TEN YEARS AFTER 1971 - August to December

IPC Magazines Ltd. 1971

Just looking at Alvin Lee is enough to stop you in your tracks, he's devastating with his thick blond hair, hazel eyes and tough physique which is one very good reason why he's probably as well known by name as Ten Years After.

He's the "face" of the group, the one whose photo all the fans want and who gets singled out for publicity, which Alvin seems to think is a bit of a drag. He'd much rather people thought of him as the brilliant guitarist that he is rather than "just a pretty face". On the subject of the way he looks Alvin says: "I was very paranoid about it at first, it started in America where the very business-like publicist we had over there found people were picking up on me and decided to exploit the situation. That led to a weird feeling about it in the band....but finally we sat down together and discussed it and it was decided that if it was going to help the band we would let it go, but I've never really liked to think of the band as anything other than a band".

Since then, the whole thing has snowballed--with Alvin developing into something of a cult, especially with the group's younger fans, and the film Woodstock did plenty to swell their ranks, because Mr. Lee somehow seemed to be the "star" turn of all the footage shot at that memorable venue. That certainly has a whole lot to do with his face as well as his dexterous hands and his sexy voice. So much so that recently he has been subjected to a selection of film offers, mostly from the states, to further his career as an actor. But Alvin just doesn't want to know. This is because he loves guitar playing and among the connoisseurs of the music world he has been called " the last of the great British guitarist" and earned the nickname Flash.

His present popularity is a long way from the beginnings of the band. A few years back Alvin Lee, Leo Lyons and Ric Lee started playing round Nottingham, they had lean times until they moved to London, and did a lot of session work that got the group together on musical experience. Then Chick Churchill joined them on organ.

On stage they finally talked their way into a date at the Speakeasy and that was how Ten Years After started to become well-known.

Afterwards they hit States and became really red hot musical property. Now at last they have the recognition they deserve in Britain as well. As well as playing lead guitar like an earthly angel and singing in the same sort of vein Alvin is the member of the band who gets things moving, the one with the ideas. He works very hard at writing songs which he admits he finds hard work, luckily for us the results are always worth the effort.

Nowadays when he's not on the road he spends much of his time at his Berkshire country home experimenting with good sounds and editing his cine films.

When you're one of the budding legends of the 70's it's nice to have somewhere where you can get away from all that snowballing fame.

The beautiful back-page pic of the irresistible Alvin (in glorious color!) almost does justice to his colorful character.

Well worth a spot on your wall I'd say..... Georgina Mells

From The Rock Journal 1971 – By Teacher, Author and Journalist Jim O’Donnell

Edited by Dave for use on our website:

It’s exactly one year ago this summer that the Woodstock movie made a teen idol out of Ten Years After’s guitarist Alvin Lee. You may recall that the blonde twenty six year old Englishman flashed his ES335 Gibson guitar under the camera light so fast, that it looked like a re-take of the Wilkinson Sword Blade television commercial. He improvised an eleven minute rendition of their encore hit called, “I’m Going Home”. With such blazing velocity in the mid – August heat that he all but turned the Woodstock stage into a working toaster.

When the lights came back on after the movie version, you expected the screen to look like burnt toast. It was a super-nova act, to be sure, so astounding a display, that the guitarist managed to accomplish more than just hold his own in a film that also included among others:

Jimi Hendrix, Johnny Winter, Pete Townshend, Leslie West, Carlos Santana and Paul Butterfield. But, what all that speed-fingering and guitar lashing on a movie screen did to Alvin’s reputation, was to recast him from an exceptional guitarist and good overall musician, right into superstardom – automatically. Instead of being simply known by a considerable loyal underground following, as a proficient free – form – cooking - lead guitarist, he’s now perceived by millions as a formidable guitar hero. Along with this notoriety, overseeing and overbearing arrogance, that goes along with the title. Images of course never have enough regard for facts, and the fact of the matter is that, Alvin Lee the person, bears no resemblance to Alvin Lee the guitar god of stage and now screen.

I once handed him an advertisement from a rock newspaper and told him that maybe he should look into it. The advert said: “Learn To Play Guitar the Chet Atkins way! Complete for just $2.98 with postage included. According to stereotype, he was supposed to respond to me, like an affronted cobra. In reality, the soft spoken Nottingham native, just laughed.

This disparity between what a performer is really like and what people think, he or she is like, presents a major problem for reporters and fans. If you write about the individual that lurks behind the image, you will usually produce a picture of a pleasant, polite and decent person who just so happens to have one or more outstanding talents. As is the case with all the members of Ten Years After who are equally multitalented, and have a multitude of tricks still in their bag.

This interview between Alvin Lee and myself took place on Monday August 9, 1971 in New York City. The Friday before this interview, Ten Years After performed at Gaelic Park in the Bronx, after just returning from a three month lay-off. The bands brand new album is called, “A Space In Time” and had just been released.

Question: How did you feel about your show at Gaelic Park the other night?

Alvin Lee: “We had a lot of rough spots because it was the first live gig we had done in about three months”.

Question: How come you took three months off from touring and recording?

Alvin Lee: “We were turning into a performing jukebox really. We didn’t have time to get into new stuff and we were just repeating ourselves. A lot of the solos, instead of being jams, they were getting to be the same every night”.

Question: Did you try to do anything special with this new album?

Alvin Lee: We spent a lot more time on details, quality and such. We took a lot more trouble. We’ve done seven albums. I don’t think we’ve ever reached what we’re trying to do, but I know we’re getting nearer”.

Question: How did you feel about your part in the Woodstock movie?

Alvin Lee: “ It’s the old celluloid thing – as soon as you get into the movies, then something else happens, people freak-out and think “Film Stars” and it’s not really what we’re about at all”.

Question: When years ago you first started doing your own kind of music, as opposed to whatever was popular at the time, did you have much trouble staying original?”

Alvin Lee: “We didn’t have any conviction about it. We were floundering. We were playing and often did think, perhaps we’re barking up the wrong tree. We knew enough to know that we were into something valid, musically, but there just didn’t seem to be any way of finding the market for it at the time”.

Question: Do you practice much?

Alvin Lee “You can always play a bit”.

Question: What’s it like in the middle of a stage during a Ten Years After concert?

Alvin Lee: “You’re not out there thinking how cool it is, or how groovy or anything. You’re just out there working really. That’s all I ever do”.

Question: How about audience riots when you’re playing? How do you feel onstage during something like that?

Alvin Lee: “It’s just a nasty position to be in and it makes me sick that I can get into that position”.

Question: Any plans for changing your show?

Alvin Lee: “What we’re hoping to do now, is to try and turn on the young people that want to come to our concerts, to what we believe in, you know, listening and picking out the subtleties of free-form expression, et-cetera, rather than just dropping downers, drinking wine and freaking out to rock `n´ roll”.

Question: Did you once say that you would like to get rid of that part of your white heritage, that seems to inhibit you?

Alvin Lee: “It definitely inhibits you by being white. I’m not so inhibited now. I’ve worked it out a bit”.

Question: Do you think rock `n´ roll will last forever?

Alvin Lee: “Rock `n´ Roll is just a beat to the music. That can’t die because it’s always there. If you only tap your foot to it, that’s the relevance”.

Question: Did you join Elvis Presley’s fan club?

Alvin Lee: “Yeah, I did do that”.

Question: What kind of mail does Ten Years After get?

Alvin Lee: “Oh, we get some incredible letters. There are the Japanese letters, the humble type of letters they write from Japan, like – “will you grace us with your presence”? Then you get the American ones saying, “Hi, I’m stoned on THC and I’m listening to your record. Far Out”! Ramble, ramble. And then you get the English (British) ones saying, “I’m very interested in modern music and I’d like to know – a, b, c, d, - and they’ll have a list of questions”.

Question: One last question, you always save your highest powered numbers for the end. How come?

Alvin Lee: “It’s the ideal climax. You can’t have subtle sex without an orgasm at the end.!

The photos above are contributions by Christoph Müller (thank you Christoph)

AUGUST 7, 1971 - DISC And MUSIC ECHO

6p – USA 30c

It is now almost exactly ten years after the bass / lead guitar partnership started between Alvin Lee and Leo Lyons; a partnership that has weathered a lot of strains, and knocks. The current line up of Ten Years After has been together for about four years, and the extraordinary part is that they’ve come a lot nearer to splitting through fame and fortune than they ever did in poverty with audiences booing them. In the old days, Leo Lyons used to ring up for the bookings and never let on he was the bass player, and they couldn’t afford an agent.

More often than not, when they’d done a gig, the promoter would shake his fist at them and scream, “it’s bands like you that are ruining the ballroom scene.” Ten Years After sailed through hardships like that. It wasn’t until the beginning of this year when they were all wealthy enough to retire, they came to the point of splitting. It might have been partly due to the element of struggle and fighting towards a goal being removed that weakened them, but the main problem was the audiences. “The thing was that we built up such a reputation, that as soon as we walked onstage, people were reacting to what they’d heard we did rather than what we actually were about to do. People didn’t sit there for what we did and then react; we weren’t communicating anything. “It got to the stage when it felt as if we were going on and doing an imitation of ourselves. We couldn’t work out why we were going along and playing a 20,000 seater. Was it for the money, or was it because we were enjoying it? Musically we were just repeating our popular stage numbers. “So we took some time off and thought about it and tried to get back some of the feelings we had in the early days. We must have come nearest to splitting then; lots of bands split there, Cream did. Now instead of going on and playing what people wanted to hear, we do what we want.”

Leo Lyons was talking at his beautiful rural home in Bedfordshire, sitting on a mound at the top of the paddock watching his three horses graze. It’s hot and it’s peaceful and their tenth tour of America starting this week, seems an eternity away. You wonder why Leo doesn’t retire for good to this haven, when financially, he doesn’t need to play another note for the rest of his life. “Because I’d get bored out of my mind, and because we really do enjoy playing live,” he says emphatically. “Firstly you do it for love, then you get addicted to it.”

Having toured all over the world now, the group want to concentrate a little more on their albums. In the past they’ve been in the habit of rushing into the studio between tours and doing a quick album. Their new one just finished, called “A Space In Time” was much more thought out and leisurely. “The trouble in the past was that we’d put down a number in such a hurry that three months later, after doing it onstage, the stage version was much better than the album one. We’ve never professed to be an album band, though, always a live one.

The most time we spent on the other albums was three weeks, and some of the numbers we hadn’t played until we got into the studio. This album, we had two numbers we’d played onstage over the last couple of tours, and the rest were untried stuff, but we spent quite a bit of time rehearsing. We’ve never had a gold album and I think that’s something that we’d like to work towards in the future. “We’ve worked places in America to a sold out concert and the number of people in the hall was about three times the number of albums we’d sold in that area, despite the fact, that the cost of the tickets was more than the cost of the album.”

In the past, the group was adamant about singles, now they don’t mind too much whether the record company puts one out off the album because, says Leo, the tracks on this new album are far more representative and would stand up to being singled out. Alvin still does the majority of the writing, although Leo writes at home for his own pleasure, but he doesn’t think he’s done anything worth presenting yet. Leo is also into recording at home and has converted one of the attics into a studio. “On the “Stonedhenge” album we all played wrote and did something ourselves but that’s the only thing I’ve ever written that’s been recorded.

We all do bits to Alvin’s songs. He comes along with a rough tune and we throw it around. We might even change the rhythm and the concept of it.”

From travelling with their equipment in a 15 cwt. truck – Ten Years After now travel in a cavalcade of cars with the equipment, handled by three permanent roadies, travelling in a five ton truck. TYA are one of the most highly paid bands in the country (England). After ten tours of the United States they could still work non-stop there for a couple of years and fill every gig. “A lot of people reckon we’re overpaid.” Says Leo thoughtfully, surveying his house, his land, his cars and horses, “but when you work out the short span of time in which we’ll be earning and spread that money over a working man’s earning life, we work pretty cheaply really.”

CAROLINE BOUCHER

On The Scene Page of this paper:

“Ten Years After’s Leo Lyons a great collector of antique guns and Wild West paraphernalia. He’s even erected his own stables.

Record Mirror August 7, 1971

Ten Years After will play their first British dates in over 18 months in September, and an album is set for release to co-inside with the tour. The 10 date tour covers every major city, apart from Glasgow, and the London venue will not be announced until next week.

Ten Years After’s last London gig, at the Albert Hall, ended in their being banned from the venue and it’s this ban which has resulted in this difficulty, of fixing a London venue.

The full dates are: September 14^th Colston Hall, Bristol,15^th Philharmonic Liverpool 16^th, Cith Hall Newcastle 20^th, Guild Hall, Southampton 22^nd, De Montfort Hall Leicester 24^th, City Hall Hull 25^th, Empire, Edinburgh 26^th, Free Trade Hall Manchester 28^th, City Hall Sheffield October 4^th Town Hall Birmingham.

