HW: New Year

[Keith A Henderson]

Scott writes:
>        Hello Everyone,
>             I hope that everyone on the list had nice holidays. I am sorry I
>        had to miss the BS gig in Boston, but thanks to Rudy and Anne i will
>        get to see it second hand! Anyway, Spoke with Chris and Mary Bruce of
>        the Kadu Flyer and Chris said that HW are working on another live CD
>        to be taken from the most recent europe tour 95' with Ron.
>             I did not see any posts of the HW london show 12/22/95? I guess
>        no one went? Anyone go to the show in Cleveland on Dec31st with F/i,
>        Alien Planetscapes and HW guests??

Yes!!  I was there (in Cleveland), and it was actually a very good time...it
was the first time I can remember ever going out for New Years.  I think New
Years has to be about the dumbest holiday of all, but that's just me.  The
funny thing was, since the "HW tribute band"  was still playing their set at
the 'magical' time, noone really noticed when it happened...I know I didn't.
Maybe they should've have been playing the 'Countdown' as Stacia did during
Space Ritual...  :)

Anyway, there were three bands that played that night:

1)  Gaia Avantara - a threesome (space whisperish vocals (female), a bongo
player, and a flutist, plus some ambient synthesised background music).  As I
was strolling around, meeting old friends (from HW and Ozric tours of the
past), I didn't watch them attentively, but their music was nice enough & a
good warmup for the rest of the evening.  At first, for a moment, I thought it
was Tania up there on stage, but then I realized it was someone else.  They
played from about 9:15 - 10:00.

2)  the "HW tribute band" - I don't know how else to refer to them, as they
never introduced themselves, and I knew from the sheer number of musicians
(varying from 9-11) that these guys were from different bands.  Some I believe
were from Architectural Metaphor, a couple from Alien Planetscapes, and maybe 1
or 2 of the guys from F/i, I can't remember.  Anyway, whoever they were, they
did an excellent job, considering the lack of ever playing together before.

The set was all Hawkwind tunes, mostly 70's material as I figure they could
only do what enough of them knew, and that just turned out to be the classics.
The set was something like this....this is from memory only:

Standing at the Edge (cool synth work in background)
Down Through the Night   (great)
The Black Corridor....segued into....
Space Is Deep    (nice jam)
Master of the Universe  (a little uneven)
Spirit of the Age    (very nice)
The Watcher     ("halfway" between HW and Motorhead version)
The Demented Man   (excellent)
We Took the Wrong Step Years Ago   (more acoustic!!)
Flying Doctor   (true to the original)
Heads   (well, it was a good try - only post-Calvert song)
Sonic Attack  (a little too long)
Uncle Sam's on Mars   (not bad)
Robot  (R----O----B----O----T----R----O----B----O----T)
Wind of Change  (nice finish)

(set went from about 10:30 - 12:10)

That's all I can remember at the moment...there may have been one or two more.
I really thought that they pulled it off very well, considering the
circumstances, and I really had a good time watching these guys.  Doug Walker
(who looks a little like Louis Gossett, Jr.) from Alien Planetscapes, was the
only one of these guys I spoke to....he's an interesting guy, and plays synth,
flute, and electronic sax (a cool reedless instrument that I'd like to have
someday...as a trumpet player, I think I could learn to play this thing, as you
only blow air though it).

3) F/i - a space rock outfit from Milwaukee, WI
   These guys were reasonably interesting, but I wasn't overwhelmed by their
music.  They reminded me a little of the band 'Sleep' that opened for Nik here
in Columbus, and also the Helios Creed tunes from that show (that's the only
Creed material I'm familiar with).  They played only instrumentals, and in that
way, they are similar to the Ozrics, but musically they are heavier, with more
fuzzed out guitar.  I guess if you took a Monster Magnet 45 rpm record, removed
the vocals, and played it at 33 rpm, you'd get something like F/i.  They have a
single out, I guess, and the song that they said was the 'A' side of this
single was IMHO the best song that they played.

(set went from about 12:50 - 2:10)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

The lights were quite good, and were done by Louise McAuley (who now lives in
Montreal, although I believe she's really from the London/Kitchener area)...I
remember meeting her at several places during the last HW tour.  She's really a
cool person, and a very good artist as well - she made small laminated posters
for this event like she did for the HW shows, which promptly sold out.  For
those of you who were at either the Toronto or St. Catharines shows, you'll
remember the 'Fire' guy, who nearly set a number of audience members ablaze at
the Toronto gig.  Anyway, his name is Stew Orr I think, and he was there as
well, and luckily noone was singed  :)  By the way, Louise and Stew are now
a couple after meeting at the HW shows in Canada.

The Hawkwind display out front was pretty interesting....they had very nearly
all the official releases of HW (lps only), and many of the solo efforts, plus
10 or so posters from various periods.  There were a few things, though, that
were missing...not just the very rare stuff (Greasy Truckers Party, the van der
Graff thing, for instance), but also I don't remember seeing Earthed to the
Ground, or The New World's Fair, or the small singles/EP's like 'Your Last
Chance', and Social Alliance, etc.  But then they didn't have much space to
spare.  They were selling a few CD's there as well...nothing I didn't already
have except for Simon House's Yassassim, for $22 I think.  I passed on this, as
I don't know whether there is a US release planned.

Between the sets, they played ALLIENN 4 over the sound system, which was the
first time I've heard it (I'm waiting for the US release).  It sounded pretty
good to me, but then I wasn't listening closely all the time.

Jim Collins of TofE was there, with a bunch of CD's and tapes had had for sale,
as well as a sign up for the Ozrics newsletter....he also said that he's going
to start up a HW newsletter as well....I know he's been working on a lengthy
tour review booklet from last April, called Hawktales or something, but I guess
he's going to do something on a regular basis as well.  Anyway, I'm glad he was
there, 'cause I got a couple of CD's I had wanted for awhile....Melting
Euphoria's 'Upon the Solar Winds', and Dead Flowers' 'Altered State Circus'
(great!)

The Phantasy Nite Club is a really nice place....the one and only time I had
ever been there was for a Soul Asylum concert about five years ago, believe it
or not.  The crowd for this show was about the same size (100 or so?)...this
was before Soul Asylum became popular with that horrible 'Runaway Train' song,
needless to say.  There are two 'ships' built into the club, one of which acts
as the platform for the sound/lighting equipment, the other has a secluded
booth inside, from which you can still see the stage.  There were some kids
inside there for some reason this night,  maybe the owner's kids, I don't know.
The Phantasy Theatre, which is next door, is the larger "club" with many rows
of permanent seats, and a much bigger stage.  HW played here in 1989 -- an
absolutely fantastic show....my favourite of the 15 that I've seen.

This event, although of fairly small scale, turned out really nice (kudos to
Jim Lascko for organizing it), and it did draw some people from far
away...Chris from New Hampshire (who I met in Canada in April also) came all
the way to Cleveland for it.  I'd like to see something like this happen again
soon, with maybe many of us getting involved somehow to find a centrally
located place (Cleveland's actually not too bad, I don't think) and have
another jam session of Hawkwind tunes with list members and these other groups.
Of course, we could invite Dave Brock to bring his band also :)....in fact, I
remember Scott (who was part of the HW entourage last April) saying that he had
talked to Dave that day (Dec. 31), and that he had wished us all well in our
efforts to have events like this.

Sorry I've gone on so long, but this was a pretty nice event, and I'm glad I
decided to drive the 2.5 hours up & back for it...I got home at 5 A.M. and the
visiblility on the roads was completely awful (thick fog)....luckily, all the
drunk drivers were off the road by then.

See ya'  Keith H.