HW: The REAL Hawks

[John Furnish]

Max Wilcox wrote:
>
> Martyn White wrote:
> >         My point was that,  somewhere back in the hazy days of the
> > late '60s, early '70s, the 2 artists came up with the idea of the
> > band and decided to call it HAWKWIND.  So the subsequent arguments
> > bore me to crap.  I yell "Who the fuck were Pinkee wivout Syd??
> > Answer:  they did alot, but  they went to ""get famous mode" AFTER
> > UMMA gUMMA, then "Dark Side of the Moon".
> > MM      a
>
>         This is uterly off topic, but I feel that I have to chime in here. Do
> you realy think Floyd would have gone much further if Syd had stayed
> with them as the front man (front thing?)?. I believe that the line-up
> changes in Floyd have given it a little bit of spice (though with Roger
> dropping out, they've lost it, though). They couldn't have gone on
> playing Arnold Layne all their lives. The same goes for HW, too, of
> course.
>         Although I'm not bored to crap by the discussion, I can understand how
> it could be, at least if everyone was saying "NO! -THIS- is the real HW"
> etc. But, I think a big part of the discusion is about that which
> constitutes a HW sound, etc. I'd totaly agree with John Majka's comment
> about how they constantly re-make themselves. This is one of the best
> points about HW for me, too. The one and only problem with this is that
> it raises the possibility that they could re-make themselves badly. But,
> I guess that's just one of the drawbacks of a non-static band. I'd
> prefer that, than having a static, always the same sound....
>
> - Max Wilcox

This sort of discussion has been going on on the Black Sabbath mailing
list, as well.  (The one now run by Joe Seigler, that is.)  However,
it's been a more obnoxious discussion than apparently this has been.

The only people who don't expect a band to change over time and try to
remake itself, to innovate and grow, are people who don't know anything
about music.  For example, I love Sabbath's stuff since Ozzy left rather
moreso than the older stuff, even though I grew up with Sabbath since
they came out with their first album in 1970.

The same is true of Blue Oyster Cult (perhaps just to keep things
on-topic here! ;) ).  They have always kept a certain consistent content
, songwriting style, charm... 'Last Days of May' could've been,
possibly, not on the first album but as late as 'Spectres', but not on
'Fire of Unkown Origin'.  If BOC hadn't grown past their first few
albums, we would never have had 'Veteran of the Psychic Wars' nor
'Burnin' for You' nor 'Take Me Away'... or even possibly 'Don't Fear the
Reaper' (which would've been tragic, if we could've known of the loss).

Bands always have fans who like a certain era best, and who may hate
others.  The only bands I feel changed far too much for me to continue
to accept are Bad Company and Kansas.

Anyhow, 'nuff said.

JH 'Sabocat' Furnish