created perfect flat horizons, they looked for patterns in the sun, moon and stars; they perceived in the simplicity of arcs, circles, lines and elipses an order which was entirely Unnatural and therefore Good.

Scroll on 50,000 years and many of us feel that we've taken it too far; the ordered blandness of the human world is utterly artificial and entirely uninspiring, so we might seek after a more Natural music in which Organic Process is integral, be it from one rendering of a Folk Song to the next, or simply by Improvising without pre-conception. The music is still Traditional, just that the potentials are entirely unpredictable in terms of a Chaos which some of us now perceive as A Very Good Thing.

The music of the Third Ear Band is like this: organic, fluid, never the same thing twice, living and breathing in the liminal realm between Concept and Corporeality; each rendering 'as alike or as unalike as trees, grass or crickets' with the essence of the thing in the being there, the ceremonial excellence of pure experience".

 ©2012Sedayne/Facebook

no©2012 Luca Ferrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first) 

At last a proper interview with CAROLYN LOOKER, Glen Sweeney missus and TEB former!!!

I know Carolyn from the half of the Eighties and I've tried to interview her many times but with scarce results.

She's a very kind woman and she cooperated very well to my book on the band in 1995-1996, writing a two-pages of memories for a projected but never realised tribute CD and helping me to clear some obscure  things (the original name of the band, the cultural sources...) for this archive... but I couldn't ever have a proper interview with her.

In the Summer 2010 at her home in London Hammersmith I recorded around one hour of questions & answers, but when I went back to Italy I discovered the tape couldn't work, thus no interview...

So, because she has no computers/e-mails, some months ago I've sent her some questions by letter and now we've got her answers through our common friend Steve Pank. 

Another chance to know some old facts on the Thirds...

Carolyn Looker, London 2010.

When/where you met Glen for the first time?

"Both Glen and I was working at Liberty's in Regent Street. Glen was doing modern furniture display. He had his drumkit in the storeroom where he would hide and practice his drumming (!) which at the time was modern jazz...".

Where Glen was from?

"Glen's family lived in Croydon, about ten miles south of the Thames".

Which was your interests at that time?

"Sartre, Kerouack and the Beat Generation, Zen Buddhism, Jazz, Occult".

Had you involved in the cultural scene of those days?

"Yes, I was reading beat poetry to avantgarde jazz to a very small audience in pub gigs".

Have you some memories of the beginning with the Giant Sun Trolley?

"Many happenings at UFO with Sun Trolley! A dog howling to Dave's sax. Total 15 minutes of silence from the two, then a spaced out kid tried to bang on Glen's drum. Glen hit him with D stick - said it was Zen - kid remained  far from that".

How Glen met Dave?

"Dave was advertising for drummer. Glen (auditioned) in Free School that was a cellar where Dave was squatting with a poet called Macavity. Glen was told to take the drum sound from here to there. Dave said making directions. Glen being good with fantasy managed to do so and got the gig!".

Which was the mood at UFO?

"Memories but not clear. It was all like a scene from a Fellini movie".

And what's about the music Sun Trolley played?

"Very avantgarde: used happenings on stage, i.e. electric scissors cutting clothes off a dancer (at the 14th Technicolor Dream)...".

How TEB started to play at the Drury Lane's Arts Lab? 

"Jim Haynes loved TEB, said they gave him orgasms. They play Arts Lab on a regular basis. A room painted black, incense burning and audience on floor cushions".

What's about the legendary levitation of St. Pancras' station? Is it all true?

"Yes, us and John Peel sat outside ohming... Hard work but it lifted a few inches (we were on acid)...".

What kind of music the first electric TEB line-up played? Do you remember some particular tunes played?

"I remember Clive [Kingsley]'s "Ronson Riff", a marvelous thing he did sliding his ciggy lighter along his guitar".

Do you remember something about the instruments stolen after a concert that induced the new TEB acoustic line-up?

"Instruments were left in van overnight, gone in the morning. Never found out who took them. Of course they weren't insured!".

Carolyn with her cat Leonardo (London 2010).

How John Peel was involved at the "Alchemy"'s recording sessions?

"A friend of Glen's took us around to Peel's flat. I remember us all discussing the existence of fairies".

Can you tell me something about that wonderful album cover?

"Glen was very much into Alchemy, the illustration was in a book he had".

Any memories on the second album recording sessions?

"Sorry, we were all stoned. Glen would suggest a feel or a vision for each track and the guys played it".

Is it true EMI engineers left the studio during the sessions?

"I don't think the engineers liked or understood the music, so mixing they weren't into".

And what do you think about EMI? Why they gave up the band?

"EMI were fine. I think the contract ran out".

Do you remember the gig TEB played with Bernard Parmegiani in London? Can you tell me something about it?

"Parmegiani concert was at Festival Hall. It didn't work too well in my opinion. TEB's music was organic, the French were music concrete, it didn't got".

How did it go with Polanski?

