Top Image: Ross Burgess with his Hillman Super Minx in Scotland, 2nd from top Image: Rick White and Milton Parker with Ross Burgess`s Bradford van.
Written by Ross Burgess, Roadie, Wellington NZ music connoisseur since early 1960`s and his experiences on his travels. (Eight pages)
Page One - By 1963 I was an ardent shadows fan, had all their records, while still at college and after persueding my father to help finance an electric guitar I became the proud owner of a Kawai. The only trouble I didn't have a clue how to play it. Spotting a fellow with a guitar case waiting for a bus, he turned out to be Paul Densham who played in a group called the Electrons. They had a regular fortnightly gig at a youth club in kelburn and practised in a plumbers workshop in molesworth st opposite parliament. The line up was Rick White (guitar and vocals) Paul Densham (on rythym gat) Bruce Sheerin (bass) and John (moon) Hall on drums. I started to hang out with them and soon became the roadie, which meant that by helping to carry the gear I could get into gigs for free especially when they started working for Tom McDonald and getting past Mrs McDonald on the door became a problem! as the drinking age was still 21, there was a thriving youth club and dance scene at the many community halls in Wellington and suburbs and `Toms Universal Booking Agency` provided work for the many groups spawned during that era.
By 1965 Paul Densham had to leave the group for his school certificate year and was replaced by Milton Parker who impressed because although he had not played in a group before was capable of playing both the lead and rythym parts to "Apache and The Savage" at his audition! Also for a short time John Veale (ex "The Berets") joined the band. I remember one particular gig in Palmerston North, the band wagon was my Bradford ute which had a top speed of about 35 mph, Rick White and I left the gig at 2am and drove past Wellington railway station in time for breakfast at 7 am. The others had travelled in John Veales mother`s Morris 1100 `sheer luxury`. John left the band soon after to continue his medical training in Dunedin but not before teaching Milton how to play Chuck Berry licks. Incidently nobody has seen Paul Densham since about 1971, does anyone know what happened to him?
Around this time I was astonished to find that I as a fresh-faced 17 year old was able to rent the Karori community hall for about $20 and suggested to the guys that we run our own dance. We put up posters all over town but our enterprising spirit was quashed when on the night cars drove up, but as the hall had glass doors people could see no-one inside and the punters all went to see Pete Nelson and the Castaways who were playing at a church hall nearby, nobody came!. The band had by then became more R&B and changed their name to "The Relics", Bruce Sheerin left to be replaced by Dave Jenkinson on bass. Then John Hall left to be replaced by Alan Beamsley on drums.
The Relics got a recording contract with HMV and released a single, a cover of Tommy James and the Shondells "Hanky Panky" backed with "Jambalaya" the selection chosen by HMV, Frank Douglas was the engineer and the recording was done in HMV`s original studio in lower Victoria st, the studio was then equipped with two mono recorders, double tracking achieved from one to the other!. One day I visited the groups flat in Haitaitai. Milton was excited by the release of Creams first single "Cats Squired!" this was the first time we had heard Eric Clapton. The Cream record proved popular and HMV (NZ) finally released the John Mayalls Blues breakers album featuring Clapton. Milton soon got the hang of playing blues and started a new blues group "The Phil Jacobs Combo". The line up was Phil Jacobs (vocals) Milton Parker (guitar) Phil Saunders (bass) and Darryl Freshwater on drums. They started a blues club in an upstairs coffee bar in upper Willis St. This lasted for about a year during which Phil Saunders left and was replaced by George Limbidis on bass. The blues club proved very popular unfortunately they were closed down after being busted for selling beer from under the counter!
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Page Two - During this time I also got to know Peter Raxworthy and Ben Kaika from "Bitter End", In 1967 the band known as "Sounds Unlimited" got a gig playing aboard RHMS Ellinis to England, the lineup was: Reno Teihei, Paddy Beach and Ben Kaika. While in London they saw Jimi Hendrix playing at the Marquee. By the time they returned Reno had Hendrix' material down to a tee. The three of them formed "Joyful Crye" They played in a little coffee bar in Marjorie banks St called "The Phsycodelic Id", while this was successful for a while they werent making much money and had elected to join the Quincy Conserve who had a regular gig at the "Downtown club". However an Aussie promoter Mike Browning had heard about them and came to Wellington to audition, persueding them to take their Hendrix act to Sydney. Reno was right handed but in an effort to look more like Hendrix needed a left handed Strat to turn upside down (Hendrix played a right handed Strat upside down) I drove him to Palmerston North to buy about the only left handed Strat in NZ and a few days later they left for Sydney where they became "Compulsion". Reno even played with his teeth and set fire to his Strat!