The album, the group’s long awaited follow-up to their “Watt” album, is titled

“A Space In Time” and will be released in September, although no exact date has been finalised. This is due to the label destination of the album being uncertain. Ten Years After are currently in the States and “A Space In Time” will be issued there in advance of the British release. It’s the bands first album for the Columbia Record Label.

New Musical Express August 7, 1971

New Musical Express August 14, 1971

Ten Years After – Banned from the Royal Albert Hall two years ago, has fixed alternative London dates for its British concert tour, which opens at Bristol Colston Hall on September 14^th. The group will play a special midnight concert at the London Coliseum, the first outfit ever to do so. On Saturday September 18^th. And to ensure that it caters for as many people as possible, Ten Years After will play an additional date at the Coliseum the following evening at 7:00 pm. The Remaining dates for the group’s tour have already been reported in the New Musical Express. Ten Years After is currently touring America, where their next album, and the first to be released on Columbia Records in the States, is due out immediately. The L.P. is titled, “A Space In Time,” and will be issued in Britain next month.

August 1971 - Release of "A Space In Time"

Ten Years After 1971 - Photos above and below by Ed Caraeff

1971 - TYA "A Space In Time" Photo Session, Photo: Ed Caraeff

1971

A Very Funny Find - Guaranteed to make you smile - or even laugh out loud!

Original Press Photo from the "Chicago Sun-Times" - Photographer: Ed Caraeff

Picture contributed by Gary Holdinghausen

Alvin Lee of “Ten Years After” during my St. Louis concert that ended in a riot. Cops arrested me when I tried to stop a cop from beating a fan with a flashlight. Tom Karr – Concert Promoter

Former KSHE D.J. John Williams recalling the riot that broke out during an August 28, 1971 Ten Years After concert, at the Kiel Auditorium, in St. Louis, Missouri.

It was after all, a great way to make a quick hundred dollars. Walk out on stage and announce, “Ladies and Gentleman, would you please welcome the British band “Ten Years After”.

Then, walk off and collect the money. But on the night of August 26, 1971 - an apparently simple job, was anything but simple this time. For Disc-Jockey John Williams, this would be a night that he would not easily forget. This was the night that a new, unknown band called J. Geils, would be opening for the already established and famous Ten Years After. From early on in the set, Craig Petty was right up front, taking photos of Ten Years After. But as Ten Years After’s set was coming to an end, something went seriously wrong.

The audience wanted and expected the band to play their usual encores, but someone behind the scenes, unexpectedly and abruptly ended the show. “I was five feet away from everything” said Craig “I was in perfect position to see what was going on”. People put a table upon the stage, people were getting pushed and crushed against the table that was about waist high and it got thrown on top of the crowd, by the concert promoter. The audience didn’t do anything wrong, they just picked it up and pushed it off to the side and then the security guys came rushing out and grabbed the table and threw it back on top of the crowd, it hurt people and the rest who witnessed this went off. We climbed out from under the thing and headed to the back of the auditorium. We sat in the seats and watched it all go down, we saw people busting chairs up and throwing shit, and I think they broke some windows around the exit ramps”. “Shoes and bottles rained down on me”, recalled Nancy Webb, who was sitting in the first row on the main floor. While John Williams had a unique vantage point, of the mêlées. “I was the hired emcee, I was paid one hundred bucks to introduce the guys.

I vividly remember introducing them, because I remember the exact words that I said, “Ladies and Gentleman, Hi, I’m John Williams from radio station KSHE – FM – Radio, and won’t you please welcome to the Kiel Auditorium, Alvin Lee and Ten Years After. Usually, you would walk off, collect your money, and do what you were going to do after that. But, there was confusion going on, and there was a microphone and Alvin Lee and Ten Years After, had either stopped playing, or they were off stage, I just don’t seem to remember exactly, I was doing my best. Then, someone shoved me and said, “get this thing under control, or we’re going to shut the thing down”. So I went out there, on stage, with the ridiculously stupid idea of trying to calm down 10,000 people. So I’m out there saying something on that microphone, and the next thing I know, I’m down on the floor, on the stage, knocked out cold. I got clobbered right on the forehead by a wine bottle, it came out of nowhere. Somebody came and dragged me off the stage and I ended up on a cot backstage and off to the side. The next thing I remember, I woke up in my apartment and there was a gigantic party going on around me, I guess I recovered and joined the party”.

The next morning, Jim Singer, recalled John Williams getting on the air at KSHE and chewing out St. Louis, he was pissed. He played a Ten Years After song, and piped it down and asked why? He did it over and over, remembered Jim. “It was a beer barrel type of crowd”, said Williams, I loved that group, they had long cuts on their record albums, and they were British and they were great. John Williams left St. Louis not long after this riot, and moved to California – he worked for KZAR – Radio.

In another accounting of the event: Ten Years After had just finished playing their usual set and the crowd wanted an encore. The hall management refused to allow it and the audience became unruly. The police moved in. This made matters worse and the whole thing turned into a riot. I didn’t see the result because we left once the thing flared up, but I understand that somehow the promoter became involved and threw a table into the audience. The police arrested him and he spent the night in jail. The whole thing could have been avoided had the band been allowed to play one more song.

It was this event and one other similar incident in Queens, New York that gave Ten Years After the reputation of attracting unruly audiences and after that the band had problems with municipal auditorium management, police and fire departments, who insisted the audience must sit for the whole show under threat of being arrested. Promoter Bill Graham overcame the problem by having his own security people at his promotions.

In the photo, you’ll notice the large speaker cabinet that had fallen in front of the stage, just prior to the start of the riot. Just further proof of Craig Petty’s version of how it all started.

From Alvin Lee & Ten Years After – Visual History – By Herb Staehr

Towards the end of the show, Alvin Lee tells the crowd to move closer. The fans storm the stage, the riot police are called in and Ten Years After are unable to complete the last song.

The following photos by Gary Holdinghausen:

28 August 1971 - TYA at Kiel Auditorium, St. Louis, Missouri

Many Thanks to Gary Holdinghausen
for sharing these rare, beautiful photos with us

"I have a few pictures of TYA in St Louis that I took in 1971, at my 1st TYA concert.
They were taken with a cheap instamatic 110 camera – with no flash.
At this concert there was a riot that started when Alvin ask the audience to come closer"

SOUNDS MAGAZINE - AUGUST 28, 1971

An exclusive review of the new Ten Years After album

“A SPACE IN TIME” and their opening U.S. concert.

CONCERT REVIEW:

The young lad had carried the watermelon from home and finally tucked it between his legs and waited for the end of Ten Years After’s hour and a half long set. Finally, after the encore, the long-haired youth gave the watermelon to the equally long-haired security guard in front of the high stage. He reached up and rolled it behind the amps, where it came to rest at the feet of Ten Years After. That was the way one out of a crowd of 12,000 showed his thanks, the other 11,999 simply stood their ground and roared for ten minutes; finally after a few last “yeahs,” they started on home, leaving much excitement hanging in the warm air.

This then was the way Ten Years After kicked off their latest American tour, and it’s not bad having 12,000 people come to see your concert. The scene of all the excitement was Gaelic Park, which is in the upper reaches of New York City, just north of the point where Manhattan turns in the burro of the Bronx. Gaelic Park is a soccer-rugby field, owned by Manhattan College, and has been the scene of some really fine concerts this summer.

EXCITING:

The concert had a festive if not festival feel to it. Many of the audience carried heavy picnic hampers (baskets) full of food and liquid goodies. For a brief few seconds the scene resembled the Woodstock Festival two years ago, except this concert lacked the other 400,000 people present at Woodstock. The audience had come to see Ten Years After without question. Many simply arrived minutes before Ten Years After took the stage, missing the balance of Edgar Winter’s fine set. Over 8,000 tickets were sold up to the day of the concert, while another 3,000 to 4,000 lined up the afternoon of the show for tickets. Despite a rash of violence that has plagued many outdoor concerts this summer, the audience was well behaved and respectful of Alvin, Chick, Ric and Leo. Without question the concert was exciting. Many bands lose whatever magic they contain after working together for some period of time. However, that is not the case with Ten Years After. Even though they had not played for a few months, they were as tight and as creative as ever. Leo Lyons bass runs were visual to the eye and splendid to the ear as ever.

IMAGE:

Ric Lee still has that great drum style, that puts him high above the other drummers that are working in rock music today. I can’t recall Chick Churchill’s organ playing sounding better. And finally, Alvin Lee…Most of the yells between sets were aimed at Alvin, who has the image that most audiences want of rock guitarist.

CREATIVE:

However, Alvin is one of the hardest-working, creative guitarist in music today, and a fine musician. His style and drive are beyond compare, and he thrilled the audience by using his harmonica and microphone stand on the neck of his guitar, much in the same way guitarist use a slide technique. Alvin’s style and skill have grown over the last few years, and he still sings quite well. Many of the selections played, were from the band’s new album “A Space In Time”. “Hard Monkeys” – “Baby Won’t You Let Me Rock `N´ Roll You” – were the songs that went down well, followed by an encore of “Going Home”.

The 12,000 plus fans that came out to see Ten Years After, reaffirmed the popularity and fine music the band is able to effortlessly create. It’s good to see them work, and remain untouched from the changes other bands go through. For those that question the popularity of the band, I can safely say it was not owing to a mass advertising effort, rather the simple fact that they are a fine band and discriminating audiences as in the past have the good taste to see them work.

By Chuck Pullin

ALBUM REVIEW:

Ten Years After : “A Space In Time” (Chryalis) September Release:

Having Reviewed the WHO’S latest album (WHO’S NEXT) on the same weekend as

“A Space In Time,” I’m afraid the latter must suffer by comparison, in fact, anything the same week, (or even longer) would suffer the same fate, and when making assessments of any album, especially when they are both British rock bands, this is unavoidable. This, and the WHO and Ten Years After’s great following throughout the world, are the only real parallels, as Ten Years After are far more a rock and roll band, than a “rock” band, it comes across strong enough on record, but nowhere nearly as strong as their live dates.

STABBING:

Guitarist Alvin Lee has suffered a lot of abuse about his speed and therefore lack of apparent taste, but here there’s a marked slowing down and on the very rare occasions that he does really let go, he handles the lyrical and melodic angles well. The opener “One Of These Days”, has a stabbing start, somewhat like “Tobacco Road” and just when you think Lee’s bluesy voice could do with a bit more volume, Chick Churchill’s organ and Alvin on mouth harp pep things up. Leo Lyons (bass) and Ric Lee (drums) add even more pace and while there’s a lack of excitement, Alvin’s controlled rolling guitar break does save face.

“I’d Love To Change The World” is far better, much more the Ten Years After we’ve come to expect. Acoustic guitar, echoing vocals and electric guitar build up the tempo with very good cool electric passages by Alvin and while there’s nothing new developing, it’s a very nice track.

EXCITEMENT:

“Over The Hill” is a strangely non Ten Years After cut, with very pleasant string arrangement with simple acoustic guitar added. An unexpected but pleasing dimension to the overall feel of the album with “Baby Won’t You Let Me Rock `N´ Roll You” blasting out what you’d expect – tough rock and roll. There’s an element of send-up in the “period” voice, rolling piano and thrashing drums, but the old Ten Years After excitement is very evident in this one and you can almost see Leo Lyons hair flapping around as he pounds out the bass lines at the back.

Side two opener – “Once There Was A Time” suffers a little from the same thing as lots of the other tracks, lack of strength or projection of Alvin’s voice, but it’s followed by “Let The Sky Fall” where the sultry close to the mike, sort of vocal approach pays off. The backing is kept on a tight reign and while Leo Lyons bass gives the track a very firm direction, it’s the lightly wailing guitar and nice cool break by Alvin that rounds it nicely. No tricks or high speed just a straight show of skills.

“Uncle Jam” shows a very positive jazz influence, with more than a touch of Szabo Garbo electric guitar with the rest of the band jamming like mad for the track’s quite short duration.

It really doesn’t need repeating that Ten Years After are a far better live band than their albums suggest, they get over much more of their charisma and excitement that has a job surfacing on their recorded work.

By Billy Walker

HIT PARADER Sept 1971

Ten Years After had a voluntary lay off for a quarter of a year, following a date in December in the States. From there they went back home to England to “own – thing” it for three months. The official statement was that the group wanted to re-think its policy and get a new act together. I was to find, following them through the first three concerts after the lay off, in Munich and Dusseldorf, Germany, that this just wasn’t true. In fact Alvin Lee’s first words when I arrived in Munich were “I hope you haven’t come to hear our new bag. We were misquoted, we didn’t have the three months off to do a new thing, I spent it getting everything that went before out of my head. I don’t know what difference you’ll notice. We can hear each other more now. Before we’d play our hits and think, “Right he’s going to play such and such now”. “It got very automatic, there was no spontaneity anymore”.