"Lots of memories of Polanski. He and Glen were the same height, so got on really well. Recordings were made improvising the pieces of the film which were projected in the recording studio".

Which is your opinion about Blackhill? Do you think the agency was really involved into the TEB music?

"Blackhill never really understood the music, if they had been more supportive made more of film music. I.e. Polanski and Kubrick admiring TEB and involved them more in the arts as in Pink Floyd. Steered the right way the band could have been big".

One of the most obscure period of your (Glen and you) life is when you lived on a boat in a river during the Seventies...

"We had an idyllic Summer on the boat. Glen was writing poetry, I was painting. Hard work because the mooring wasn't residential we had to collect our water and calor gas about 1/2 mile away. We retired to a friend's flat in the Winter as the river flooded all the time. Infact one huge flood, the Ark, our boat, flooded over into the field and settled there when the floods ended. We lived that way chocked up in the middle of a field for an year. The council complained and at great expense we hired a crane to put us back in the water".

Which was the feelings of Glen about music just before I met him in your Sheperd's Bush flat? Why at the beginning he was so suspicious of me?

"Before meeting you I think Glen had decided to retire from the music scene.  I was envolved in managing a prop hire company and we figured it Glen's turn to take a rest. Glen suspicious of you? I think he was suspicious of most people's intentions till proved otherwise!".

Some TEB fans are interested to know if Glen was involved in black magic...

"Glen was very interested in esoteric, also in black magic, but did not practice it".

And what's about TEB's relation with Druids?

"Steve Pank can tell you more about the Druid meetings and the Glastonbury Tor concert. As he is now a fully fledged Druid and Dave Loxley the Head Druid who created the celtic border of "Alchemy"".

no©2012 Luca Ferrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first) 

Denny Bridges updated.

Denny from his MySpace profile.

"Hello Luca, 
I still truly like the term 'fascinatingly old-fashioned' [note: I used this expression in one of my last e-mails to him to define his music...]. Next CD maybe. 

The days and then the years pass by so quickly. I have intended to do much and regretfully have achieved less than that intended. 

I look at the Archive from time to time. I saw (how would you describe what I saw?) references to "Fleance"'s Song. I' m not sure that these new folks have recorded a version but I wish I could hear it if they did. I did hear what the band from Bristol did some time ago. I tried to contact them through Reverbnation (I think) but no response. You may be interested to know that last night Paul Buckmaster and I spoke, by telephone, for 3 hours catching up on all things. Who knows what may develop. 

I am still working on locating enough material for a decent length CD. It must be somewhere. 

I regret that the 2011 Renaissance tour was limited to USA which seems to be what will happen this year. We can live in hope for Europe - one day. 

So, just to keep you a little informed but it is, regretfully, it is very little - for now. Finally, it's Denny not Danny (bottom if "Fleance" page). That is the scourge of my life. In America they always get it wrong. 

Denny Bridges".

Follow Denny Bridges at:

Thebevans.weebly.com 

Reverbnation.com/thebevans
MySpacemusic.com/bevansband 
MySpace.com/dxbden

no©2012 Luca Ferrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first)

Soon an interview with Carolyn Looker, Glen Sweeney's missus and TEB founder...

Some months ago I sent some questions to Carolyn because she hasn't got computers and e-mail. She has written down all the answers and given them to Steve Pank (TEB former driver and manager) when Steve went London from Norfolk for the Druidic Spring equinox meeting.

Just few days ago I've received a postcard from her where she tells me Steve will send me all the answers by e-mail.

So at last well have soon Carolyn's point of view about many old and obscure things related to the Third Ear Band...

Apart this interview (another important piece for the reconstruction of the TEB's e(pic)soteric story), you have to admit it's difficult to hold the interest for this archive because, you know, it’s about a band (apparently) dead and buried.

We need rare stuffs, photos, stories, memories, essays - all can be of interest for who was/is involved in this extraordinary story.

Otherwise this archive risks to be closed soon.

no©2012 Luca Ferrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first) 

Italian edition of Barry Miles' "London Calling" out now with some quotes of Dave Tomlin, Glen Sweeney and the Giant Sun Trolley...

As reported in July 2010 (read  at http://ghettoraga.blogspot.it/2010/07/some-quotations-on-third-ear-band-and.html), on the last wonderful Barry Miles' book dedicated to the London underground ("London Calling", published by Atlantic Books), also some quotations about UFO epic era and some characters as Dave Tomlin (excerpts from his books inspired by the Embassy experiences...), The Giant Sun Trolley and Glen Sweeney (excerpts from the famous Muz Murray "Gandalf's Gardens"' interview).

Now is available an Italian translation by A. Lovisolo of the book published by EDT (pages 544, euros 23,00). Info at http://www.edt.it/viaggi/london_calling/
An excerpt from a chapter on the Punk scene at http://www.edt.it/viaggi/london_calling/lettura.php

no©2012 Luca Ferrari (unless you intend to make a profit. In which case, ask first)