NIK: Nik Turner Band Live 1978

[Jon Jarrett]

On Tue, 3 Apr 2001, Chuck Rosenberg wrote:

> What would you say about this release, I'm curious? Essential?

        For what use it may be, here's a review I wrote for elsewhere,
which people can consider public domain therefore:

"This is a five track CD from the people who ran the festival at which
it was recorded, and it's well, rough. There are bootlegs better than
this. But not, and this is the point, of this show. Nik Turner,
ex-Hawkwind saxophonist, had just released, as Sphynx, an album with about
half of Gong and a very odd collective of Eastern musicians and Australian
would-be-guru Hari Williamson, which centred around the Egyptian Book of
the Dead and some flute recordings Nik was somehow permitted to make in
the King's Chamber of the Great Pyramid. It is an extremely odd album and
here they attempt to take it live.

        "Or at least, Nik and Hari do, because the entirety of the rest of
the band had changed by now, and that means not only that Steve Hillage
and Miquette Giraudy of Gong and System 7 fame (now), as well as Andy
Anderson later to be of The Cure, had all gone, but also means, as far as
you can tell from this album, that only Nik, whose playing is never
exactly structured, and Hari know what the songs are meant to sound
like. This means the whole thing tends towards wandering eerie jams of
very little variation. What there is quite difficult to hear too. In
places Steffi Sharpstrings of Here & Now contributes some lovely lead
guitar, but not very much of it, and Nik's playing varies from the
inaudible through random to the quite pretty. Tunes there are however
none. The mood is strange and the rhythms eventually mesmeric, but
it's hard going to get into their space to enjoy it. So if you like the
sound of an hour plus of bootleg-quality jamming by some quite competent
but basically under-rehearsed musicians along a concept nobody
understands, then this is probably OK. Otherwise, and assuming you're not
a Hawkwind collector which is the other reason for having it, don't worry
about it. 9/20"

        Yours,
                Jon
--
              Spooky peanut terror bringing pain and death!
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     Jon Jarrett (01223 514989)      jjarrett at chiark.greenend.org.uk