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Daevid Allen
Christopher David Allen (13 January 1938 – 13 March 2015), known professionally as Daevid Allen, sometimes credited as Divided Alien, was an Australian musician. He was co-founder of the psychedelic rock groups Soft Machine (in the UK, 1966) and Gong (in France, 1967).McFarlane, 1999, Biography Early years In 1960, inspired by the Beat Generation writers he had discovered while working in a Melbourne bookshop, Allen travelled to Paris, where he stayed at the Beat Hotel, moving into a room recently vacated by Allen Ginsberg and Peter Orlovsky. While selling the '' International Herald Tribune'' around Le Chat Qui Pêche and the Latin Quarter, he met Terry Riley and also gained free access to the jazz clubs in the area. In 1961 Allen travelled to England and rented a room at Lydden, near Dover, where he soon began to look for work as a musician. He first replied to a newspaper advertisement for a guitar player to join Dover-based group the Rolling Stones (no connection w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gong (band)
Gong are a progressive rock band that incorporates elements of jazz and space rock into their musical style. The group was formed in Paris in 1967 by Australian musician Daevid Allen and English vocalist Gilli Smyth. Band members have included Didier Malherbe, Pip Pyle, Steve Hillage, Mike Howlett, Pierre Moerlen, Bill Laswell and Theo Travis. Others who have played on stage with Gong include Don Cherry, Chris Cutler, Bill Bruford, Brian Davison, Dave Stewart and Tatsuya Yoshida. Gong's 1970 debut album, ''Magick Brother'', featured a psychedelic pop sound. By the following year, the second album, ''Camembert Electrique'', featured the more psychedelic rock/space rock sound with which they would be most associated. Between 1973 and 1974, Gong released their best known work, the allegorical ''Radio Gnome Invisible'' trilogy, describing the adventures of Zero the Hero, the Good Witch Yoni and the Pot Head Pixies from the Planet Gong. In 1975, Allen and Smyth left the band, whi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Latin Quarter
The Latin Quarter of Paris (french: Quartier latin, ) is an area in the 5th and the 6th arrondissements of Paris. It is situated on the left bank of the Seine, around the Sorbonne. Known for its student life, lively atmosphere, and bistros, the Latin Quarter is the home to a number of higher education establishments besides the university itself, such as : * Paris City University (with the Faculté de Médecine de Paris) ; * Sorbonne University (with Sorbonne and Jussieu university campus) * PSL University (with the École Normale Supérieure - PSL and the École des Mines de Paris - PSL campuses) ; * the lycée Henri-IV, the lycée Louis-le-Grand and the lycée Saint-Louis, known as les trois lycées de la montagne * Panthéon-Assas University ; * Panthéon-Sorbonne University (with the École de droit de la Sorbonne) ; * the Collège de France ; * and the Schola Cantorum. Other establishments such as the École Polytechnique have relocated in recent times to mor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wilde Flowers
The Wilde Flowers were an English psychedelic rock band from Canterbury, Kent. Formed in 1964, the group originally featured lead vocalist Kevin Ayers, lead guitarist and co-lead vocalist Brian Hopper, rhythm guitarist and vocalist Richard Sinclair, bassist Hugh Hopper and drummer Robert Wyatt. Despite not releasing any material during their brief three-year tenure, the band are generally considered to be the originators of the Canterbury scene. After their breakup in 1969, the group's members went on to form numerous key bands within the scene, including Soft Machine, Caravan and Camel. History After several years of jamming together, the Wilde Flowers were officially formed in 1964 by lead vocalist Kevin Ayers, lead guitarist, saxophonist and vocalist Brian Hopper, rhythm guitarist and vocalist Richard Sinclair, bassist and saxophonist Hugh Hopper, and drummer and vocalist Robert Wyatt. The group performed a series of live shows before their first recording session in March 1 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Soft Machine
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the most frequently used word in the English language; studies and analyses of texts have found it to account for seven percent of all printed English-language words. It is derived from gendered articles in Old English which combined in Middle English and now has a single form used with pronouns of any gender. The word can be used with both singular and plural nouns, and with a noun that starts with any letter. This is different from many other languages, which have different forms of the definite article for different genders or numbers. Pronunciation In most dialects, "the" is pronounced as (with the voiced dental fricative followed by a schwa) when followed by a consonant sound, and as (homophone of pronoun ''thee'') when followed by a v ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mike Ratledge
Michael Roland Ratledge (born 6 May 1943) is a British musician. A part of the Canterbury scene, he was a founding member of Soft Machine. He was the last founding member to leave the group, doing so in 1976. Biography and career Ratledge was born in Maidstone, Kent, the son of a Canterbury secondary modern school headmaster. As a child, he was educated in classical music, the only kind of music played in his parents' home. He learned to play the piano, and with his friend Brian Hopper, whom he had met at Simon Langton Grammar School for Boys in Canterbury, played classical piano and clarinet pieces. Ratledge also met Brian's younger brother Hugh, and Robert Wyatt. In 1961, he met Daevid Allen, who interested them in playing jazz. Through Cecil Taylor's piano pieces Ratledge became familiar with the music of Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis and John Coltrane. In 1963, he played in the Daevid Allen Trio. Unlike his friends, Ratledge wanted to further his education, and studied at Un ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kevin Ayers