The concert in Munich, Germany went on hours late because of difficulties concerning erecting a stage. Ten Years After faced a massive uptight crowd that had been kept waiting for three hours. By the end they were on their feet cheering. Reflected Leo Lyons afterwards on the way back to the hotel. “We had to go down there to the concert hall, even if it was only to go on and talk to them, to let them know we were there. You have certain responsibilities to be aware of, and if we hadn’t gone on, people would have been hurt in a riot. It’s always better to go on, no matter how late. Most of them seemed to think it was our fault they had to wait three hours, there was no one to explain to them”. Dusseldorf was better, from the point of view of hotels and the concert hall. The dressing room was as grand as the Munich one had been miniscule. We were all silent for the standard procedure of Alvin tuning up. He does so by listening acoustically to Leo’s bass through the end of the neck. Drummer Ric Lee was playing with a protective finger stall. Having had a wart removed from his fingers. After the concert I complimented him on his drum solo. He replied, “I don’t like making solos too long. They get boring unless you’re Buddy Rich, and I’m not. “That’s why I don’t like Ginger Baker. His solos are always too long, they go on and on.

Chick Churchill had hand trouble as well, blisters from not playing for so long, and taped up his thumb. Leo Lyons told me, “During the lay off, I had plenty to do, I live in the country and I’ve got horses. I spent a lot of time thinking about what the group would like to do, whether to go out doing a lot of concerts and taking the money, or record more, or what”.

“It’s like putting the cart before the horse. Now it’s getting back to the way it used to be.

We’ve gone way beyond what we ever hoped for, we never thought we’d be this big. We thought we’d get gigs and enough bread to pay the bills. After a time you find yourself consciously trying to live up to your reputation”. Leo said, that on stage, the group now jams a lot and it was obvious from all the solos. That each member has a chance to show his paces individually, and that the music is a lot less restricted and stereotyped now. But Leo would like to spend more time on records in the future. “We spend three weeks on an album and that’s it. It’s over and done with. Some groups, even new ones, take months over it and I think we ought to take more time out for recording. We’ve done six albums and about 60,000 gigs.

The trouble is, we’re lazy”.

Article By Richard Green

Record Mirror September 4, 1971

New Musical Express September 4, 1971

Ten Years After have added a further date to their British concert tour which opens at Bristol Colston Hall on September 14^th, it is at Bradford Street. George’s Hall on September 27^th.

But the group’s visit to Scotland, Edinburgh Empire had previously been announced for September 25^th, has been put back to October and revised dates are now being set for Edinburgh and Glasgow. Other on the tour, which also features Supertramp and Keith Christmas, are at the following: Liverpool Philharmonic Hall September 15^th, Newcastle City Hall 16^th, The London Coliseum 18^th and 19^th, Southampton Guildhall 20^th, Leicester De Montfort Hall 22^nd, Manchester Free Trade Hall 26^th, Sheffield City Hall 28^th, and Birmingham Town Hall October 4^th.
The brand new Ten Years After album, “A Space In Time” is currently climbing the American Album Charts.

New Musical Express - September 18, 1971

Ten Years After Tour A Sell Out – Extra Dates Added – New Album Set

Ten Years After who opened their first British tour for eighteen months to a standing room only audience at Bristol on Tuesday, have virtually sold out all of the eleven dates so far fixed and plans are now in hand to extend the tour, adding at least two dates in Scotland. This weekend the group became the first ever to play a midnight concert at London’s famous Coliseum Theatre. They do a midnight show on Saturday followed by an evening performance on Sunday. The group’s new album “A Space In Time” has now been set for release here on October 16^th on the Chrysalis label, but there are no plans to issue their current American hit single, “I’d Love To Change The World” a track from the album.
Ten Years After and their manager Chris Wright are known to be reluctant to release conventional singles. Their last British release “Love Like A Man” which reached number 6 in the New Music Express Chart, featured on the flip side, an eight minute version of the number playing at 33 rpm, recorded at the Fillmore East.

NME - 18 September 1971

September 18, 1971 - NEW MUSICIAL EXPRESS - AROUND LONDON

TYA: The Spiritual Worth Of Touring

Woodstock did a lot of people a lot of good, but the impact of “I’m Going Home” kind of boomeranged on Ten Years After. Some Ten Years After American freaks wanted and expected little else.

A just completed US tour and the release there of “A Space In Time” have gone far in changing the balance, and it’s tracks from this new album which form the basis of the band’s new act for its upcoming series of British concerts. They open this weekend with two dates at the Coliseum.

Not that “I’m Going Home” is being dropped altogether. Bassist Leo Lyons is philosophical: “Alvin and I have been doing that number doe ten or eleven years. It’s a work-out, and we just have to accept that audiences want it. We’re not complaining. It’s not a case of fuck ‘em here we go one more time. In fact, any time we’re O.K. for energy then that number is where it goes.”

I asked him (Leo) about the rarity of Ten Years After’s British appearances. We’re they financially worthwhile, in terms of the size of the venues and the number available? “No. British tours aren’t financially worthwhile……but they’re spiritually worthwhile, it’s great to work in England. And though I say they’re not financially worth it, I suppose we must make a profit eventually.

“What we’re doing really is to attempt to make a concert tour as good as we possibly can, hence the new PA (public address system). It’ll be really totally satisfying to us on this tour if we can get it all working well and present something of a good standard.”

That Ten Years After play at the Coliseum this weekend and not the Royal Albert Hall is as a result of a ban placed on them by the Royal Albert Hall management, itself as a result of crowd behaviour the last time they played there. What reaction does a musician have when something like this happens?

Lyons: “The Albert Hall ban was as a result of over enthusiasm, broken seats, that type of thing. We knew nothing about it until we were told, you can’t tell from the stage. We could have turned round and said it was the fault of a minority of the audience, it was a good concert. It felt good, the audience was good and we played good. So my reaction is fuck the Albert Hall.” “It’s disappointing, because it’s a nice place to play and it’s nicely situated for people to get to. You’re not left with much alternative , other than in places that look and feel like railway stations. I feel that in the Albert Hall, wherever you sit you get a reasonable sound and a view of the stage.”

With the tour now about to move on to the road and the time lag since the last album I asked when “A Space In Time” would be out there. “I think it’ll be released any day now but I don’t even know which label because we’ve just changed record companies. Yes, they’re all Alvin’s numbers, aside from the jam we did. He’s excelled on this album, he’s written some stuff which is far better than anything he’s done before.

“We put more time and effort into this one. Some of our albums, we’ve done in three weeks. A lot of the material we rehearsed and played in the studio, and after we’d done it on stage a few numbers sounded better than the recording – so this time round we knocked a number into shape before we finally recorded it.”

“A lot of the A Space In Time tracks were integrated into rehearsals. Alvin got sixteen numbers together in a month, we got down to a short list, and the basis of the album is the basis of the new material.
“I do feel it’s important for musicians to go on stage and have that will to create something, and have the audience pick it up if you’re playing well. It’s just not so good if they’re up there already. “There was a situation after Woodstock where the greatest reaction you could get was when you walked on stage. Consequently the communication broke down.”

Alvin Lee at London Coliseum, 19th September 1971 - Photo by Michael Putland

Autumn 1971 - Alvin Lee with his second Gibson ES 335 cherry red

which he used from August 1971 til January 1973

Photo and lettering used for the concert posters from

14 September til 4 October 1971 in England

Original Coliseum Concert Program from 1971

KEITH CHRISTMAS

For the past few years, Keith Christmas has been caught up in the dilemma of a personal dichotomy, involving music and university studies. And as a result, his musical career has tended to be vicariously enveloped by his academic studies in Bath.

But Keith has now passed through the educational system and has emerged with a Bachelor Of Science Degree in Engineering and a grim determination to take his music to the masses.

The importance of his long apprenticeship on the folk scene is evident, as Keith has now completely transcended the folk circuit and found his true niche on the rock scene. For while Keith Christmas may be an acoustic soloist, a folk singer he most certainly isn’t as his albums clearly illustrate.

And, in recent months he has taken full advantage of all the opportunities thrown at him, by playing some outstanding support gigs with “The Who” and “King Crimson”. And in the near future, he faces the exciting prospect of a dozen or so with “Ten Years After”.

Keith’s third album “Pigmy” is released this month on B & C Records (CAS 1041) and has every chance of gaining him the recognition he deserves. Among the back up musicians are: Ray Warleigh, Fuzzy Samuels, Comrade Isadore, Rod Argent, Roger Powell and Ian Whiteman. It now seems that Keith’s days in folk clubs are over for his bookings up until February contain no folk gigs. As Keith says, “It just seems pointless doing folk clubs to an audience of about 70 people when in two nights you can play to 4,000 people, not only that, but it’s a better gig all round”.

TEN YEARS AFTER

Alvin Lee	Guitar and Vocals
Leo Lyons	Bass
Ric Lee	Drums
Chick Churchill	Organ

There have been two major British Invasions of the American Rock Scene. The first was Beatle led and Liverpool based, and the second was that of the British Underground, groups who grew out of the Blues Boom, of the late Sixties. Both produced a handful of groups whose musical individually captured the attention and imagination of a vast previously untapped audience. Ten Years After were one of the first of those groups who took part in that second invasion, and they earned an incredible reputation, not through a string of chart singles, but through supercharged performances of Seventies´ rock and roll, an amalgam of their musical roots. Alvin Lee grew up listening to jazz and blues. “Ever since I can remember,” he says, “my folks have played jazz and blues records around the house. When I was ten, I was already familiar with Ralph Willis, Lonnie Johnson, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Leadbelly and, my favourite Big Bill Broonzy”.

Charlie Christan, a pioneer of the electric guitar who worked with Benny Goodman, was another early influence on Lee, who began playing with the groups around his home town of Nottingham, which is where he met bass player Leo Lyons, a rock and roller who was also impressed with the work of jazzmen like Scott La Faro, Bill Black and Ray Brown. Lee and Lyons began playing together in 1961 and they went to Hamburg that year as part of one of the myriad groups working out of that German seaport, at a time when it was the music coming out of that city’s cellars that dictated what the rest of the music world would ultimately follow.

Returning to England, that first group broke up (The Jaybirds) and Lee and Lyons went back to Nottingham where they found Ric Lee, who’d taken lessons from their old drummer, and knew what they were trying to achieve musically. Chick Churchill came in on organ and Ten Years After came to London.

London’s Marquee Club, which has played a major part in the formative years of most of the big British groups, offered Ten Years After a residency and from there they built up a following on the London Club Circuit. Decca heard of the group’s success and offered Ten Years After the rare chance of making an album without the usual formality of a hit single first.

In 1967, the group played the annual National Jazz and Blues Festival, which is organised by the Marquee. Each year has seen a new group emerge at that festival and that year, at Windsor, Ten Years After really came to the attention of the British public.

Through their first album, they also came to the attention of rock promoter Bill Graham who, having heard the album, cabled manager Chris Wright with an offer for Ten Years After to play the Fillmore West. Ten Years After went to America and found an audience as devoted as that of the Marquee, but many times larger.

The “Underground” had become reality in America, and Ten Years After’s reputation spread through their appearances and their albums, which, with the new album “A Space In Time”, now number seven in the charts.

It’s on stage though that Ten Years After really come across. Reporting in New York for Melody Maker, Vicki Wickham wrote: “Ten Years After’s ultimate break through was Woodstock 1969, and they are not only incredibly popular, they are playing to standing room only audiences throughout the country. In April they shook New York’s Fillmore East. Last week they devastated it.

“Alvin Lee, is 1971’s Mick Jagger, the audience was turned on by him, they were mesmerised, and despite the set going on to 4:30 a.m. in the morning, they would have stayed forever. The fuss and commotion they are causing is comparable to the Beatles or Stones, partly because they are the most exciting blues / rock band assembled, and four faultless musicians, and partly because of the exuberance and style of Alvin Lee.

“His fingers move like lightning, you see and hear seven guitars, and his voice, whether shouting pure rock and roll, moaning a white soul-blues, or just singing, matches his playing. Drummer Ric Lee had everyone holding their breath during a twenty five minute solo, while he went simultaneously through rhythms and counter rhythms, hitting and getting the best out of everything he touches, including the stage floor.

“Leo Lyons, has a stamina which never lets up, whether jamming with Alvin or driving his bass consistently throughout the set, and organist Chick Churchill only gets mentioned after the others because it’s been said, and he is up tempo all the way, and totally holds his own with three other star musicians…”

Reactions of that calibre have been reported everywhere where Ten Years After have played through fifteen different countries. America’s Woodstock Festival and the subsequent film of the festival brought Ten Years After world-wide acclaim and, perhaps more importantly, their music continues to gain respect . ten years on.

Supertramp Indelibly Stamped

Supertramp, one of the most exciting live bands playing on the scene at the moment, have their second album on release now…It captures all the atmosphere and magic of the band live… Now hear for yourself what real rock is all about.