After the demise of the blues club Phil Jacobs Combo decided to try their luck in Aussie and departed to Sydney at the end of 1968. A month or so later I went to join them but by then they had moved to Melbourne having purchased Marshall stacks while in Sydney. (It was difficult to get decent amps in NZ, Jansen reigned supreme, or not!) Melbourne was a happening scene that year but still very straight, Wellington was used to longhairs but in Melbourne truckies would shout derogatory abuse when the guys walked down the street in the day. At nightclubs things were different, lots of gigs but it took a wee while for them to work up a reputation. When I joined them in a rented house in North Fitzroy the yard had an old wooden shed and a wooden fence down each side of the section. It was a cold winter and when we moved to South Yarra a few weeks later both the shed and every second fence paling had gone on the fire! Everyone was broke.
One day I applied for a job at an office cleaning company. The boss took me to a 1930s building and on the 11th floor showed me how to clean the windows, these being of the sash type my blood froze when he lifted one and got out on a tiny sloping ledge shut the window and cleaned the outside hanging on with one hand! He left me to it and all morning I cleaned the inside of the windows. When he came back at lunchtime and told me to do the outsides as he had shown me I refused and was sacked, however he had to pay me for the morning which provided a good feed for hungry bods. Once we moved to south Yarra things improved. The Combo had changed their name to "Freshwater" and now included Peter Sheehan on organ. He had a Hammond B3 and two leslie speakers. A Hammond B3 organ is very heavy! With 4 of us we could just shuffle it into gigs. The band wagon was a Volkswagen Kombi and a tight squeeze for 7 people and all that gear. By now they had a manager, a cockney spiv called Dave Gregory and he did get them a lot of gigs.
Many other NZ musos were in Melbourne, Freshwater`s closest rivals doing similar material were "Larrys Rebels" but they shared gigs with Bruno Lawrence and Claude Papeche' Trinity and opened for "Max Merrit and the Meteors" (who were one of the biggest groups in Australia at the time) Sometimes we did three gigs a night doing 1 hour spots at the city night clubs "Berties", "Sebastians" and the "Thumping Tum". Heaving that organ up stairs was no joke. Then came a recording contract with W&G records and they released a single "Together till the end of time" b/w "Its in your power" both chosen by the record company. The house at South Yarra was almost completely unfurnished with only 2 comfy chairs in the lounge and a black and white Tv on which we saw the moon landings live. (which pinpoints the era as 1969) On Saturday mornings there was a 2 hour pop show on TV fronted by 'Molly' Meldrum and featuring Australian groups. Whoever was rostered to cook the dinner would bring their own plates to the lounge and bag the armchairs while everyone else rushed to get their meal from the kitchen.
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Page Three - Those who were last had to sit on the floor while the armchair hoggers would not dare to leave the room for the evening! I got a job as lube operator at a nearby gas station. One day Athol Guy from the Seekers brought his Aston Martin DB5 for a lube job, I had never seen a car like it, and could not resist blasting it round the block when the boss was out altho in the traffic I never got out of second gear. In 2024 on google I found Athol Guy's own story about his Aston Martin. The Seekers had been living in London during the 1960s and Athol wrote their biggest hit "Georgy Girl" which reached No 2 on the American charts in 1966 and sold 3.5 million copies. Georgy Girl was also a movie starring James Mason and Lynn Redgrave. By 1967 the royalties he earned came to 500,000 pounds- but the British Government taxed it at 90%. In 1967 he was walking past the Aston Martin showroom in London and saw the car, a 1964 DB5 (The James Bond car) in the window, and the price of 50,000 pounds matched exactly the cheque he had received, so he went in and bought it. That was a LOT of money in 1967. (I had no idea that the car was worth so much when I drove it, but those early cars were hand built.) Haggerty give a current valuation of US$604,000 for one in good condition!
Two Australian bands we held in awe were Doug Parkinson in "Focus and Tully", Doug did awesome versions of "Dear Prudence" and "Ticket to ride". Tully did original material. Most bands did covers in those days-there was one group who did only Jethro Tull numbers. All good things come to an end and for some reason long forgotten I returned to NZ. Within a year both Milton Parker and George Limbidis had returned. By the end of 1970 George had formed "Highway" with Phil Pritchard, Jim Lawrie and Bruce Sontgen. "Highway" wrote and played only original material. Their main gig was at Lucifers nightclub in Wellington and Peter Frater did the lightshow. In 1971 they recorded their album at EMIs new studio in Wakefield st. I was present at the all-night recording session produced by Alan Galbraith. In 1970 Milton Parker got back together with Rick White to form "Farmyard" They released two albums of original material "Farmyard" and "Back to Fronting" with Tom Swainson on drums.
