The demented ramblings of a prog-rock guy
One of the many reasons I am currently alternating posts on these two bands is that in 1971 they both released albums called “Relics”:
More of these in due course, God willing.
In the meantime, note that the PF Relics was only ever a single LP. In a typically confusing manner here, though, there is a single LP ISB Relics AND a double one! It is the double one shown here. I bought the single one first but gave this to my sister when I got the double one.
Pink Floyd and The Incredible String Band.
Pink Floyd.
This time we continue with “Alex the Gnome”’s notes in the insert which came with the CD “An Italian Tale”:
“The day after the band performed regularly at the EUR Palazzo dello Sport in Rome, adding new songs to the set list played at Brescia including “Astronomy Domine” to include in the show. After this brief and somewhat tormented experience Pink Floyd returned to Italy for only a few days in October of the same year to shoot their famous concert in the amphitheatre of Pompei [see above].
“After this last visit, the band wouldn’t return to Italy for a long while; the promoters poor reputation had the management decide to turn their backs on the Italian public. Only 17 years later, in 1988 and with the release of “A Momentary Lapse of Reason” this embargo ended and Pink Floyd played 5 shows in 3 different cities (Turin, Modena and Rome), the huge success meant that the band would return again in Italy the following year (with the same show) for 8 other shows to 4 other Italian cities, including Verona, where they finally played for 3 nights at the famous Arena where they would have played on August 26th 1972 during a festival, but unfortunately this was cancelled due to the alleged hostility from the Italian press.”
Next PF time we conclude Alex the Gnome’s notes. Meanwhile, a pic from the CD packaging:
Pink Floyd and The Incredible String Band.
The Incredible String Band.
At long last we now come to the final post on this brilliant and baffling double LP, which will consider the very last track on it. This is a masterpiece called “The Circle is Unbroken”, timed at 4.47 minutes. It claims to be a Williamson composition, which is certainly true as regards the lyrics. The tune, however, is an ancient Celtic traditional folk melody the true authorship of which is lost in the mists of time, and one of the most beautiful and haunting ones you will ever hear. This is arguably the best fitting cadence to an album that I know. Mike plays organ, and Robin plays whistle and Irish harp. Robin sings solo throughout, and these are the words:
“Seasons they change while cold blood is raining
I have been waiting beyond the years
Now over the skyline I see you’re travelling
Brothers from all time gathering here
Come let us build the ship of the future
In an ancient pattern that journeys far
Come let us set sail for the always island
Through seas of leaving to the summer stars.
Seasons they change but with gaze unchanging
O deep eyed sisters is it you I see?
Seeds of beauty ye bear within you
Of unborn children glad and free
Within your fingers the fates are spinning
The sacred binding of the yellow grain
Scattered we were when the long night was breaking
But in bright morning converse again.”
My very last comment on the double album is that, uniquely, it has a credit for typesetting: James C. Joyce Ltd.
Pink Floyd and The Incredible String Band.
Pink Floyd.
This time we continue with “Alex the Gnome”s notes in the insert which came with the CD “An Italian Tale”:
“Everything looked pretty much established (posters had already been printed advertising the event) when, once again, the fear of public disorder led local authorities to deny the necessary permissions (the music of the Floyd obviously appeared very antagonistic at that time). A curious thing to highlight is that James Brown has played one of his high-octaine shows at the Palazzo dello Sport in Bologna in 1971, without any kind of problem from unrest nor needed any special permission to play.
“The show was about to be cancelled when the band promoter finally managed to find the availability of another city not too far from Milan, Brescia, where the “Palace of Art Events” was available for the band. The ticket price was set at 1500 Lire (about 1 Dollar 15 cents or 65 new British pence). The Floyd played for two hours in front of an audience that had arrived from many parts of Italy but the light show, that the band would later become renowned for, was not very sophisticated or developed at that time so it was mainly the job of the music to captivate the audience. “Echoes” was still listed as “The Return of the Son of Nothing” (Its name was changed during their first Japanese tour in 1971) and had been performed live no more than a dozen times before that evening. “Atom Heart Mother” without its familiar brass and choir had a major impact, and after closing the show with “A Saucerful of Secrets”, the Floyd were forced to deny the rumour that Syd Barrett should appear on stage with them for the concert the following day in Rome, that rumour being originated from EMI before the Italian tour ( a Machiavellian attempt to increase number of tickets sold).”
