HW: Fantasy Line up Alert

[Jonathan Jarrett]

On Wed, Feb 13, 2002 at 03:25:05AM -0000, Tony Wilson typed out:
> I've been thinking about this postponed !! Copenhagen Spacerock Festival,
> which looked more like a prog-rock festival to me, (which doesn't
> necessarily make it any less of an event, of course), and I was wondering
> why there isn't a one day British SPACEROCK festival ??? I know they have
> Strange Daze in the USA, why not have one here in the UK ???
> Anyway........... If there was a one day spacerock festival in the UK (or
> anywhere really) and you could pick the line up, of lets say 5 bands (which
> are still around today preferably), who would you pick????
> My choices would be:
> Hawkwind, (of course).
> The Ozric Tentacles, (pure energy live).
> Mr Quimby's Beard (awesome at the Forum Xmas party)
> Farflung, (still my favourite US band, and in Europe this summer
> apparently).
> and Weltraumstaunen, (a young, but very good German band).
>
> I must admit that was harder than I first thought as there was so many to
> chose from.......

        Now, I must be a cynic because whenever I try this game I think
there are far too few. Two of the bands I'd like to have at such a thing,
in the UK at least, I don't think actually tour (Starfield and The
Incredible Expandig Mindfuck). Hawkwind and Bedouin are obvious choices
among the British bands that do; Krel would probably be entertaining but
they don't tour ay more either, do they? Then you've got MQB who are sort
of inevitable, the Ozrics of course and how many other space-rock bands
are there in the UK?

        I'll have nothing to do with Spacehead live any more, I don't like
'em; there are four or five Ozrics clones but unlike MQB and HW I don't
think you can actually put them on beside the actual Ozrics and have
anyone see the need for the lesser bands. So for Britain who else is
there?

        Once you branch into the US then it gets better; I'd love to see
dozens of bands on that scene, well, I can think of four or five
(Farflung, ST37, Alien Planetscapes, Das Ludicroix (heh), Nucleon), but of
them only Farflung is remotely likely to come over here I'd have thought,
and that would be great, but. DarXtar were once planning a UK gig or two,
they'd be an obvious candidate from elsewhere; The Spacious Mind similarly
(do they even exist now?), and that band Omnia that came out of Omnia
Opera may be around somewhere though I never managed to find out anything
more about them. After these names though you wind up branching into
either techno or stoner, both of which is fine by me but not necessarily
the same sort of gig.

        So ideally but not asking for new touring bands to be formed, I'd
want Hawkwind and the Ozrics on as double-header, Bedouin, DarXtar, MQB
and Omnia if they can be found; and let's have Adrian Shaw, since he
actually could raise a touring band without too much trouble... it's still
only a one-dayer max, isn't it? This is why I don't think the scene is
terribly healthy, not that it's ever been much better; it's just a small
genre, and one that councils seem to feel present a threat to society that
can easily be stomped on. Yours,
                                 Jon

ObCD: Hawkwind - _Love in Space_ disc one
--
        Jonathan Jarrett                Birkbeck College, London
                 jjarrett at chiark.greenend.org.uk
        --------------------------------------------------------
  "The large print giveth and the small print taketh away." (Tom Waits)