Supertramp spent one hundred hours in Olympic Recording Studios over Easter, and the result is “Indelibly Stamped” their second album, issued by A & M Records on June 25, 1971. It’s exactly a year since their debut album “Supertramp” was released amidst high critical acclaim, and many people wondered why the band didn’t quickly consolidate their strong reputation. Quite simply, there were internal differences of opinion within the band, which took several months to iron out. Fran Farrell replaced Richard Palmer, who was the group’s former bassist, Roger Hodgson became lead player. Kevin Currie replaced Bob Miller on drums. The other group members are Richard Davies (keyboards) and Dave Winthrop (saxes).

In common with their first album, “Indelibly Stamped” was produced by the group themselves. Although they had written the songs prior to recording, the treatment and arrangements were all worked out in the studio.

All tracks, with the exception of “Rosie Had Everything Planned” (Hodgson – Farrell) were penned by Davis – Hodgson. The titles are: “Your Poppa Don’t Mind” – “Travelled” – “I’m Coming Home” – “Potter” – “Forever”- “Remember” – “Rosie Had Everything Planned” – “Friend In Need” – “Times Have Changed” – and “Aries”.

Kevin Currie comments: “I joined Supertramp two months before we started work on the album. I had to do three auditions (short list and things) and the band saw 87 drummers and 93 guitarists.

“What can I say about the album…it’s right where we all are at the moment. We’re not out to impress all and sundry with our musical prowess and virtuosity. We like to think people who buy the album will listen with their heads, and not their ears, but we don’t mind. If they get something out of it, that we didn’t consciously put on it, then good for them. We think and feel, both on the album and on stage. Most of our live gigs are colleges which means we’re only exposed to people who want to know anyway. We hope the album will find its way into the possession of people who wouldn’t normally associate themselves with “groovy” college bands”.

Band Personnel:

Richard Davies – was born on July 22, 1944 in Swindon, Wiltshire. He plays organ, piano, harmonica and sings. He has had eight years experience and was formerly an art student.

Roger Hodgson – was born on March 21, 1950 in Portsmouth. He is the group’s lead guitarist and also plays the flageolet, guitar and piano, as well as singing. He has had five years experience and was formerly a solo recording artists.

David Winthrop – was born on November 27, 1948, in New Jersey, U.S.A. He plays tenor and alto saxophones, flute, baritone and soprano saxophones, clarinet, trumpet, trombone, piano, as well as singing. He has had five years experience and was formerly an art student.

Kevin Currie – comes from Liverpool. He played in semi-professional groups there before coming to London to turn professional. Kevin has also backed artists like Billie Davies and John Walker. He plays drums.

Frank Farrell – comes from Birmingham where he played in several local groups before coming to London to join Supertramp. He plays bass guitar.

1971, September 19 - London Coliseum Theatre, Photos: Michael Putland

Photo: Michael Putland - published in American Songwriter Magazine

September 21, 1971 – Southampton, England.

1,000 Rock Fans Go Wild In Soton.

Lose your inhabitions with Ten Years After, more than 1,000 rock fans went wild in Southampton Guildhall last night at the climax of the the groups performance.

As the group roared into their famous Woodstock Festival Number I’m Going Home, the fans leapt out of their seats, and started dancing in the aisles. Others jumped on top of their seats clapping and stamping their feet. At the end of this steamroller of a number, nearley everyone present stood at attention, giving the group the peace sign and then called them back for an encore. Warmed by the audience response, Ten Years After - obliged with a rousing version of "Sweet Little Sixteen," a number they have adopted from Chuck Berry.

So popular are this british group, that all the seats were full well before the concert started, and many ticket holders including myself, had to sit in the asile.

Ten Years After play some excellent blues – rock. One criticism – they do tend to be a bit riffy at times, but I suppose, you do get blasé sometimes after you have seen as many rock concerts as I have.

Article Written By - B.D.

New Musical Express September 25, 1971

Ten Years worth the wait:

After a long absence, Ten Years After returned to London in styles last weekend when they appeared for two nights at the London Coliseum. It was a good venue for them since they were determined to make a London appearance during their British tour and had to hold it off for a while (since their Royal Albert Hall ban) until they found the right hall.

Comfortable surroundings, central location, fine acoustics all contributed to making the Coliseum such a place, and it’s a wonder more Rock acts don’t use it.

Keith Christmas received a deservedly warm reception and despite his apprehension and nervousness about appearing before a predominantly Ten Years After audience. He was called back for an encore which due to the pressure of time, he couldn’t do. Little quips like, “This is a 16^th century folk song written by me,” thrown out by a little guy with an acoustic guitar in the centre of a vast stage obviously appealed to the sense of humour of the crowd.

“Acid Queen,” his tongue-in-cheek folk number drew laughter and added to the charisma of the evening.

Supertramp next and Ric Davies, Kevin Currie, Roger Hodgson, Frank Farrell and Dave Winthrop had complete command of the audience. Excellent musicians with a good line in spiel, a strong melodic content to their compositions and a driving rock beat, they proved that they’re soon to emerge as a top line outfit.

Ten Years After of course, created a riot and the capacity crowd of 2,500 were on their feet at the end of “I’m Going Home” and they brought Alvin Lee, Chick Churchill, Ric Lee and Leo Lyons back for three encores of the supercharged rock `n´ roll that has earned them a reputation of being one of the finest rock bands in the world. Their music ranges through the whole spectrum of contemporary rock: it’s a fusion of jazz, blues, rock and even the classics. Alvin demonstrated it all. His “Slow Blues In C” proves he is a great blues guitarist and Chick Churchill added fine touches on electric piano. Churchill is coming more into his own now, both on electric piano and organ, and his keyboard work fills out what is one of the best rhythm sections in rock.

Leo Lyons on bass and Ric Lee on drums lay down an incredible foundation for Alvin to work from. Ten Years After combined both the old and the new. Old favourites like “No Title” and Ric’s drum solo “Hobbit,”” which earned a standing ovation, but nothing like the response for “I’m Going Home”.

Their encores were “Baby Won’t You Let Me Rock and Roll You” from their new album and a couple of high tension rockers.

By Sean Sowry

October 2, 1971 – Disc and Music Echo Magazine

Ten Years After seem to come in for criticism whatever they do. They spend too much time in America…and then when they do play over here, the cool critics say they aren’t much good.

It’s enough to make a band split up, but Ten Years After take it in their stride, although Alvin Lee does get a bit mystified by the attitude of the Pop-Press. “We’ve really enjoyed this current British Tour. The audiences here now listen much more attentively, the same as they do in the States. We’ve been putting more stress on the first part of our act, but we still get the odd freak judging us only on the rock `n´ roll we do at the end, and saying we’re a load of rubbish. “I can take criticism, but it always seems to be, “the audience liked them, but I the reporter, was the only one who really knew how bad they were.” “The thing is, that we like to play rock `n` roll at the end of a show, if we have any energy left, we like to put it all into the last number, then we feel we’ve done a good night’s graft.” Alvin says, that many of their problems have stemmed from “Woodstock” and “I’m Going Home.” On their new album, “A Space In Time,” they try to show, “some musical maturity.” After nearly five years together, they ought to be a better band. It’s been over a year since Ten Years After appeared in Britain, and Alvin is genuinely surprised at the change in audiences, of audiences in the States, he says; “the latest thing is that people who buy the cheapest tickets at the back, rush to the front when we go on, so that the people who buy the most expensive tickets can’t see.

We’re seriously thinking of making tickets all one price over there. “But in Britain, audiences are so cool. “they listen to the intense things and enjoy themselves at the end with the rock `n´ roll.” The record album is released on October 15^th, and he says, it’s the first one they’ve tried to produce systematically. “We’ve always played on albums the same as we do on stage, but this time we cleaned things up and spent more time on it.” They’ve been playing three numbers from the album on the British tour: “One Of These Days”, “Hard Monkeys” and the first track on side two, “Once There Was A Time.” “I’m never really pleased with albums, because every time you play them you hear different faults, but this is the nearest thing to doing one properly. We spent a lot of time tidying up, although really the more you strive to make something perfect, the more you are contriving.

Really, an album is just a documentary of what you happen to be doing at the time.” Alvin says, the material he wrote for it is more milder than on previous albums, because he’s moved out of London, and into a much milder environment. “Your environment definitely plays a big part in what you do. We had three months off earlier this year, and I didn’t even see an electric guitar all that time. I wrote lots of things on acoustic. “That was the first holiday we have had in four years, and we stayed “off” until we were so bored, we really wanted to get back to playing.” That was the time when all the “split” rumours started flying around. “And there never was any question of a split.

“Nobody dominates in our band, although most people think I do. I’m the lead singer and lead guitarist and I try to bring out what’s in the others, but Ric, Leo and Chick bring out things in me. None of us are selfish musicians. “Five years ago we went through the hassles of who was going on stage first - now we’re just interested in making music. “We’ve been described as virtuoso musicians and all sorts of things like that. I’d be very pleased to think we were, but even if we were, I wouldn’t say it. “A lot of people misunderstand Chick, because he doesn’t do super solos. He’s there to blend it all together, even though he’s the more advanced technically than the rest of us. If he wanted to do twenty minute erotic solos, jumping up and down the keyboards, he could. Ten Years After return to the States on November 5^th but they hope to play Britain again very soon, hopefully early next year. “Perhaps we have spent too much time over there, but you can tour Britain in a week and a half, It’s so vast in America, that you need to do six tours to get round everywhere.” November will be their 12^th, so that’s only like playing everywhere twice. Alvin won’t accept that Ten Years After have become too successful for Britain. “We’ve never had a gold album and we’ve never appeared on Top Of The Pops, but we get a lot more criticism than the groups who do!

By Roy Shipston

Sounds Magazine

October 2, 1971

Thirty Miles outside of London, in the rural tranquillity of pastoral Berkshire lives Alvin Lee, one of Britain’s most recognisable faces in the urban rock business. Mr. Lee, guitarist and self-effacing figurehead of Ten Years After, is perfectly aware of his star status, despite efforts to minimise the aura that accompanies it, and is acutely conscious of the responsibility that a man in his position and of his particular calling has today.

In his rambling country home, an acquisition once the exclusive domain of novelist, artists and playwrights but now very firmly in the hands of the rock elite. Alvin sits relaxed in a cowboy shirt, faded Levis and bright red clogs, talking about his new found enthusiasm and sense of well-being, that his escape to the country has brought him and his reactions to criticism that have been levelled against Ten Years After on their current British tour.

Ride:

Despite the band’s undoubted public acceptance, Alvin has not yet found he is able to ride criticism, in fact at times he feels more vulnerable: “What really gets to you, is when something isn’t represented, as I feel it really was. I do ride over some of them, but I don’t get involved like John Lennon or Paul McCartney who write to papers with answer back letters, I’d never do that. “Sometimes, you find it’s a bit depressing: You do a concert which you thought was good, and you’re quite pleased with it because everything went well, but then somebody will write that it was “all right”. But I don’t believe all I read in the papers, and I’m sure nobody else does. “I read in one of the musical papers last week, two reviews of the same concert, one was good and one was bad, and that’s about it”. But he did think that there could be a little more to bad reviews than lack of understanding: “I know some of the politics behind reporting. A friend of mine in the States, John Mossman said that any reporter who wants to make a name for himself, will knock established names. Therefore, people will write letters to the paper and the editor will notice that he is getting read”.

Rave Up:

Alvin thought that it was a bit unfortunate and that music should really be a bit above all that, saying that in the London Coliseum reviews and papers had, “belittled everything” and didn’t really mention “what was important”. Another thought was that perhaps “Woodstock” had not helped in this respect. “After `Going Home´ in the film of “Woodstock” everybody associated Ten Years After with “Going Home” which is all very well but what we wanted to do was bring out what else we do as well. We always end up with a rock and roll rave up, because it’s a nice way to end a gig, but we also play a lot of serious music as well, but the papers just mentioned the rock and roll because everybody stood up for the last three numbers”.

Diet:

Critics, whether of films, plays or musical concerts, see an awful lot of the same diet, and Alvin was prepared to make this concession: “They’ve got a set idea of what we’re going to do and it’s difficult to blow somebody’s mind if they’ve seen you a few times. We’re not a sensational group, we don’t blow people’s minds on purpose, we just play the music as it is.

“If everybody has seen it and gets bored with it, there’s nothing we can do. We won’t change it because that’s the case, we just keep on playing to the people who want to hear it. “That brought up the subject of Ten Years After’s progression, a thing that Alvin had said he didn’t like pushing. “It’s very easy to force it, to think what you should be doing. A lot of bands progress, because they think the audience wants them to do it, but often you get out of touch with everything that you are actually doing. We try and bring out what’s there”.

