HW: Do Not Panic documentary

[M Holmes]

eddie jobson writes:

> Interesting comments! Can see where you are coming from though. In my 
> opinion I never rated Nik very much but he was gone by the time I got into 
> the band in 1977.

Ditto. His sax was an intrinsic part of the anarchic sound in the Space
Ritual period and Warrior wouldn't sound the same without him. However
Quark and PXR5 would have been ruined by his sax.

It's possible to imagine he'd have helped punk up the Hawklords though.

When he did come back in 1982, I thought the tour was fantastic, what
with the SF stage set and the screens and everything. He really made the
song Social Alliance come over live. At Stonehenge in 1983 though on one
set he played a different song to the others after some sort of argument
on stage and came to a tussle with Huw. This was after he'd fucked up
some songs overspeaking them with his "Uncle Sam's on heroin" and "Get
off my Mummy" drivel. By 1984 he'd still make some songs better ("Born
To Go" sticks out in my mind) but with his vestal virgins stage nonsense
and all the rest of it, he was very much a liability to Hawkwind looking
like a serious band rather than a kind of Spinal Tap comedy act. His
next sacking was written all over it. In my view, the problem was that
Hawkwind wanted to play music, and outside of jazz, Turner just isn't
very musical. He can put on a pretty good rock circus show but his
musical limits mean that it pretty much defaults to punk unless he can
get a gig with a more accomplished band. That his Ex-Hawkwind ended up
doing punk/ska versions of Hawwkind songs testifies to just how much
dominance over a sound Turner can exert.

Where I'd say Turner has real talent is in the business of getting shit
organised and done.  He has great energy and can seemingly persuade not
only the hind legs off a donkey, but have them drive 300 miles on their
own Dollar to tap dance in the interlude between bands. 

With the crap over Hawkestra, the gig sabotage with the name, and the
legal shit though, it's easy to see how he tore the arse out of it as
far as the patience of the band goes. It'd do everyone a great favour if
Nik would finally let Hawkwind go and do whatever it is that he wants to
do. 

> Strangely enough Lemmy still seems to have some respect for Nik.

Having respect for someone is orthogonal to agreeing with what they do.

FoFP