Manafonistas

on life, music etc beyond mainstream

2015 12 Jun

Special guest Gordie B. reveals distant memories

von: Michael Engelbrecht Filed under: Blog | TB | 12 Comments

Now I have to confess to having a soft spot for early Hawkwind. The first time I saw them was in a youth club in Hatfield circa 1970. They turned strobes on the audience, Terry Ollis drummed naked. Nik Turner was seriously weird in the best way and Dave Brock earthed the whole thing and played mean guitar.

Imagine our collective suprise when it was chucking out time that they had played for four hours it was well past midnight and the boy scouts running the club were seriously pissed by the beastliness of this band. oh, not to mention Mr Ollis and the condoms thrown into the audience and a whole lot of anarchist/subversive mags. In short it was a bloody good night and the aged fifteen Hertfordshire male collective we would attend other such occassions again and did, many!

And none did disapoint. So this on vinyl. Great record store day 2015. Like fucking genius Eno’s „my squelchy life“, or fucking genius Nelson’s „teatro“. All on vinyl. In New Zealand I played this Hawkwind debut from 1970 (look at the cover!) in a music class for my 6 weeks I attended Takapuna Grammar – it met with disinterest only getting traction when I moved into a flat-barely 16 with a group of dope smoking architecture students.

It is a classic but maybe not as good as the follow up „In search of space“ a seriously brain altering bit of mayhem-particulalry in certain conditions-through cans and enough stereo effect to get shifting sounds. But Hawkwind is a cross roads into something other than the mainstream prog rock of its era.

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12 Comments

  1. Michael Engelbrecht:

    … so langsam geniessen unsere unschuldigen special guests hier Artenschutz, und das ist gut so.

  2. Michael Engelbrecht:

    Das Cover der ersten Hawkwind-Schallplatte sieht man auf dem Plattenspielerfoto.

  3. Uwe Meilchen:

    Apropos: welche LP drehte sich denn auf dem s/w Photo – wo wir zum Raten aufgerufen waren? Auf dem Cover war die Zeichnung einer stilisierten Zuendkerze …

  4. Michael Engelbrecht:

    Motor Nighttime Vol. 3, von Robert Hood.

  5. Uwe Meilchen:

    Ah ! Und ich sehe gerade bei SOUNDCLOUD dass es doch keine stilisierte Zuendkerze, sondern eine stilisierte Skyline einer Grossstadt ist….

  6. Michael Engelbrecht:

    Hi, Gordie, I told you no one would dare some new detective work and doubt your identity. Thx for the story. M

  7. Ian M:

    I love Hawkwind. Saw them live once in Scotland. Cosmic vibes. I agree Hawkwind is a crossroads – certainly in a way that ELP weren’t. Ha!

  8. Ian M:

    What’s that noise in the background? It’s Mussorgsky turning in his grave.

  9. Michael Engelbrecht:

    On that first Hawkwind? Maybe it’s something I have no words for. I played it very loud this afternoon. The walls were tumbling.

  10. Ian M:

    No, ELP. Bad noise.

  11. Uwe Meilchen:

    As for Mussorgsky: there’s this famous record by ELP titled „Pictures At An Exibition“ where they Play, not very surprisingly their very own Version of the classic Mussorgksy composition. („Night on the bare mountain“, anyone?) I guess that’s what Ian M meant with his reference to Mussorgksy rotating in his grave. As Melanie put it a Long Long time ago: „What have they done to my song, Ma?“ ;-D

  12. Michael Engelbrecht:

    ELP: crap. Pictures of an exhibition ELP-style: crap. ELP even in early years showed the embarassment of kitsch in all its dumb facettes.


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