On stage Ten Years After are fairly straight, despite Alvin looking pretty sharp in an all red outfit, and with red electric guitar, etc – there aren’t the stage antics that many bands employ.

Did he think that they lack anything in the theatrics on stage? “I don’t think we lack anything anymore than I think the concerts lack anything. In England it’s been great. I’ve really been happy because the people, apart from the last three numbers, where we invite them to get up and dance, have been really listening. You can hear a pin drop during some of the more progressive things we’re into, it makes you play better when everyone is listening”.

Speed:

Inevitably, Alvin’s guitar style, particularly has speed at times, has come in for a lot of argument, for and against, but he refuses to be drawn into such arguments, preferring not to stoke the fires that he feels that he feels are quite irrelevant and which he dismisses as “schoolboy talk”. He says that these sort arguments tend to lay false emphasis on what the people think the musicians are like-creatures an image that isn’t at all like-like. “We’re very seriously involved in what we do and try and concentrate on improving it and not having “groovy” images. We are what we are, and the only way I think we have suffered by that, is that people really don’t know us as people. It’s kind of worked the other way. “I’ve always thought that if I don’t hype and bullshit, and don’t go flashing my face around, doing the old Cadillac bit, it would be cool, and it is cool obviously, but people don’t pick up on that. They think you’re doing an out-of-the-way Greta Garbo, or something, and that’s come back on us a little”. In very much the same way as people from their individual ideas of what they want their artists to be like, they can be pretty undiscerning when it comes to live performances, willing to put up with less than one hundred percent effort or mediocre concerts: “We’ve had what we considered bad gigs, and we’ve been a little disgusted with ourselves where we’ve gone down really well, but our sole purpose isn’t just going down well at all. “If the band don’t think they’ve done well themselves, it makes you feel hollow and that there’s no reality in what you’re doing. No one’s into it as much as the musicians themselves, we’ve never played the same thing twice on stage, there has always been something a little different, but I don’t suppose anyone’s noticed”.

The understanding that Ten Years After have on stage isn’t something that has come overnight. The band has been together five years, and Alvin and bassist Leo Lyons have been playing as a teem for eleven years. This shows in their sort of “sixth sense” during the protracted jams they work on, but the obvious equality of the individual members, despite the spotlight inevitably falling on vocalist / guitarist Alvin Lee, was dented a bit recently, when a reviewer thought some of the band members might not be up to a certain musical level.

“It’s really sad,” said Alvin. “I don’t really see what is the point of taking one person out and comparing him to the others, it’s a British fad, it doesn’t happen so much in other places. Chick Churchill for instance, is probably the least spoken about, or written about musically, but he is probably the best musician in the band. It doesn’t come over because he’s not the most forward, he doesn’t play long solos, or go shrieking up and down. “He’s been playing classical piano since he was five years old, and he can bring off a quick Tchaikovsky and blow my mind. He can read and write music perfectly, which I can’t, all I’ve done is develop my own personal style, like a way of musical thinking. I don’t judge myself technically or question what I do. I just do it”. The physical strain and mental pressures on musicians, particularly those at Ten Years After’s level, where the need to be as near-perfect as possible is of prime importance, is often played down. Gruelling eleven week tours of the States and all that goes with them, creates the need for something else away from music, an escapism if you like.

Off the road it’s hard to imagine their respective forms of relaxation. People tend just to think of Alvin for instance, as a handsome dude, up on stage playing lightning licks on his Gibson, and sending the ladies into fainting fits, but his particular crouch and fits of flying hair, is another very relaxed guy, who is very much into horses.

Fresh:

“My “alter-ego,” admits Alvin, “is photography. I got more of a thrill about getting a couple of pages in “Armature Photographer” than our albums getting into the charts”. It’s all down to relaxation in one form or another, and it’s helped Ten Years After iron out a few wrinkles and smooth off a few ragged edges when they returned from their recent lay off, to face the new album with a fresh outlook. Alvin says, that moving to the house in the country helped the album called: “A Space In Time” considerably, it helped him think and also gave his song writing a freer rein. “It’s the first time I’ve had more songs than we needed, we got about seventeen tracks down. “We spent much more time producing the album, our impression before had always been, “we’ll play it in the studio, and how it sounds is how we are and that’s the truth,” which is all very well, but the ragged edges were getting more ragged, and it got to the stage where we thought, we could go and blast an album off, this time we spent more time rounding the edges off”. One of the best tracks on the album is called:

“Hard Monkeys,” which makes a very positive stand against hard drugs and it was intended to do just that. “ In the States particularly,” stated Alvin, on the subject of drug taking, “there are twelve year old kids taking heroin because of the romanticised part of it. Some of the kids, and I don’t refer to audiences as kids, but there are some in America doing it because they think Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin’s deaths were romantic and a good way to go.

Drugs:

“People associate all bands with hard drugs, and they naturally think everybody is on it, so I thought I just wanted to state that I wasn’t”. But Alvin was prepared to take it further by not wearing T-shirts proclaiming the use of drugs: “I don’t think of myself as a rock star, but there are a few who went to see the movie “Woodstock” who think we’re a “real groove” as it were, and you’ve got to be aware that there are a few you could be a very strong influence on them”. Even rock and rollers like Alvin Lee have to face the fact, that advancing years might see their hair greying, fitted shirts and tight trousers bulging, and the on-stage exertion bringing gasps for breath, so what happens at thirty-five or forty years of age for him?

Grown:

“I used to think when I was eighteen, when I blew all my lessons out to play the guitar, what I’d be doing when I was twenty-one. I’d be a fully grown man then, not a young lad with a guitar, but the whole thing has matured now anyway, and it will phase in one direction or another. I can’t say which way it will go, but the opportunity will arise for me to do different things. “I don’t think that at any point in my life, I’m going to have to say “I’m too old to play guitar, so I’ll have to do something else!” That will certainly please Ten Years After / Alvin Lee devotees and until then we can expect more urban rock to germinate in rural Berkshire, and if that isn’t a contradiction in terms, I don’t know what is.

Ten Years After - Live On Stage - Concert and Date Unknown

But Love This Beautiful Black and White Photo

Jackie Magazine, No. 407, England - October 1971

A Space In Time-was recorded at Olympic Studios - London, England and released in August 1971

The Rolling Stone Magazine Review, from October 14, 1971

“The original material and arrangements are terribly lame…As the Romans used to say…let the buyer beware…”

In another article a little more positive review:

A Space In Time was Ten Years After’s biggest commercial success. The reasons are pretty obvious; Alvin Lee’s song writing had improved markedly and there was far more stylistic variety than on their previous albums. The big hit here was “I’d Love To Change The World,” with its catchy acoustic guitar hook and immortal opening line, “Everywhere is Freaks and Harries.” Other high points include:

“Baby Won’t You Let Me Rock ‘n’ Roll You,” the bands first stab at a Stones-style raunch (complete with a riff from Led Zeppelin); the country-ish romp “Once There Was A Time”; and the gently folky and surprisingly self-deprecating “Over The Hill,” which features strings, a move that would have been unthinkable for this band a year or two earlier.

The original size of the photo above, is really just half the size of a match-book cover.

With the help of photo-shop, we were able to save this, and not let it go to waste in the dust-bin.

Guitar Player Magazine – October 1971

A Magazine For Professional and Amateur Guitarist

And into the mystical music machine were fed the following: white-covered rock and roll, black blues, Rhythm and Blues, early jazz and old licks. The reply: cannot assure success / slight loss of musical integrity / musical form and character must be raw, dense and tortured / cannot compute monetary value of Woodstock movie exposure / throbbing beat and super speed required / cross fingers and wait.

By Michael Brooks

It is easy foe fellow musicians to categorize Alvin Lee as a “Hot Licks Copy Kid,” or accuse him of sacrificing musicianship for showmanship, but seldom is his perspective sought for the rebuttal. We spoke with Alvin during a Ten Years After tour of the States, to learn his side of the story.

Alvin is not unusual as far as the wide and varied realm of guitarist backgrounds goes. He grew up in a musical family, in the small English town of Nottingham. His parents collected 78-rpm Jazz Discs from the 1930’s and 1940’s and his mother played tenor guitar. His brother took up the clarinet which induced Alvin to make a similar attempt. After playing woodwind for a year, Alvin found that the lessons were not all in vain since the instrument introduced him to the genius Charlie Christian. Alvin soon traded his clarinet for a guitar and began four months of chord lessons.

About this time, in another part of the world, a mad dog musical revolutionary entered the scene, Bill Haley and his rock-around the clock Comets. “Bill Haley was the first guitarist I had ever really listened to,” Lee recalls. Then other guitarist followed in a seemingly endless stream: Fran Beechy, Elvis Presley, Scotty Moore, Tal Farlow, Barney Kessel, Tod Dockstader, Joe Pass and of course, the European Gypsy himself Django Reinhardt. About Django, Alvin says, “I was amazed at his playing, but I really couldn’t relate to him. I really just got into his chording which tore me up.”

Young Alvin spent many hours learning the fingerboard. He used to take just a fingerboard to school each day, and while the teacher expounded facts of disinterest to the aspiring guitarist, Alvin would be working his fingers on it concealed under his desk.

So Alvin’s guitar started as a childhood hobby, with no premonition of an occupational aftermath, but at the age of sixteen the hobby became an obsession when he left school and needed a way to earn a living. His listening progressed naturally from the disk of Merle Travis, which led him into Chet Atkins, and when Chet started his classical trip, it steered Alvin into Juan Serrano. Today, (1971) he still enjoys playing Chet’s material, “but I’ve allowed my own style to interpret what I feel Chet is saying.”

Around 1964 Lee teamed up with Leo Lyons, a fellow home-towner, on bass and produced an electric trio with the addition of a drummer. The group did small-time for a few years and then went on to Hamburg, Germany, gaining pockets of fans wherever they went. While the group was going, Alvin and Leo both worked studios for existence, and then in 1967 the duo met with Ric Lee (No relation to Alvin) on drums and Chick Churchill on organ – and became “Ten Years After”.

They realized the English environment was not all that receptive to new bands, so they began endless treks across the sea to tour the United States. Today, the group performs very tightly on stage with occasional improvisatory interims, a far cry from the raunchy rock group in Hamburg.

Alvin is apparently disappointed with much of today’s audiences. Ten Years After, previously a solid underground group, has fallen from that plateau onto the fields of commercialism. Alvin feels this is not the group’s fault, but that of the masses who swarm to see the man from the “Teenage American Dream,” Woodstock, and his own ambition to please his audiences.

“We were underground, but now the whole scene has changed and we’re pop stars. Sometimes, I feel I can get away with playing just feedback,” Alvin sadly admits. Along the way, he did listen quite heavily to the sounds of other groups, and in a sense did copy some of their licks, but says, “I tried to keep them separate from my own music”. He often had misgivings about rudimental music and consciously sought to avoid playing others solos. Alvin sees his playing much like one poet reading another’s material. The poet’s style still remains legitimate if he integrates his feelings with the original author’s intentions.

Among musicians, one of the main criticisms levelled at Alvin’s playing ability is his “uncontrolled” speed, especially in the phrasing of his licks. He explains, “I’m not conscious of the speed. It’s a feeling, an emotion that my fingers lodge upon the neck and I can get fast, but it’s not my motive. My motive is displaying a voice through the fingerboard.”

To achieve his speed, Alvin used the mind-boggling method of repetition until each lick became more of a reflex than a thought. There is one point though, where his speed is a conscious thought, and that is when Alvin is producing a musical crescendo. “Then,” he says, “my style is more neurotic and is basically a fingerboard pattern from rote memory, which found its way into an explanation of how I feel the music should be”.

Alvin maintained a good balance of income and integrity as he grew in popularity. He always made it a point to keep his music valid. “If things got to commercial for me,” he says, “I just wouldn’t show up. I found that I had reached a point where, where if I tried to reach too hard, I would just become a caricature of myself, so now I am playing to myself”.

On stage Alvin Lee’s equipment is not radical for the sound he is attempting to achieve. He uses a very old Gibson 335 with a few minor changes. He has taken off the pickup covers, which he feels “brings out the trebles and the basses,” and he has inserted a Fender Stratocaster pickup wired to the back pickup closest to the bridge. He prefers reasonably high action on his instrument, which is strung with Fender thins on the top three strings and Gibson Sonomatics on the bottom. This type of string set-up affords him a heavy rhythm when he wants it and yet he is still able to hit the high licks with room for bending the notes.

With his right hand, he uses a very heavy flat pick, the three-cornered type, for that special shuffling effect. This pick also allows him to change corners when one tip breaks or wears down.

He uses a 100 watt Marshall amp, with 16 – 12” speakers in four cabinets, the reason being that he likes amplifier distortion, not speaker distortion. With the powerful Marshall and many speakers he can even get harmonic distortion. Amplifier volume settings on stage usually run from three-quarters to full to avoid distortion “dry-up” or decay. Alvin doesn’t use pedals of any sort, because he feels they only clutter up the stage.