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Page Four - At the end of 1971 I decided to go to England. Blake Thompson who had fronted Wellingtons long-lived Falcons was now in a group called "The Other Band". The lineup was Blake on guitar and vocals, Graham Harvey on bass,Graeme Osten on keyboards and Ally Matthews on Drums and vocals. They were also about to go to the UK by playing there way on board the Ocean Monarch, a Shaw Savill ship. They would have 6 months there and return on another voyage. Most people went to Europe by ship in those days as it was very expensive to fly before the advent of Boeing 747s and Douglas DC10s. There were a few cheap charter airlines in the northern hemisphere but Australia and New Zealand would not let them undercut our airlines. There was a cheaper alternative though, as the Far East travel Company offered a package deal, which was a ship from Perth to Singapore, and a charter flight from there to London. I decided to take this option. The price added up to $500 for the whole trip Welligton to London.
Just before I left another friend, Jim Davidson told me he was about to fly to the UK, and gave me a contact number in London. He was going to stay at his Aunts house in Hampstead and her story is worth noting here. She had been a school teacher in NZ in the 1920s, but incredibly in those days a divorcee was not allowed to teach in NZ. After her divorce she left NZ and never returned, instead marrying a South African Professor of Philosophy who by the 70s had tenure at Harvard University in the USA, and so they spent their year between Harvard and their house in Hampstead which Jim and his family would have the use of in her absence. So I flew to Melbourne and stayed a few nights with Highway who had moved to Australia. From there I took the train to Perth. This journey takes 3 days and as most of it is through desert incredibly boring. The train stops at little oasis' of railway workers dwellings, their sections watered with supplies from tank cars dropped off the train, the desert right up to their fences.
They drove old Holdens and Falcons with no registration plates as they are miles from any road. At Kalgoorlie a sign at the station pointed to the brothel, the only legal brothel in Australia at that time, they had to keep the miners happy! Thankfully the train was air conditioned as the heat was oppressive at these stops. I spent a couple of nights in Perth, One day taking a launch to Rottnest Island. This is a holiday camp island with no cars, but you could rent bicycles. So I did and rode to the other side of the island, however every time I stopped riding I would be covered in large blowflies landing all over my head and body, these flies could not be waved off and the only way to get rid of them was to ride flat out until they flew away. So I returned to the Pub where I waited till the return launch journey.
The following day I embarked on the MS "Karborvorsk" a Russian ship chartered by the Far East travel company. This would be a 5 day voyage to Singapore and the passengers were mostly young Kiwis and Aussies bound for Europe. Only the main saloons were air conditioned so the cabins were rather hot. Every evening the crew would put on a concert for the passengers; even the Captain sang in a wonderful baritone.The ships band however were still playing numbers from the 1950s. On the first days of the voyage I noticed a young Englishman who was embibing rather a lot of the plentiful Russian vodka available on board. He would down a whole bottle and pass out, sleeping it off. After 2 days of this I saw that on the 3rd day he was only drinking wine. On the last evening of the voyage we passed through the straits between Java and Sumartra, Krakatoa volcano being clearly visible, and I found him sitting at the stern completely sober. His name was Graham and he told me he had passed through Singapore before and was getting ready for the Bhudda grass you could obtain there. He explained that he had been working on a years contract for a company in New Guinea, at a compound in the interior, that was surrounded by head hunting tribes!, there was little to do but drink and so he had become an alchoholic.
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Page Five - When the ship reached Singapore the immigration officials came on board. Singapore had only recently gained independence from Britain and were determined to stamp out hippies and had stiff penalties for drug offences. It was rumoured that longhairs were being shorn in the streets when caught by the police. Therefore any of the passengers with long hair or a beard were put aside for processing after the other passengers. My hair at that point was early beatle length but I was put aside, as were sea captain types with beards, Graham who had shoulder length hair also joined us among others, however the Far Eastern Travel company had sent a representative to smooth the way for its passengers. The result was that we had to hand over our passports while in Singapore, to be handed back at the airport when we flew out. The alternative was to be sent back to Australia on the ship as several people who were not part of the Far Eastern travel clientel were refused entry even though all they wanted was to travel overland from there. Four were sent back.