Kevin Ayers (16 August 1944 – 18 February 2013) was an English singer-songwriter who was active in the English psychedelic music movement. Ayers was a founding member of the psychedelic band Soft Machine in the mid-1960s, and was closely associated with the Canterbury scene. He recorded a series of albums as a solo artist and over the years worked with Brian Eno, Syd Barrett, Bridget St John, John Cale, Elton John, Robert Wyatt, Andy Summers, Mike Oldfield, Nico and Ollie Halsall, among others. After living for many years in Deià, Mallorca, he returned to the United Kingdom in the mid-1990s before moving to the south of France. His last album, '' The Unfairground'', was released in 2007. The British rock journalist Nick Kent wrote: "Kevin Ayers and Syd Barrett were the two most important people in British pop music. Everything that came after came from them." Biography Early life Ayers was born in Herne Bay, Kent, the son of BBC producer Rowan Ayers. Following his parents ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Ticket That Exploded
''The Ticket That Exploded'' is a 1962 novel by American author William S. Burroughs, published by Olympia Press and later by Grove Press in 1967. Together with '' The Soft Machine'' and ''Nova Express'' it is part of a trilogy, referred to as ''The Nova Trilogy'', created using the cut-up technique, although for this book Burroughs used a variant called 'the fold-in' method. The novel is an anarchic tale concerning mind control by psychic, electronic, sexual, pharmaceutical, subliminal, and other means. Passages from the other two books and even from this book show up in rearranged form and are often repeated. This work is significant for fans of Burroughs, in that it describes his idea of language as a virus and his philosophy of the cut-up technique. William S. Burroughs and the Language of Cyberpunk by Brent Wood Science Fiction Studies #68 = Volume 23, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Wyatt
Robert Wyatt (born Robert Wyatt-Ellidge, 28 January 1945) is a retired English musician. A founding member of the influential Canterbury scene bands Soft Machine and Matching Mole, he was initially a kit drummer and singer before becoming paraplegic following an accidental fall from a window in 1973, which led him to abandon band work, explore other instruments, and begin a forty-year solo career. A key player during the formative years of British jazz fusion, psychedelia and progressive rock, Wyatt's own work became increasingly interpretative, collaborative and politicised from the mid-1970s onwards. His solo music has covered a particularly individual musical terrain ranging from covers of pop singles to shifting, amorphous song collections drawing on elements of jazz, folk and nursery rhyme. Wyatt retired from his music career in 2014, stating "there is a pride in topping I don't want he musicto go off." He is married to English painter and songwriter Alfreda Benge. Earl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Free Jazz
Free jazz is an experimental approach to jazz improvisation that developed in the late 1950s and early 1960s when musicians attempted to change or break down jazz conventions, such as regular tempos, tones, and chord changes. Musicians during this period believed that the bebop, hard bop, and modal jazz that had been played before them was too limiting. They became preoccupied with creating something new and exploring new directions. The term "free jazz" has often been combined with or substituted for the term "avant-garde jazz". Europeans tend to favor the term "free improvisation". Others have used "modern jazz", "creative music", and "art music". The ambiguity of free jazz presents problems of definition. Although it is usually played by small groups or individuals, free jazz big bands have existed. Although musicians and critics claim it is innovative and forward-looking, it draws on early styles of jazz and has been described as an attempt to return to primitive, often re ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sun Ra
Le Sony'r Ra (born Herman Poole Blount, May 22, 1914 – May 30, 1993), better known as Sun Ra, was an American jazz composer, bandleader, piano and synthesizer player, and poet known for his experimental music, "cosmic" philosophy, prolific output, and theatrical performances. For much of his career, Ra led "The Arkestra", an ensemble with an ever-changing name and flexible line-up. Born and raised in Alabama, Blount became involved in the Chicago jazz scene during the late 1940s. He soon abandoned his birth name, taking the name Le Sony'r Ra, shortened to Sun Ra (after Ra, the Egyptian god of the Sun). Claiming to be an alien from Saturn on a mission to preach peace, he developed a mythical persona and an idiosyncratic credo that made him a pioneer of Afrofuturism. Throughout his life he denied ties to his prior identity saying, "Any name that I use other than Ra is a pseudonym." His widely eclectic and avant-garde music echoed the entire history of jazz, from ragtime and ea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William S
William is a male given name of Germanic origin.Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 276. It became very popular in the English language after the Norman conquest of England in 1066,All Things William"Meaning & Origin of the Name"/ref> and remained so throughout the Middle Ages and into the modern era. It is sometimes abbreviated "Wm." Shortened familiar versions in English include Will, Wills, Willy, Willie, Bill, and Billy. A common Irish form is Liam. Scottish diminutives include Wull, Willie or Wullie (as in Oor Wullie or the play ''Douglas''). Female forms are Willa, Willemina, Wilma and Wilhelmina. Etymology William is related to the given name ''Wilhelm'' (cf. Proto-Germanic ᚹᛁᛚᛃᚨᚺᛖᛚᛗᚨᛉ, ''*Wiljahelmaz'' > German ''Wilhelm'' and Old Norse ᚢᛁᛚᛋᛅᚼᛅᛚᛘᛅᛋ, ''Vilhjálmr''). By regular sound changes, the native, inherited English form of the name shoul ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Neil Landon
Neil Landon (born Patrick Cahill, 26 July 1941 – 26 March 2020) was an English singer, who has been credited with singing on a number of hits in the UK Singles Chart. In addition, he was a singer and songwriter with the band Fat Mattress, which he co-founded with guitarist/singer Noel Redding. Biography Born in Petworth, Sussex, England, and later based in Folkestone, England, Landon started singing and playing semi-professionally under his real name of Pat Cahill in 1960, replacing Kitson 'Kit' Keen in the Dover based 'Rolling Stones' (no connection with the later famous band of that name). When he left to front the 'Cheetahs' (1961–62), he was replaced by Mick Morris (later of Mirkwood). After adopting the name Neil Landon, he joined Folkestone group the 'Burnettes' (1962–65), in which Noel Redding became lead guitarist and Pete Kircher, the drummer. In 1965 Landon released two singles, "Waiting Here For Someone" b/w "I've Got Nothing To Lose" (Decca F 12330) an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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