*** Coming Of Age *** - Part II of my conversations with Hard Drive Promotions MD Dave Holmes
In the late sixties there was a definite evolution in the pop music scene. I noticed it most clearly with the pop group The Monkees with their album "Head" (from the movie of the same name) it had a more progressive sound given that it was a manufactured boy band of the time. I credit Mike Nesmith for his visionary approach to a more mature sound for that band. My favourite song being "Porpoise"
I asked Dave to tell me about his recollections of the music of that time
"There was very little in the pop music charts in the late 60's/early 70's that did interest me. Bands that I did hear on the radio that got my attention, I heard on the more diverse radio shows presented by the likes of Bob Harris and John Peel, they offered a more diverse radio program that did not represent the pop music in the charts. Some of the offerings that appealed to me were progressive rock bands such as "Tangerine Dream", "Kraftwerk" "Gong" and other artists such as Leon Russell, Edgar Froese, Barclay James Harvest (*also one of my favourites*) which all fed my hunger for diversity and interesting music from a myriad of artists. This list also includes Lindisfarne (oh mine too Dave!) The Moody Blues and bands such as Atomic Rooster and Black Sabbath, such a broad spectrum indicative of the wide interests I espoused. It was like trying on different styles of clothing - trying to find what "fit" me!
I think it was around 1972 or '73 that Roy Wood ('The Move') created a group called 'The Electric Light Orchestra' , releasing a single 'The 10538 Overture' that was a completely different sound to me and it was something that really caught my interest, something that stood out to me as refreshingly different! They were exploring a new sound and presentation that appealed to me.
Hearing a single was never enough for me, if I heard a unique sound or band I was compelled to go and purchase the entire album. Now here I am, some 40 years later realizing that compulsion was the grounding for what I now believe in wholeheartedly and try to represent with Hard Drive Promotions, the ability that I developed at an early age for being able to recognize an artist that stands out from the cookie cutter music, manufactured dross that was catering to the masses in the crowd pleasing arena.
One thing that sticks in my mind about this period is my love for the ‘whole package’ whenever I bought a new album, the artwork and sleeve design was an integral and major part of the experience. I would spend hour upon hour studying every single detail and marvelling at the works of sleeve designers such as George Hardie and Roger Dean Vinyl albums were tactile and their sleeves a piece of collectable art in their own right – somehow this is lost on CD packaging and of course is all but non-existent with the advent of digital media. Something that I did with every album I purchased was to play it once, only in order to record it onto cassette tape so that the record and its sleeve could then be placed into a clear plastic album sleeve in order to preserve the entire tactile entity that was the album and the music nestled inside. I am not a vinyl only purist, it's simply that the entire sensual experience of hearing, touching, seeing all combined to bring out the finest listening experience to an artist's music and was enhanced by the whole package!
The core genre of interest to me had always been 'rhythm and blues' running parallel to my interest in progressive rock I developed a desire to explore the roots of Blues music and my attention was drawn to the 'grandfathers' of that genre from across the Atlantic. My search led me to Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker and Robert Johnson. I had a drive to discover more about the origins of The Blues. In doing that I found that I was discovering more American Blues and Rock Artists, and the spectrum widened.
In 1976 Don McClean produced the single "American Pie" and the line that intrigued me most was "the day the music died"! This was significant to me because by the end of the 1970's there was very little in the way of new music and records being produced that interested me.
At that point I developed a keen interest in the live music scene I went to "Knebworth" with my wages from my post graduate career well spent on seeing bands and artists such as Pink Floyd, Roy Harper and Lynyrd Skynyrd (the original line-up, including Ronnie Van Zandt, Steve Gains and Cassie Gains in 1976 before the plane crash, a memory that I am pleased to recall is seeing them performing the legendary song 'Free Bird'
a performance I will never ever forget) I was also taking myself off to see Eric Clapton, Hawkwind (later called The Silver Hawks' and even later 'Motorhead'), Black Sabbath and Sad Café. One significant American artist that made me a lifetime listener and fan of , was the then relatively unknown Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. I had the distinct pleasure of seeing them perform at The Hammersmith Odeon (now 'The Apollo').
One of their first songs that really sealed the deal for me is 'American Girl'...
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Life after this time changed dramatically for me personally but the live music scene, actually seeing the artists really impressed me and was something that continued to feed the whole sensory approach and appreciation of music that developed in me with the album covers and tactile experience of enjoying music that lies with me still to this day and is the foundation for Hard Drive Promotions!"