More from these notes next PF time. Meanwhile, another pic from the insert:
Pink Floyd and The Incredible String Band.
The Incredible String Band.
This time we continue, and indeed conclude, Prydwyn Piper’s notes on the penultimate track on the album, “Douglas Traherne Harding”, these notes appearing in the book “An Incredible String Band Compendium” edited by Adrian Whittaker.
[The writer has just opined that Harding was the sole supplier of actual quoted words in the song.]
“Another relevant passage:
“Nor is Christianity…unaware of the fact that genuine illumination must dispel the dark opacity of our bodies no less than of our souls. “When thy eye is single,” said Jesus mysteriously, “thy whole body also is filled with light.” This single eye is surely identical with the precious Third Eye of Indian mysticism, which enables the seer simultaneously to look in at his Emptiness and out at what’s filling it.”
“The lyrics of Douglas Traherne Harding are a wonderful synthesis of spiritual teachings drawn from a variety of sources – the words of Jesus, Thomas Traherne’s 17th-century ecstatic worldliness, D.E. Harding’s 20th-century heedlessness – all ultimately traceable to their appearance in Harding’s On Having No Head. I hope that this brief overview of those sources will have whetted your appetites to explore them further as they’re all well worth the read. And how about that delectably detuned fiddle solo!”
Immediately after this in the book is this note from Adrian Whittaker:
[Ed: “The wheel turned full circle: in Douglas Harding’s Religions Of The World (Heinmann, 1969), the “Suggested Reading” appendix listed Mike’s song, complete with Wee Tam Elektra catalogue number! Harding commented: “A pop song can be more enlightening than some of the books listed above”.]
I must say that I have found it most helpful to regurgitate all this stuff. I had never really liked this song very much, regarding it as by far the worst on the double album. Rehearsing these learned details has shown me the track in a new light, so I am now able to enjoy it a lot more.
Pink Floyd and The Incredible String Band.
Pink Floyd.
This time we continue with “Alex the Gnome”s notes in the insert which came with the CD “An Italian Tale”:
“In 1971 the band was recording their new album “Meddle” in between their usual touring schedule. After their shows in Germany, Holland, England and France, the Floyd, sponsored by the famous (at that time) Italian music magazine “Ciao 2001”), were hired for two concerts in Italy. The scheduled dates were pencilled in for the 19th and 20th of June in Milan at the Ice Palace and Rome at the Sport palace (where they had last played in 1968). For the first show, there were immediate problems because the local promoter had not reckoned with the prefect of the city and the Mayor Aldo Aniasi who had refused permission because there were previous problems during a Chicago show and they were afraid of further riots.
“Another city was found half way between Milan and Rome, such as Bologna, where there was a Palazzo dello Sport that was considered suitable for the show because of the capacity (over 5000 seats) and for the quality of the structure.”
More from these notes next Pink Floyd time. Meanwhile, here is another pic from the CD packaging:
Pink Floyd and The Incredible String Band.
The Incredible String Band.
This time we continue Prydwyn Piper’s notes on the penultimate track on the album, “Douglas Traherne Harding”, these notes appearing in the book “An Incredible String Band Compendium” edited by Adrian Whittaker.
[continuing Harding’s “no head” scribbles]
“”It took me no time at all to notice that this nothing…was no ordinary vacancy, no mere nothing. On the contrary…it was a vast emptiness vastly filled, a nothing that found room for everything – room for grass, trees, shadowy distant hills, and far above them snow-peaks like a row of angular clouds riding the blue sky. I had lost a head and found a world.””
“The remainder of Harding’s book is in large part an exploration and explanation of this basic revelation, culminating with his happy discovery of Zen some years after his original “experience of headlessness”.