A coach took us to the Ming Court Hotel. I had never seen anything like it. Turbaned Sikhs wearing swords opened the doors on entry to the marbled foyer which had a water feature and somebody played a Hammond organ 24/7 to provide musak. We queued to obtain our rooms which we had to share, I was put with an old guy who was happy to swap with Graham and so we became room mates. Just a few minutes later I ran into Ben Kaika who had long hair and a beard. I had not seen him since the "Joyful Cry" days in Wellington `WTF are you doing here`? I exclaimed, he explained that his current group had been playing in the disco downstairs until the previous night. The group were about to fly to Bangkok the next day. So I asked him about the dope situation. He warned me not to buy any from the Chinese as they were often cops, but promised to bring some to our room that evening. However he did not turn up so Graham went downtown to score from a previously known source and returned throwing several bullets of bhudda on the bed, I had previously only smoked NZ green and so was not prepared for the quality of this. One joint left you feeling unable to get off the bed and as we did not have any decent music we soon crashed out.
The next morning we met some other friends from the ship in the foyer and invited them to our room for a smoke. I was very careful to only take a small toke but they really got into it. About 10 of us decided to go downtown and headed for the lift. As the lift descended from the 22nd floor, it stopped and two very straight looking Chinese in suits entered. That bhudda was a creeper and everyone got the giggles as they stood in front of us. When we got to the ground floor our crowd fell out of the lift in a laughing heap and the two Chinese turned and came back. I slid off behind a pillar and joined a group of others from the ship. Looking back at the Chinese lecturing the laughing heap, I decided that it might be advisable to go downtown with this other group. That worked well, as an Australian woman in the group could speak Malay and got us a very cheap taxi to take us shopping and it would wait wherever it took us. At that time you got $4 singapore for one NZ$. I wanted to buy a stereo system and was taken to a shop where they sat me in an armchair, brought me a Coke, and demonstrated several sytems. I bought a Sanyo system. It had a FM radio (No FM in NZ then) and turntable unit, with detachable speakers and it was mains or battery, I also bought Pink Floyds "Meddle" album which had yet to be released in NZ.
Returning to our hotel I found our room empty but with the TV still going on a Chinese program. Graham did not return and I enjoyed listening to the new album that evening, while puzzled as to Grahams absence. The next morning in the foyer I ran into a girl who explained that Graham was in her room on the 5th floor. Going there I found him to be quie paranoid, he said that the Chinese guys had told them to go back to their rooms. His key had fallen out of his pocket and they could see his room number. Later when he returned to the room he did not enter because he could hear Chinese voices inside. I pointed out that what he heard was the TV, but he implored me to go and bring all our gear down to the girls room, citing that I had not been seen by the Chinese and that we were flying out that evening. So I went back to our room and started packing both of our stuff.
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Page Six - Just then there was a knock on the door. Opening it, I was confronted by 3 Chinese guys trying to sell me Bhudda sticks. They were foot in the door keen and I had great trouble getting rid of them, telling them to "fuck off, I never touch the stuff!" After I had managed to shut the door I rang down to Grahams room telling him what had happened. He suggested flushing away any hooch I had left. Once the coast was clear it took me ages to get our gear from the 22nd floor down the back stairs to the 5th floor as I did not want to go near the main lift lobby but by the time I got down there Graham had been out and bought a suit, he was clean shaven and the girl had just finished cutting his shoulder length hair to a short back and sides, muttering that they would not recognise him now. we left for the airport. at the airport we had to wait in a holding room, we would not get our passports back till on our way to the plane, Graham was still paranoid claiming `they would still get us at that point`. When we eventually were allowed through they handed back our passports with smiles and we continued to the plane, a stripped out Douglas DC8, we had to queue to board via the stairs on wheels used in those days, just then some other guys we had known on the ship asked if we had bought any of the dope they had scored from some Chinese after which they had sent them to our room! Grahams face was a study!
The flight landed to refuel at Bombay in the middle of the night.Then again at Bahrain at dawn. The 3rd stop was at Athens on a beautiful sunny day. You could see the Parthenon etc from the air as we came in to land. The airport was an old style square of tarmac with a Taverna with tables and brollys at its edge. Graham was soon indulging in a bottle of Retsina- a greek wine made from pine resin. The last I heard him say was that he intended to go to Morrocco. He never made it back to the plane and I never saw him again.