The young Nottinghamite has become synonymous with the high speed attack. Sometimes it’s regulated and sometimes it’s not. “It all comes in different categories. It can get to the point where I don’t have control over what I am playing. I sometimes relate to other guitarist, using my own thing. I try to let it go on a natural progression, but basically it depends on the audience. Sometimes I just press notes to test or feel them out. Sometimes I can point a guitar just right towards my amp and get full harmonics. I like to contrast the high with the low as far as playing up and down the fingerboard. The basic style develops from me trying to please myself. When I get bored with what I am playing, I push on”.

A walking library of well-executed licks, Alvin has instant recall for seemingly any music he has heard or done. While he is restless enough to push on to different types of music, admittedly, he will never leave “good old rock and roll”. On stage the fanatical electricity is thought of as a “work-out,” he says, “and I never end the gig until I can sing no more”.

Like many rock guitarist, Alvin is getting into acoustical music for his own enjoyment, recently purchasing a Martin D-35, and is working through open tuning of the Mississippi derivative. He plays a stylistically unique version of Steve Stills “Black Queen” done in open D (D,A,D,D,A,D) and is getting into open G (G,B,D,G,B,D) and a dissonant-sounding open A (A,A,E,A,Db,E) – “When I’m playing for myself, I like bass string ringing in the key I am playing in,” comments Alvin.

Not uncommon in the realm of so-called stardom, Lee occasionally questions his basic musical existence. “Sometimes I get very little self-encouragement ,” he muses. “At one time I could relate to what I was doing. Now, I can’t judge if I’m doing anything very valid, I can’t judge myself. It got to a ridiculous point, that when we were rehearsing, we would do regular numbers instead of working out new tunes. We work jams and remember certain phrases, but it gets to a point where you are constantly doing old tricks on stage, with old licks and riffs.

You’ve got to get bored with that before you’ll ever end up doing something a little different. Like a show we did in Vancouver: the press later said it was something like:

“several constipated musicians and Alvin Lee is one of them”. I don’t know, maybe he’s right”.

Alvin Lee is not entirely a picture on an album cover, nor is he merely a sound in a groove; he is a man who is sensitive to the criticisms levelled at him and is not totally sure that some of the critiques are not valid. One thing for sure though, is his rejection of himself as a pop star, even though its remedy means a breach of contract. His thoughts are open, “I think it’s a kind of masochistic thing in a way, playing with the things in vogue. It’s grown on me, but I like to think of myself as a guitarist, and not as a pop star”.

He appears perplexed over the obvious similarity between “Grand Funk Railroad” and “Ten Years After”. “Grand Funk formed a cloud in my mind,” he claims, “and the guitarist plays similar things to what I play, but he doesn’t have much control”. And yet these same comments often shadow him.

Alvin’s objective is learning and living, and in that he finds consolation and creation. He realizes that “learning becomes slower as one progresses, but each new thing becomes more and more beautiful”. Even though the public sees Alvin Lee as firmly established in his style, he is continually evolving towards a greater maturity and perhaps someday full and just commendation will be given this artist within his own perspective.

October 14, 1971 - Rolling Stone Magazine

Ten Years After – A Space In Time – Album Review:

Like a hamster running on a treadmill, Ten Years After is expending energy without moving.

“A Space In Time,” is the group’s first album for Columbia Records, but it re-hashes most of the material on the last four Ten Year After releases. There are a couple of Alvin Lee guitar specials, several low key attempts at relevant social commentary, and a lot of underdeveloped and unsuccessful music. The record in an improvement over the disastrous “Watt” album, but hardly a sufficient one. The original material and arrangements are terribly lame. Vocal melodies and guitar lines are virtually indistinguishable from one song to the next, and few arrangements highlight anything besides Alvin Lee, and his two, three or four guitar parts.

Chick Churchill’s potential as an additional soloist, for example, is stupidly wasted, by having him play only rhythm accompaniment on piano and organ, behind Alvin’s numerous leads.

Although bassist Leo Lyons and drummer Ric Lee provide the band with a foundation that is both workable and firm. Ten Years After does not use this rhythmic support to the best possible advantage. There are some worth-while exceptions however:

“One Of These Days” is a compelling track with good all-round instrumentation, even if it does drag on a bit. “Hard Monkeys” and “I’d Love To Change The World” contain intriguing guitar riffs, but nothing much else of any distinction. The best piece on this album is a Chuck Berry white-wash called: “Baby Won’t You Let Me Rock and Roll You”. Ten Years After is quite adept at playing this quasi Berry stuff, but I wish they hadn’t tacked on many banal sound effects to spruce the song up.

Alvin Lee’s lyrics have always served as merely adequate vocal companions to his instrumental pyrotechnics, but the words on this album border on the senseless and inane. When Alvin sings, “got no streetcar named desire / and I’ll never light her fire” in “Hard Monkeys,” you know he doesn’t know what he’s talking about, and a poet he’s not; just listen to his attempt at a tactful metaphor in the horrendous “Over The Hill,” – “like a cripple and his crutch / I have learned a bit too much / seems that doubt (?) should never touch again”.

This song, incidentally, features a grating string quartet arrangement behind Alvin’s singing and easily rates as the group’s worst studio track.

Fans of Ten Years After will undoubtedly receive “A Space In Time” with wide open arms, but others may find the weak material and electronic Léger de main too much to bear.

Review by – John Koegel

VERONICA - October 16, 1971

October 23, 1971 - Melody Maker

Ten Years After - “A Space In Time” (Chrysalis)

Yes folks, Mr Alvin Lee and his rock and roll band pushing out the most relevant thing they’ve done to date. This album’s got the guitar and vocals of a bitchy old lady: out for trouble, and finding it. Lee is at his meanest, with guitar and vocals that don’t rely on frills nor finery, just quick fingers and a poisonous, Venemous tongue. It opens with “One Of These Days,” a rising, cosmic noise that lashes into a furious half-bop, half-boogie, taking in about every facet of Lee’s hard shifting guitar. That all melts down into “Here They Come” soft and acoustic, but with an underlying riff of menace. “I’d Love To Change The World,” is another in the more complex TYA book, with Lee adopting an almost angelic look on life, but a quick “oh yeh!” rattles it onwards.

Then there’s “Over The Hill” the most beautiful track on the album, tumbling with melody and TYA is the Last band you’d expect that from. Yeh, strings, lots of them, and it’s as commercial as you’d ever get. With the effect of somebody finding the rock and roll channel on the radio, we get the real 50’s influenced Band, “Baby Let Me Rock and Roll You,” barrel–rolling piano and Alvin on long metallic runs with echoed, gutsy vocals. Short, sweet, and just dandy. Down home blues, is here too with things like “Once There Was A Time,” which progresses from a plonking jog to another high-flying racer. This track is Alvin’s “Johnny B. Goode,” and it’s a glad one. “Let the Sky Falls,” brings an up-tempo “Love Like a Man” to mind, and like every track the presence of Lyons, Churchill and Ric Lee is more prominent, and commendable than ever before. Yeh, they can certainly play.

There’s a few things here going to surprise a lot of TYA freaks, but they’re going to like it, as are a lot of the bands critics. This is TYA experimenting, progressing, and succeeding. Our meanest rock and rollers with a good, proud album.

By R.H.

"A Space In Time" – 1971

Alvin Lee has said - “A Space In Time, is his favourite album" and some would call it a masterpiece of rock.

Ten Years After – “A Space In Time” – 1971

Columbia Records, has added to its prestige and profits by luring one of the best English rock and blues bands to its labels. Ten Years After has kept its part of the bargain with one of its most consistently excellent LP’s. No throw-away cuts here, but superb instrumental and vocal performances, especially: “Here They Come,” – “I’d Love To Change The World,” – and “One Of These Days,” – all written by lead guitarist, singer, song-writer Alvin Lee.

From Billboard Magazine 1971

Ten Years After 1971

A Space In Time; Rock and Roll Music To The World (Beat Goes On)

Not too highly regarded among incoming’s tame. Ten Years After experts, these were the band’s first albums for Chrysalis after leaving Deram. A Space In Time was their third album of 1970 and it shows. It was, however their biggest U.S. hit and sold a million there. Includes the single “Baby Won’t You Let Me Rock and Roll You”. The follow up included minor hit,

“Choo-Choo-Mama” (ah, these titles!).

German Article
Ten Years After

“A Space In Time” 1971 - (Chrysalis 6307 500)

Facts: Neue Ten Years After –LP mit zehn Titeln, wovon neun Alvin Lee und einer Lee zusammen mit Leo Lyons, Ric Lee, und Chick Churchill geschrieben hat.

Review: Wer stampfenden Rhythmus, lichtschnelle Gitarrensolos und kernige Bassstrukturen erwartet-also Rock ‚n’ Roll in wohlbekannter Ten Years After- Machart-wird vielleicht etwas enttäuscht sein. Natürlich sind das immer noch die alten Ten Years After: das dichte Schlagzeugspiel, Leos eigenwilliger Bass, Alvin’s unverkennbarer Gesang und seine einmaligen Kurz-Solis.
Aber, A Space In Time, ist dynamischer und differenzierter geraten. Streicher, akustische Gitarren, ungewohnt leichte, ruhigere Parts zeigen Ten Years After sehr verspielt. Das ist für Alvin, Leo, Ric und Chick eine wertvolle musikalische Weiterentwicklung. Ten Years After klingt so nicht weniger gut.

Single "Baby Won't You Let Me Rock'N Roll You / Once Thee Was A Time" - France

Album Review – “A Space In Time”

In which the rock heavy (Alvin Lee) comes of age with his toughest, fullest, and most coherent album. I like it, in a way, but it does lack a certain winning abandon, and I’m not crazy about the heavy’s economic theories – fellow (Alvin Lee) seems to believe that if you “tax the rich to feed the poor” – you soon run out of the rich, with dire consequences.

By Robert Christgau’s Record Guide

October 23, 1971 - New Musical Express

Ten Years After – “A Space In Time” Album Review

When I first heard this, it didn’t really grab me, but after awhile I discovered quite a lot of interest in the music. It’s well put together, but retaining a looseness here and there for improvisation. Still Ten Years After are a more important performing rock band than a recording outfit, and so compared to live appearances, this LP is just a little flat. But it does have variety, something like a worn carpet, when you can say, oh yes, I knew that bit was there, or I was expecting that – predictable !

The opening track, “One Of These Days,” has a rough rhythm and blues feel, building up rock excitement, towards the end. Then, “Here They Come” is more relaxed with gentle vocals, and so the moods go – sometimes high and pulsating, and sometimes down low (not musically speaking) when the songs just groove along. But the acoustic guitar openings did get a bit monotonous by the end of the cuts, and on “I’d Love To Change The World,” the intro brought back distant memories of the As Tears Go By pattern. It was the Ten Years After I like to hear on “Baby Won’t You Let Me Rock and Roll You,” with a gimmicky radio tuning intro. Real sweaty pigs music which no doubt gets a lot of teeth rattling in a lot of shaking heads at concerts. Except for “Uncle Jam” a revelation of Ten Years After abilities.

I was not over impressed by the second side. But the jam number, seemingly thrown in to fill up the record, is in the jazz vain, with some inventive piano playing by Chick Churchill, a solid entente between bass and drums and some fine jazz blues guitar patterns setting the mood. Perhaps the whole set would be better appreciated by a Ten Years After devotee though. – T.S.

October 23, 1971 - Record Mirror

“The Fastest Guitar in the West,”- “The Elvis Presley of the Woodstock Generation,” – “King Guitar” (Bert Weedon would dispute that – rock on Bert), these are just a few of the back-handed compliments which have been slung at the photogenic head of a man more sinned against than sinning – Alvin Lee, guitarist with Ten Years After. “I’ve never sought the super-star bit,” said Alvin, reflectively sucking on a piece liquorice wood (my misspent youth before sweets came off the ration flashed before my eyes) as he sat in the Chrysalis office considering that which has been done on him from a great height by some critics.

“Apart from anything else it is simple logic to avoid the face cult, I spent some early days working in backing groups, and I saw what happened to pop stars like Eden Kane who were up there one minute and forgotten the next. “Because I am the lead guitarist and because I stand up front, I have come in for some special attention, but I honestly believe that Chick Churchill (organist) is the best musician in our band, I just believe that so people can laugh at it if they like. “Someone has to front for the band and I have found myself edged into that situation, but I have not sought it. Rod Stewart used to make jokes about the band going to be called:

“Alvin Lee and Company” but I noticed that he has been put in the same situation with:

“The Faces,” so maybe now he understands how it can happen. The “Woodstock” film was partially responsible for some of the misconceptions about the group. We seem to have spent our playing careers trying to straighten out and de-escalate these false impressions. The film had a lot of people convinced that we were “I’m Going Home” and that old rock syndrome that went with it, but it was just one facet of the band. “I really don’t want to have to justify my position as a guitarist, but all this “Best” – “Fastest” – “Better” nonsense is ludicrous to a musician. It just cannot be said that Eric Clapton is better than Jimmy Page or someone else.