“I enjoyed reading all the Traherne – I did always have a soft spot for old Christian mystics (like Mother Julian of Norwich), but once I had read On having No Head I realised that however much Traherne Mike may or may not have read circa 1968, all of the quotes which he used in Douglas Traherne Harding appear in On Having No Head.
More from these notes next ISB time.
Pink Floyd and The Incredible String Band.
Pink Floyd.
This time we continue with “Alex the Gnome”s notes in the insert which came with the CD “An Italian Tale”:
“This festival was produced from many dreams and ambitions but had several organizational problems: after being postponed twice and the defection of several bands it ended up with the Floyd performing in this great space in front of only 400 fans, while many other performances were moved to the smaller “Piper Club”. Part of this gig has been recorded by Italian national radio company RAI together with an interview with Waters. After these concerts in Italy, the band toured a lot in England, the Netherlands and the United States.
“The reason the band would return to Italy, or rather Rome again, was not to play a concert, but to record the soundtrack for the new movie by Michelangelo Antonioni “Zabriskie Point” [see above]; the work went on in the recording studio “Technicolor Sound Services” for a week in mid-November 1969 and the result was rather frustrating for the band as the great director, in the end, chose only three songs from the material produced by the band (This material would not be left unused, however, but would form part of the album “The Dark Side of the Moon”). After this visit to Italy, the band returned to playing live, however, they wouldn’t return to the country that had shown so much interest in their music.”
More from these notes next time. Meanwhile, another picture from the insert:
Pink Floyd and The Incredible String Band.
The Incredible String Band.
This time we continue Prydwyn Piper’s notes on the penultimate track on the album, “Douglas Traherne Harding”, these notes appearing in the book “An Incredible String Band Compendium” edited by Adrian Whittaker.
“Among Harding’s publications is a relatively small book titled On Having No Head which was first published in 1961. The core of the book is laid out in its first three pages, which describe the following astonishing revelation, visited upon the author during a wartime stroll in the Himalayas:
“The best day of my life – my rebirthday, so to speak – was when I found I had no head…What actually happened was something absurdly simple and unspectacular: just for the moment I stopped thinking…It was as if I had been born that instant, brand new, mindless, innocent of all memories. There existed only the Now, that present moment and what was clearly given in it. To look was enough. And what I found was khaki trouserlegs terminating downwards in a pair of brown shoes, khaki sleeves terminating sideways in a par of pink hands, and a khaki shirtfront terminating upwards in – absolutely nothing whatsoever!”
More from these notes next ISB time.
Pink Floyd and The Incredible String Band.
Pink Floyd.
About 25 years ago I was on holiday in Manhattan, and while there spent many happy hours in Greenwich Village. There were some very trendy CD stores there, and I was delighted to find a couple of Pink Floyd ones I had never heard of, one of which was “An Italian Tale”, on sale for 49.99 USD, and I bought it.
The CD came with an illustrated insert of which this is the front:
The insert contains some intriguing notes, which I shall start to set out today. The author calls himself Alex The Gnome:
“Italy is considered the country with the highest number of collectors in Pink Floyd’s world and some records (singles, albums and box sets) released exclusively for the Italian market are among the highest priced gems on the collectors’ scene. Despite this, Pink Floyd tours have never really arrived in Italy even though the band’s first visit to this country dates back to 1968, in the middle of the recording sessions for “A Saucerful of Secrets” [see above], when they arrived for two shows both in Rome on the 18th and 19th April at the famous “Piper Club” (Beat music club and historical destination for many foreign musicians such as Jimi Hendrix, Genesis and David Bowie.) There is also incredible video footage of the band during the shows (in playback and released by the BBC although the shooting was probably done by an Italian TV crew.) The outcry after these performances was so immense that the Floyd were hired shortly thereafter for another event on Italian soil: the “FIRST EUROPEAN INTERNATIONAL POP FESTIVAL”, which was held at the EUR Sport Palace, in Rome, May 6th 1968.”
More from these notes next Pink Floyd time.
More 