Arriving at Gatwick airport on a freezing cold raining winters day at the end of December, I caught the train to London Victoria, they would not let me take my boxed stereo system into the carriage but had to put it in the guards van. Worried it might get stolen, on arrival I raced to get it but in doing so left behind a brand new Kaipoi woolen blanket that my mother had given me as a going away present. By the time I realised this the shuttle had departed returning to Gatwick. The lost property office suggested I wait the two hours for the train to return, which I did and while waiting was joined by an Australian guy who waited with me and chatted. I had not had much to do with him onboard the ship and so was puzzled. When the train returned but my blanket was gone, it became clear that he wanted to borrow some money as he had spent all his cash and no banks were open at that late hour. His name was Angelo and thinking I would never see him again I lent him three quid, enough for the youth hostel.
I had arranged to stay with a girl I knew for that first night in London. Next day I went to `NZ House` where I had arranged to meet Angelo at mid-day. He turned up and reimbursed my loan. We both needed somewhere to live and so found a very cheap hotel in Earls Court, which had just re-opened and were offering bed and Continental breakfast at the amazing price of 4 quid a week! Our room had a gas heater and was very cosy. At the time the miners were on strike and whole areas of London were having 4 hour power cuts. It was like being there in the blitz! Cars drove with only their sidelights to avoid dazzling, and the candle sellers were doing a roaring trade. As we had a gas heater and my stereo would run on batteries, soon all the Aussies and Kiwis would party in our room. However on our first night Angelo dropped his trousers and revealed that he had bullets of Singapore Bhudda taped up both legs! As a result those first weeks in London were a blast!
Soon we saw Pink Floyd doing "The Dark side of the Moon" at the Rainbow, Londons premier rock concert venue, a 1000 seat former movie theater. This was nearly a year before the album was released and probably the last time they played indoor venues. At the interval a Scottish comedian I had never heard of before had the audience splitting their sides. His name was Billy Connolly! I soon made contact with Jim and Carol and his 3 year old daughter Lisa. They were already at his Aunts house in Hampstead. He already had a job with a company called `Civic Trees` that moved trees from country estates to replace trees that had died in the city.
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Page Seven - They promised you could earn 40pounds a week, so both Angelo and I applied. There were no vacancies at the London branch but had some at their Yorkshire branch if we were prepared to go there. I had bought a Morris Minor 1000 for 5 pounds and so we travelled up to Birmingham where Angelo had been invited to stay by a family on the ship, and we stayed a night there. The teenage son of our hosts asked if we would like to go "Paki bashing' with him and his mates that evening. We politely declined! The next day we continued on to Richmond in Yorkshire to start work. The firm gave us a Ford Anglia van for transport, and the job involved digging up trees at country estates, for each inch in diameter of a trunk, you had to dig one foot further out, a trench about 3 feet deep. This was undercut and a chain was encircled at the bottom. A Collar was then clamped around the trunk and straps were ratched tight from the collar to the chain all around a special trailer was then tipped up and bolted to the collar, once the trailer was towed upright the whole tree would come out onto the trailer ready for transport to a city. Our job was to do the digging, the English employees drove the truck. It was hard work as the ground was still frozen.
Then we would head for a city, in this case Scunthorpe, which was an industrial steel making town. The air was thick with red dust, a car parked overnight would have an inch of dust on it by morning. No wonder the trees died! Towards the end of the week we asked when we would get paid, and it was explained that as the wages were made up in London we would not get paid till the 3rd week. However the boss subbed us 25pounds each which he explained we would have to pay back at the rate of 5pounds a week once our wages arrived. Toward the end of the first week at a motorway Cafe where we stopped for a meal I hungerily ate some odd tasting diced carrots, which poisoned me, that evening I chundered at both ends and was so ill an ambulance took me to hospital. On finding out that I had recently been in Singapore they raced me off to an isolation hospital on Sheffield Moor in case I had a noxious disease. My room there had glass walls with a view out onto the snow covered moor. I was told the man in the next room had been there for 3 years!
After 4 days I had recovered and proving not to have any disease I left to hitch back to Richmond. I was still very weak so I was not able to do much digging the following week,but by the end of that week our pay arrived. I was paid 13 pounds less the fiver so I got 8 quid! I asked what about the 40 quid the advert promised? It was explained that it was piece-work and we would have to work harder to earn that. It was then realised that Angelo was so incensed that he had taken off in the firms Anglia van, probably back to London. I never saw him again. I decided to quit while ahead and departed as well! At least I had had 33 pounds for my first weeks work, Angelo had done a lot more for less money.