It’s a question of style and the type of music they play. “This country has always been too anxious to compare A with B and it’s really just so much schoolboy talk. Now they are currently playing the game of who is the best Beatle, it’s all so childish. Pop Polls are almost as silly and insignificant and I’m told merely reflective of what is happening in the charts at the time. “I would never have the effrontery to rank myself anywhere in a guitar poll, anyone who plays guitar and gets paid for it must be good. All I really want as a musician is recognition for the band and our music. What I don’t want, is to encourage adulation.

“The kind of thing which really brings us up, is when someone interviews us and shows that they know about our records and material. We have now got the kind of audiences who are prepared to listen and not leap around up out of their seats. We don’t want glowing reviews and glory, all we ask for is a fair hearing and some real attention. Our last tour was encouraging because it indicated that at last, that is what we are getting”.

Article by Keith Altham

October 30, 1971 - RECORD MIRROR

“A Space In Time”- Not to put to fine a point on it, Ten Years After have done it again.

The familiar recipe of blues-cum-rock will strike home as rapidly and effectively as have previous albums. “A Space In Time” is, once again, all Alvin Lee originals except for "Uncle Jam,” the closing track composed by the whole band – and they do the necessary, allowing Alvin sufficient breaks to get in his licks and his three compatriots their rock – steady backing support. Ten Years After are most emphatically NOT a hard rock band, exercising their musical prowess rather in a more restrained way, and that, perhaps, is the one drawback to this album. It lacks the fire and excitement of Ten Years After “live,” for no matter whether you like or dislike their music, you can’t argue with the fact that they are an engrossing band on stage. Lyrically and vocally, Alvin makes several salient points.

One imagines that if he set his mind to it he could write some fine ballads, but the blues is where his heart is. -----Article by B.M.

30 October 1971, Spectrum, Philadelphia - Concert Poster, Artist: Spencer Zahn

THE RELUCTANT HERO – ALVIN LEE „THEY THOUGHT I WAS DOING A GARBO“

From Melody Maker – November 6, 1971

A Super-Star sat in a darkened room and looked up with hopeful eyes. Was it a day to be on the defensive, or could he afford to relax? It was a man from the photographic magazine. So Alvin Lee could slump a little further into his chair and discuss the speed of film instead of the rate of his guitar playing. Ever since “Woodstock,” Alvin has attained the oft-mentioned special status that applies in rock as it once applied in Hollywood. He has been lauded out of proportion to his talent and slammed without fairness to his personality.

Alvin is a good, entertaining rock guitarist with an enthusiastic band who happen to be one of the longest surviving from the group-boom of the mid-sixties. Long before the United States rock press called him “Mr. Album Cover,” Alvin was down at the Marquee, in London, bringing excitement to the masses as they are today. But Alvin, Ric Lee, Leo Lyons and Chick Churchill were grooving quite happily. The attempt to make Alvin a star embarrassed him and brought confusion to the group. It almost brought them to the verge of breaking up. Moody album shots, featuring Alvin were the vogue.

“People began to think I was some kind of Greta Garbo,” grumbles Alvin in his soft Midland accent. And he refers to the “super star bit” with patient resignation.

Alvin’s great hobby is photography and he was extremely pleased and flattered that a specialist photography magazine was to (a) interview him, and (b) use his work for a photo-spread. In fact, the interviewer went on at such length, most of the staff at Chrysalis headquarters were busy listening at the keyhole in amazement. “He’s been in there for hours”!

Breathed a secretary.

Eventually the photographers friend filtered out and Alvin began to focus his attention on the subject of rock. “I’ve just got into printing,” he revealed, stretching, then burrowing further into his chair. “I’ve been taking photographs for quite awhile. I took about a thousand slides on the last tour. I think about a half a dozen came out. I’m into movies as well, and I’m hoping to get sound sync together. It’s more to entertain friends. I don’t think a public viewing is imminent ! I like to project different moods on to film and use sound effects and music to create atmosphere. Our new album is leaning that way”. What was that powerful hum at the start of the album? ! It’s backward strings over a heavy chord. The idea is to draw people into the album. People often give me the impression they review our albums from halfway through. Some of the comments have been: “There is a great rock and roll track,” which is the climax of side one. But our rock and roll stage act has been well publicised and we are trying to branch out. Rock comes easy to us, like second nature,” How did Alvin feel about his past albums? Did he ever listen to any of them? “I don’t play them usually. After I’ve finished an album I go off it. I hear all the mistakes. But after six months, if I put them on, I surprise myself! Our “Live” album is still the most satisfying. A lot of people who have come to listen to us since “Woodstock” were not familiar with what we did in our formative years, like the “Undead” album, and the jazz jams”.

What was Alvin’s image in America?

“Woodstock” freaked us out, in that it gave us an audience of youngsters who were not really into our music. And I’ve always been a bit embarrassed about the old super-star tag y’ know”. A look of yearning passed over Alvin’s not unprepossessing features, as if he would rather be pottering about in the garden, photographing small winged insects. “We try to encourage people to listen to our music and not be too pretentious about it. The main function of Ten Years After, I like to think, is to entertain, through our musical ideas. I don’t really associate with any image of Ten Years After. I’ve long ago given up trying to suss how we come over”.

Was there still friction within the band?

“It’s like married life. We’ve been through a lot of hassles and most of it was through, misunderstanding over the old super-star tag. I thought it was cool, but a lot of people got the impression I was doing a Greta Garbo and trying to be a star. But you have no control over what people think. Someone somewhere will think bad of you. I don’t think an artists will be concerned with his image if he believes in what he is doing. “I was very pleased with our last English tour. The last one we had done, the idiot dancers were all the rage and the concerts were like a big circus. On this tour I was pleased to note it was a very attentive audience. They were interested in the musical structures we were building. And it was great to have control over our equipment. You can’t just have a good P.A. these days, you have to know what you are doing. We’ve been building ours for two years. It must be very difficult to start a band these days, when the audiences hear the sophisticated equipment used by top bands.

“When we started out, the Beatles had one hundred watts. Not it’s out of all proportions. We take so long over the quality control of an LP we have to get as good a sound live. “It was a very short tour, but we were not sure how it would go down here. The reason we’ve been away so long is that we wanted to have really good equipment, like the stuff we use in the stadiums in America. There they book a PA for a concert in the same way they book a group. In England we wanted similar equipment. It was easy in the old days at the Marquee where you could get a big sound right at the back. You were practically inside the band anyway.”

I reminded Alvin of his first big concert at London’s Sayville Theatre in the days of Brian Epstein promotions. “Yeah, we did “Help Me Baby,” just one number. And it got a mixed reception. At the time, that long number seemed like the biggest mistake we have ever made!

Yeah, Jimmy James and the Vagabonds were topping.”

Did Alvin think the age of the rock guitar hero was drawing to a close? Peter Green has given up the business. Eric Clapton is hiding in obscurity. Jeff Beck has been out of action. Apart from Rory Gallagher, Alvin is still out there socking it to us, and where were the new heroes?

“It’s true that era is over. There is so much more good music now, though. We all came from the same environment and had the same influences, Scotty Moore with Elvis Presley etc. Nowadays the new guitarist have so much music to draw from it’s unfathomable. It’s incredible to me when people say rock and roll is on the way down. It’s not. The music has spread in all directions.

Why do the guitarist become so popular?

“I really don’t know. It was a kind of wave. Jimi Hendrix was the great innovator and he showed everybody the way, and how much there was to the guitar. His control of feedback was incredible”.

When Alvin took his share of fame, he took his share of criticism. How did he face up to the mixed blessings of stardom?

“Criticism is a by-product of the rock scene. Rolling Stone gave such a slamming of our last album, it was such a put down that I had to burst out laughing. It was as if they had picked on every bad thing. But I don’t have to protect myself in that way. Some people hate us, some like us, and some couldn’t care less. I’m concerned with the people who like us, and I get my feedback from them. “I used to wonder how I had crossed people that they should form such bad opinions of me. I suppose the music business has the tendency to create superstars, but I really don’t believe in such a thing. I used to when I was a kid and I was an Elvis Presley fan. Whenever I’ve met a star, they’ve turned out to be quite Norman people. And the magic doesn’t exist.

“I went to see Elvis in Las Vegas and it freaked me out badly. He was throwing teddy bears to the audience and had a supply of neck scarves he took off and threw to them, it was fifteen quid a seat and it was really disgusting. Superficially silly! The music had no balls at all, but the potential is still there. He was just coasting through his act and it seemed like it was just another gig. It can happen to any artists. We started coasting after “Woodstock,” and whatever we played went down well ! But you’ve got to hang on by your teeth and try.

“All bands should be given a chance to mature and change. And you have to follow what you feel. We are still experimenting. If I took seriously all I read about me, I’d really be in a bad state.

“As for the money, that’s a reward for perseverance. If you want to be a millionaire, don’t be a rock and roller. I remember when we overtook the Rolling Stones. It was on the M1 – and we were both in 15 cwt vans”.

By Chris Welch

1971

November 10^th – Sports Arena – San Diego, California

November 11^th - Los Angels Forum – Los Angels, California

November 12^th - Winterland, San Francisco, California

November 13^th - HIC Arena, Honolulu, Hawaii

November 16^th - Coliseum, Denver Colorado

November 18^th – Madison Square Garden, New York, New York

November 19^th - William and Mary College

November 19^th - William and Mary Hall – Wellsburg, Virginia

November 20^th - Duke University, Durham North Carolina

November 21^st – Cobo Hall, Detroit, Michigan

November 22^nd – Dune County Memorial College – Madison, Wisconsin

November 24^th – Homer Hesterly Armory, Tampa, Florida

November 25^th – Festival, Puerto-Rico

“I saw them on November 11, 1971 at the Los Angeles Forum.

The band “Yes” opened the show, J. Geils Band was next and Ten Years After were the Headliners” closing the show”.

Ten Years After:

The L.A. Forum in Inglewood, California. Ten Years After, who have been playing together for about five years, are beginning to look a little bit frayed around the edges. Make no mistake, the standing room only audience at the Forum loved them, but it appears to be a form of pre-programmed-monotony. The group members, led by singer / guitarist Alvin Lee are all excellent musicians but they are given to excess by stretching their numbers out, to the point of becoming meaningless repetition. They performed mostly older material, not really something upon much of anything from “A Space In Time,” which was a pity, as that is their most diverse album to date. They are superstars now, but for how long? If they don’t expand their musical range.

The J.Geils Band:

Boston’s J. Geils Band, certainly do know how to Rock & Roll. They are a hard pulsating group and had the audience dancing in the aisles. Lead singer Peter Wolf, a subscriber to the Jaggeresque school of movement, has a robust electrifying voice. Their set was highlighted by a knockout version of, “First I Look At The Purse” and their new single, “Looking For A Love”.

YES:

Yes, is that odd little gem of a group whose music evokes images of long ago and visions of what is yet to come. Their music is explosively powerful yet wistfully gentle; progressive rock that is classically influenced. All are highly skilled musicians and they are a joy to hear.

A special treat is lead singer Jon Anderson who has a tenderly exciting, emotion-filled voice and a jaunty stage presence. They performed a stunning set comprised chiefly of material from “The Yes Album” including their hit single “Your Move”

Review by Shelly Heber

Bill Graham presents
September - December 1971

Winterland, San Francisco, 12 November 1971

20 November, 1971, "Duke University", Cameron Indoor Stadium, Durham, North Carolina

CIRCUS MAGAZINE - November 1971

“THE´TEN YEARS AFTER MISUNDERSTANDING”

The movie “Woodstock” blinded people to what Ten Years After was all about, says Alvin Lee. Now a new album may set things straight.

Article written by Walli Elmlark

Thirteen thousand kids watched a full summer moon ascend over Gaelic Park in the Bronx N.Y. Blankets, beer, booze and smoke filled the “up” and expectant atmosphere, punctuated here and there by the cry of the vendor. No, not hot dogs and soda. mom. Those days are long gone. “Incense! All kinds of incense here.”

The occasion: Alvin Lee and Ten Years After. Alvin Lee, known as the fastest guitarist of today. But Alvin doesn’t think that’s the reason people should be coming to see him.

“I am fast “said Alvin in an office at Columbia Records. His eyes slipped to his clogs and he continues. “but I don’t aim at being fast. Fast for fast sake means nothing! I mean I could sit home all day and just practice being fast and I could play faster than I do now. But that’s not the idea, I use that fastness as a contrast, like lights and shadow.”

