HW - Article from the Arts Page of the Glasgow Herald, October 1993

[Mike Montfort]

Great read. Thanks for taking the time to type it out.

Mike

_____________________________________________

Save a little money each month and at the end of the year you'll be
surprised at how little you have.

-- Ernest Haskins





::-----Original Message-----
::From: BOC/Hawkwind Discussion List [mailto:BOC-L at LISTSERV.SPC.EDU]On
::Behalf Of Alan Taylor
::Sent: Saturday, September 21, 2002 4:36 PM
::To: BOC-L at LISTSERV.SPC.EDU
::Subject: HW - Article from the Arts Page of the Glasgow Herald, October
::1993
::
::
::Here's a news article I dug out.  I think I was inspired to tap it out by
::Mike and Jill posting  some news articles a few weeks ago, but
::once I read
::it again there's nothing really that Brock says that is new and
::lots of the
::article is just journo-fluff (although David Belcher was a good sort).
::However, since I had typed it out and probably few have seen it, I am
::posting it anyway.  Alan
::
::Headline - 'Blowing On'
::Column Name - 'BOSS GROOVES'
::David Belcher feels the force of Hawkwind
::The picture with this was one of those from the inner gatefold of
::IITBOTFTBD.
::
::Twenty-four years on and Dave Brock still hasn't mastered the business of
::selling his music.  Whenever you ask him to explain his art, he'll sound
::stumped and issue a wheezy "search me" kind of a laugh.  It is
::probably as
::it should be, creative-wise.  In Italics- Don't think; do, man.  Music
::criticism is the sound of one hand clapping, dig?
::
::So, like, wow, we salute ye, oh Hawkwind, ye loose aggregation
::of Ladbroke
::Grove anarcho-squatters who were born to play benefit gigs and free
::festivals.  What the Guinness Encyclopaedia of Popular Music describes as
::"chemically blurred science-fiction" rock has endured.  That which was
::somewhat tatty to begin with shall never wear out, it seems.  Ambient,
::perambulatory psychedelia is in style at last.
::
::Hawkwind's twenty-second LP It Is The Business Of The Future To Be
::Dangerous, came out on Castle last week.  The sole Scottish date on their
::wide-ranging European tour is at Glasgow's Barrowland on
::November 20.  Yet
::things weren't always so ongoing.
::
::At one point, founding member Brock lost the rights to
::Hawkwind's very name.
::There's also been a 10-year royalty battle ("no money yet, but
::it's close to
::being resolved"), while a massive 18 album surfeit of Hawkwind
::anthologies ,
::collections, compilations, and live in-concert mementoes on a plethora of
::labels has tended to obscure the fact that the band are still in action,
::creating new material.
::
::What about the new LP?  Dave umms and arrs, laughs and splutters.
::"Explaining a record is like explaining a light show. I dunno.
::It's got some
::long tracks, 16 and 17 minutes.  There's no need for 40-minute
::CDs anymore.
::It's trance-like music...the sort of thing Can , Neu and
::Kraftwerk started."
::
::"At our shows we get all ages from 12 to 60.  It should always
::be all ages.
::If you go to reggae clubs, especially in the Caribbean , you'll
::get lots of
::mums and dads.  But sometimes music gets tribal - 'this is only
::for 15-year
::olds, not the forties.' That Guinness book's description of us
::sounds about
::right."
::
::Never fashionable, Hawkwind have nevertheless carved a niche for
::themselves.
::"We've done things and then been noticed for them five years later.  Our
::light-show ideas get used by other people.  We get sampled by
::other bands,
::big ones- I don't like name dropping, I don't have to."
::
::Ask Dave about the oddest scenes from Hawkwind's long strange trip and he
::can oblige with a famous name, however: "The Baader-Mienhof gang.  I was
::once arrested naked in bed early one morning in a hotel in Paris on
::suspicion of being a member."  Something to do with a dummy gun
::used in an
::on-stage bit of symbolism.
::
::Hawkwind's current stage line up features Brock and two musical
::associates,
::Alan Davey and Richard Chadwick, plus "a couple of dancers, some
::fire-eaters."  Unreconstructed males of a certain age still yearn for
::Stacia.  "A very nice girl.  Large.  Statuesque.  But we did a
::single with
::Samantha Fox recently, you know."
::
::As for the future, Dave plans a renewed collaboration with
::science fiction
::writer Michael Moorcock, and envisions "an even-more-wonderful stage show
::for '94; mime, lights, music.  We're going to be auditioning contemporary
::dancers - applications from Scotland most welcome."