So back to London and I soon had a job for a Chemist wholesale Company, driving a Ford Escort van delivering drugs to chemists shops on a route from Park Royal to Chesham in the country, I did this route twice a day. There were 15 drivers at our branch which covered the North east segment of Greater London. Needing somewhere to live, one of the drivers said I could crash at his flat. He was a Rick, cockney Rod Stewart lookalike (Hairstyle et all) and his flatmates were a Marc Bolan lookalike with an afro, and Pete Townsends younger brother who had a kit of drums Keith Moon had given him- still with the Who sign on the bass drum. Rick had taken to helping himself to a few Mandrax tabs from his deliveries and would imbibe, and sing in the bath, trying to walk through walls afterwards. The Young Ones had nothing on these guys!
Meanwhile "The Other Band" had arrived at Southampton. I drove down to meet them in my Morris. It was a pissing wet miserable day there and I walked onto the deserted wharf just in time to hear the ships announcement that nobody would be allowed off until all the baggage was unloaded. With nowhere to shelter I walked onboard the crews gangway and having located the grroups cabin, found they needed to rent a van for their gear. So we all trooped off the crews gangway and went uptown in my car, and after renting a van and returning to the ship, they went back on board before coming off on the main gangway through customs and immigration, they had very lax security in those days! Alan Galbraith who had recorded Highway`s album was also on board so I gave him a lift back to London.
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Page Eight - A couple of months later, the Great Western Lincoln Festival at Bardney in Lincolnshire was on. This was to be a 4 day festival over a Bank holiday weekend. The groups booked were a veritable Whos Who of Rock. Entrance was 4pounds and 50p. "The Other Band" were going for the entire weekend. I had to work both Friday and Saturday morning. This turned out to be good because the festival was almost rained out on the Friday and the papers were claiming a washout. However 4 of us Unichem drivers "borrowed" a firms van and drove up on Saturday afternoon. By then the weather had improved and the farmer has given the huge crowd rows of hay bales and sheets of clear plastic to use as shelter and we soon made ourselves comfortable and able to enjoy the music I remember seeing the Beach Boys and Slade, and Monty Python doing the Parrot sketch live on stage. On the Sunday the rain returned and it got so muddy we decided to leave.
Later that year we attended a laid back concert at the Crystal palace sound shell. This was very like the one in Pukekura park in New Plymouth. It started at mid-day o a very sunny day and there were Lindisfarne, Wrights wonderwheel, Capability Brown (who did 7 part harmonies ala Crosby Stills and Nash, you can find their albums on youtube - not known outside UK.) The original Mahavishnu Orchestra were playing the Inner Mounting Flame album, then later Yes who came on at dusk, playing Close to the Edge among other songs. Everyone remained seated or laying on the lawn and a lot of hash was smoked by everyone. In those days you were still allowed to smoke in theaters, I went to see the "Fritz the Cat" cartoon movie at a theater near Piccadily Circus. Cigarette smoke curls up slowly but hash burns straight up- everyone there was smoking hash joints.
"The Other band" soon rented a flat in South Norwood, near Croydon. Blake got a solo gig playing at a pub across the road. After closing time the whole pub would come back to the flat which became party central, their Landlord was a funny little man called Sid. He lived in the back flat and was always curious to know about NZ. He had an aqualung and a diving suit. I don't know if he ever really went diving but we once saw him laying in his goldfish pond wearing the whole rig! They invited Sid to their parties, oblivious to the dope being smoked he remarked "Nice bunch of chaps, they laugh a lot!".
The other concerts we loved that year included seeing the original Genesis with Peter Gabriel, we saw them in concert at the Drury Lane Theatre first and later at the Rainbow. They played most of their albums, `Trespass`, `Nursery Crime`, `Foxtro`t and `Selling England by the Pound`, as they were still my favorite group, I have been to Auckland twice to see Steve Hackett reprise those original albums in recent years. He was Genesis`s original guitarist until 1976 and has formed a group of musos that have the ability to play that material well. The Other Band returned to NZ after 6 months and took up residency at the `Cricketers Arms` in Wellington. Life was a little boring though and at the end of 1973 they disbanded, Graham Harvey returned to London in 1974, as did I. But that's another story.
Sadly: John Hall, George Limbidis, Phil Jacobs, Blake Thompson, Graeme Osten, Reno Teihei and Paddy Beach are no longer with us.
I hope these musings will help in the rememberance of bloody good times and some damn fine music!
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