Alvin feels that people began to lose sight of the “lights and shadows” after the movie of Woodstock showed Ten Years After sizzling the stage with the hard lightning of “I’m Going Home.” Since then says Alvin, they’ve been met at every concert by audiences who’ve already worked themselves up to a fever pitch before anyone’s set foot on stage. But contrary to the reaction most groups would have to this instant popularity, Alvin and the boys have gotten quite unhappy about it. Alvin asked me to make it very clear, that at the time “Woodstock” came out, the group already had five albums on the market. He doesn’t think that the frantic drive of “I’m Going Home” is representative of the group’s music. He wishes now that they had hit the movie screen with something quieter, like “I Can’t Keep From Crying.” And he’d rather trade in the overheated post-Woodstock audiences for a cool, slightly reticent crowd that’s going to listen to the music before it begins to cheer.

From this one group, to whom the amount of money and the amount of screaming means absolutely nothing, unless they feel they’ve won it musically at each gig. “We could be making any amount of money at a gig, and the kids could be tearing the roof down, but if we leave the stage, feeling we were not as close to perfect as we can get, we’re depressed and upset., until the next time when we do it right!

Alvin comes close to fetishism in this need for musical perfection. “A car could run up and down his guitar, like lightening “ he said, speaking of his legendary speed . “but be missing notes very often. Fastness would mean nothing to me without accuracy.”

“As far as sets go, we know the kids are happiest hearing the songs they know best like – “Good Morning Little School Girl” and “Love Like A Man”, but that’s the easy way out. We could get up there and lead off with those songs and have the place roaring, but that’s not where we’re at. We’re constantly changing and moving ahead, and that’s the important thing. So we’ll go up there and play cuts from our new album and work for their approval”.

The group’s new album, “A Space In Time” (on their new company Columbia), will be their seventh. When asked how it differed from the others, Alvin said, “Well first of all it took literally ten times longer to record. All the others took about two weeks. This time we wanted to take our time and be really happy with the final product.”

Do you feel the extra time you took has made a substantial difference? “Very definitely. We’re quite pleased with the outcome of the album. Much more than with any other. It’s very hard to discuss it now. It seems once we’ve cut and finished an album it’s in the past and over.

Would you believe I’ve only listened to it twice since we did it?”.

“The one cut on the album that’s a total departure for us is: “Over The Hill”. For the first time we used musicians other than just the four of us. We used eight violins and four cellos. Before you think we’ve gone balmy, I better explain, that it’s a song about over saturation and the strings are brought in at the end to demonstrate our point…..definitely over saturation.

“So many producers feel the need to fill in every gap or hole in a song. We’re all for holes (smile). But we’re fortunate in that we produce ourselves and have the say over every aspect of our album, from jacket on down”. As a matter of fact Alvin has stopped shipping on the new album just because the jacket had several flaws. The blonde guitarist looked back at the carpet, then detoured from the subject of the album. “Our main concern when writing is the musical content, and the lyrics are secondary. We like to stay loose and keep the musical creativity alive. Which is why we have no set arrangements on our songs. When we’re touring we start with the basic patterns, go into a jam, then come back for the finish. That’s why we don’t get stale. But with the same song to do so often, even the jams get to sound alike after awhile. That’s why we quit touring for three months last year. Then all these rumours started going around that we’d split up. Nothing could be more wrong. We quit because we were beginning to fall into the same jam, and when that happened two nights in a row, we knew it was time to go home and work on something new.

“How do you feel about jamming with other groups”?. “I jammed once in England with Jimi Hendrix and a couple other musicians, I can’t remember just who right now, but I found it very frustrating. The problem was that each one of us had our own very definite style and it was difficult for us to mesh them all together. I’m used to jamming since that’s how we do all our songs, but we’re so together musically that everything just flows, no one cuts you off in the middle of a riff or leaves you hanging with nowhere to go. It would feel a little childish to walk up to Hendrix and say, “hey, I’m not done – wait a minute”. Also I find if I listen to another guitarist, like Eric Clapton for awhile, I’ll find myself, without consciously realizing it, playing some of his riffs. That’s not good”.

The subject of today’s guitarist brought up the question of which ones Alvin feels are the best.

“That’s really hard to answer. Guitar playing today just isn’t near what it used to be back in the blues days. Those guys were really great. They could play a twelve bar progression without repeating themselves.

What about you Alvin?.

“Well, I try. If I had to name a couple, I guess it would be George Benson and Steve Stills. Steve does some nice things”.

When the members of Ten Years After jam, they work together like the two halves of a heart. Partly because Alvin Lee and Leo Lyons have been playing together for ten years.

“Did you go to school together?” - “No”

“Were you from the same neighbourhood ?” – “No”

“Friends?” – “No”

“Enemies?” …….

“I answered an ad in a paper one day, that said lead guitar player wanted”, Alvin finally answered, his eyes retreating again to the comfort of his clogs. “Leo was in that group, which stayed together for two weeks. When they split, Leo and I stayed together. We played a few gigs as “Raving Dave and the Rocking Daddios”, Nifty, huh?” The group as it is today, has been together close to five years. Since Alvin was wearing a “Fillmore” T-Shirt and the place had been one of his favorite gigs, it seemed only appropriate to ask him how he felt about the Fillmore closing. “Actually, it didn’t come as any surprise to me. Ever since I met Bill Graham, several years ago, he’d been saying he was going to make his money, and get out. Actually, that’s not why he closed. The hassles were just getting too heavy. I respect Bill a great deal, he set up a model for giving rock concerts that was copied all over the country.

Unfortunately, they came off as copies, because not one was as professionally run, not one had the same atmosphere, and not one had the fantastic sound system that the Fillmore had.

The Fillmore Audience had changed by the time Bill closed it. Even we noticed it. To us it appeared to be a shift in age. The 18 and 19 year olds weren’t showing up anymore. It didn’t really bother us, because when you’re 18 – 19 and into rock concerts that’s great. But hopefully as you get older, your interest progress to other things.

“The majority of people in the audience seemed to be thirteen or fourteen, but that was alright with us too. Since we care so much about the musical content of our act, and very little about being pretty, or just jumping around the stage a lot, the 13 year olds are great because we can teach and guide them musically”.

“A Grand Funk Railroad will get their interest instantaneously. They’re like avant-garde art :all bold, brash, loud and one dimensional without the undertones and nuances of fine art. For us to get those thirteen and fourteen year olds to listen and understand gives us our feeling of accomplishment in music. “We can’t stand hype or sensationalism. That’s why we give so few interviews. Also, we absolutely refuse to do any television, even though it guarantees record sales. (We’ve never had a gold record you know) That’s just not our way of doing things”.

Which brought up the problem of a movie called “Groupies”. There the filmmakers not only put Ten Years After on the screen, but they gave the impression that the group spends half of its time luring little girls away from home, then dropping them off in the middle of nowhere.

“Yes, well that was a mistake” said Alvin. “Actually we were misled by the producer. We were told it was to be a documentary called “Rock 70”. “Let me just say this”, interjected Leo Lyons, breaking his long silence. “It’s unfortunate that our music had to be associated with such crap”. “Since that word has arisen of its own accord, I’d like to set the record straight”. Alvin said. “On a rumour I’ve been hearing about, I am not now, nor have I ever been married. I also do not have the child or children, I am reported to be hiding. “It’s incredible what one learns about oneself that one never knew”. One thing few people know about Alvin Lee, is that he is quiet, soft spoken and verges on outright shy. When he talks, his eyes look aside to the carpet, the desk where his coffee sits, or the wall across from him. Then, suddenly, he looks directly at you, and through his eyes are small, a blast of blue sunshine smiles from them and you find you’re smiling back. When the questions are over, he slips into an almost bashful silence, and it’s hard to realize he’s the same Alvin Lee who, when he left the stage at Gaelic Park, had to be protected by ten body guards to keep the screaming mobs away.

BRAVO 1971

November 1971 - Musik Express Magazine, The Netherlands

One of my favorite "on stage" photos of Ten Years After - 1971 - With conga drums for
Chick Churchill to bang on!

Ten Years After hit their peak. "It really was a heads down let's go for it attitude.
Leo used to shake his head off", says "Captain Speedfingers" Lee.

Deutschlandhalle, Berlin 1971

Rock & Folk No. 59, December 1971

New Musical Express December 25, 1971

NME - London Special Issue NME - Standard Issue

New Musical Express – Around London - December 25, 1971 – Stroll On:

Pushing my way through the Christmas shopping crush at Oxford Circus tube last week, who should I meet pushing in the opposite direction but carol Grimes of Uncle Dog. The now Uncle Dog album, she told me, is almost completed. “We’ve got some very good session musicians playing with us…Paul Kossoff, David Linley, and Nicky Barclay, Fanny’s organist… and Bob Porter, and the guy who did so much for Bell and Arc, is producing it”.

When I got back to my office, I rang Lionel Conway, whose company publishes Uncle Dog’s music and who generally looks after the affairs of the group. So far, he hasn’t signed them to a label, but already he has had plenty of offers. “Just a question of sorting the wheat from the chaff,” he told me. The group is doing very well at the moment, drawing fantastic crowds to every performance”. New Years gigs for Uncle Dog include the Greyhound in Croydon on January 2^nd , High Wycombe Town Hall on the 7^th Implosion on the 9^th, and on the 13^th they are at the Marquee. Uncle Dog are an exceptional band. If you are free on one or all of those dates, a journey to visit them would be well worth taking.

A few years ago B.P. Fallon, T. Rex’s publicist gave me a very beautiful album, which I still have in my collection. It’s called, “The Playboy Of The Western World”. Sean O´ Riada who died a few months ago, wrote it as the score to a film of the same name. The music is from Ireland and is very traditional, lots of pipes, hand-drums and double-row button accordions, and of course, two “very fine” fiddles. Some of the numbers have vocals, and one in particular, the last on the first side, is an Irish jig that makes East Of Eden’s “Jig-A-Jig sound very watery. Though the album is very easy to purchase in Ireland, it is much more difficult to obtain in this country (England). However, there is a record shop at 161Arlington Road, Camden Town, called The Irish Record Centre. The lady who runs it is called Kay and she told me she has hundreds of excellent Irish records, besides Sean O´Riada and invites you to come and have a look. If you want to make sure a particular record is in stock, please call ahead first.

Last Tuesday, I rang Alvin Lee, who had just returned from another American trip, to find out how he was and what was happening with him and his lovely lady Lorraine. “Everything’s fine,” said our Alvin. “Ten Years After are going to France in January 1972, for some recordings, and we’re planning a production company of our own, producing groups and singers that we like, but so far it’s only in the talking stage”. It was Alvin’s 27^th birthday last week. December 19, 1971.

By Count Simon Christian Dominic Huchet De La Bedoyere

Ten Years After Equipment (1971)

PA:
5 - 100 watt Marshall amplifiers
12 - 100 watt Marshall cabinets
1 Fender twin Reverb
2 Acoustic 360E bass amplifiers
2 Lashramme speaker cabinets each containing 36 - 4/12 in. speakers, handling capacity per cabinet 560 watts rms.
4 A7 Bass Reflex cabinets 1 - 15in speaker per cabinet, handling 35 watts per speaker.
10 SRO speaker cabinets 2 - 12in speakers per cabinet, handling capacity 60 watts per speaker.
2 SRO speaker cabinets 2 - 15in speakers per cabinet, handling capacity 65 watts per cabinet
1 Teletronix leveling amplifier LA2A.
3 Crown DC 300 amplifiers, each Crown has a stereo amplifier of 300 watts per channel rms.

GUITARS:
1 Fender Stratocaster guitar.
2 Gibson 335 stereo (1 cherry red,
1 sand color) guitars.
1 Eko 12-string Ranger guitar.
1 Fender Telecaster bass guitar.
1 Rickenbacker bass guitar.

STRINGS:
fender/Gibson Sonomatic mixed strings.
Labella heavy guage bass strings.

ORGANS/PIANOS:
1 Hammond M102 organ
2 Hammond B3 organs
1 RMI 300B electric piano
1 Steinway grande piano

MICROPHONES:
6 ShureUnisphere 565
5 Shure Unidyne III
1 Beyer 260
1 Electro Voice
12 AKG microphone stands

DRUMS:
2 Gretsch drum kits:
1 Gretsch Black Pearl drum kit consisting of:
1 - 24" x 14" bass drum
1 - 61/2" x 14" snare drum
1 - 13" x 9" top Tom Tom
2 - 16" x 16" side Tom Toms
1 Gretsch Maple Wood drum kit consisting of:
1 - 20" x 14" bass drum
1 - 5" x 14" snare drum
1 - 12" x 8" top Tom Tom
1 - 14" x 14" side Tom Tom

CYMBALS:
2 Avedis Zildjian cymbals
2 - 15" Avedis Zildjian Hi-Hats
4 - 16" Avedis Zildjian crash cymbals
2 - 19" Avedis Zildjian ride cymbals
1 Hi-Hat Ching-ring