Spring were an English

progressive rock Progressive rock (shortened as prog rock or simply prog; sometimes conflated with art rock) is a broad genre of rock music that developed in the United Kingdom and United States through the mid- to late 1960s, peaking in the early 1970s. Init ...

band from Leicester. They released only one album in their career, a self-titled LP in 1971. Spring's music is notable for the use of the

mellotron The Mellotron is an electro-mechanical musical instrument developed in Birmingham, England, in 1963. It is played by pressing its keys, each of which pushes a length of magnetic tape against a capstan, which pulls it across a playback head. A ...

with three of its five members credited with playing that instrument on the album. Songs for a second album were recorded but not released at the time. They were later released on CD together with some demos as ''Untitled 2'', as a bonus CD on the Esoteric CD release of 2015, and as a bootleg vinyl album ''Spring 2'' (with Roger Dean cover). Three of the tracks were used as bonus on the single CD edition of the first album.

Members

Spring originally consisted of Pat Moran (vocals), Ray Martinez (guitars), Kips Brown (keyboards),

Pick Withers David "Pick" Withers (born 4 April 1948) is an English rock and jazz drummer. He was the original drummer of rock band Dire Straits and played on their first four albums, which included hit singles such as " Sultans of Swing", " Romeo and Jul ...

(drums) and Adrian Maloney (bass), Denis Nolan (lead) all of whom had previously played in various local Leicester bands. A turning point in Spring's fortunes happened after a gig in Cardiff, when the band's van broke down somewhere in the Welsh countryside, coincidentally very near where producer/engineer Kingsley Ward had recently set up Rockfield Studios. Ward would later marvel at the "coincidence of meeting a group with a broken down truck in your own home town when you have previously spent months traipsing around the country in search of talent". He was particularly intrigued by the fact that they owned a mellotron, and "invited them down the following week for an audition with my brother Charles and myself", the outcome of which was "good enough for us to want to be involved with them". Several demo sessions followed. The band were rehearsing at Rockfield when producer Gus Dudgeon (of

David Bowie David Robert Jones (8 January 194710 January 2016), known professionally as David Bowie ( ), was an English singer-songwriter and actor. A leading figure in the music industry, he is regarded as one of the most influential musicians of the ...

and

Elton John Sir Elton Hercules John (born Reginald Kenneth Dwight; 25 March 1947) is a British singer, pianist and composer. Commonly nicknamed the "Rocket Man" after his 1972 hit single of the same name, John has led a commercially successful career a ...

fame) dropped by to check the studio out, heard them play and expressed interest in producing them. A few months later, sessions took place at both Rockfield and London's Trident Studios, and the resulting album was released on the RCA/Neon label in 1971. In spite of supporting Velvet Underground on a UK tour, plus Keith Christmas and The Sutherland Brothers on various dates, the band broke up in 1972 following aborted attempts at recording a second album. Two previously unreleased songs from these sessions (featuring new bassist Peter Decindis) appeared on The Laser's Edge's 1992 CD reissue of the album, along with "Fool's Gold" from the first album sessions. Moran later worked as sound engineer at Rockfield Studios, notably for

Van der Graaf Generator Van der Graaf Generator are an English progressive rock band, formed in 1967 in Manchester by singer-songwriters Peter Hammill and Judge Smith, Chris Judge Smith and the first act signed by Charisma Records. They did not experience much commerc ...

and

Robert Plant Robert Anthony Plant (born 20 August 1948) is an English singer and songwriter, best known as the lead singer and lyricist of the English rock band Led Zeppelin for all of its existence from 1968 until 1980, when the band broke up following the ...

; he died in early 2011. Martinez became an in-demand session guitarist, working with the likes of Alkatraz, Michael Chapman, Gypsy, Tim Rose and Robert Plant. He also wrote Cliff Richard's 1982 hit " The Only Way Out".

later became the drummer for

Dire Straits Dire Straits were a British rock band formed in London in 1977 by Mark Knopfler (lead vocals and lead guitar), David Knopfler (rhythm guitar and backing vocals), John Illsley (bass guitar and backing vocals) and Pick Withers (drums and percuss ...

, playing on their first four records. Kips Brown became a session musician, playing with

Andy Fairweather Low Andrew Fairweather Low (born 2 August 1948) is a Welsh guitarist and singer. He was a founding member and lead singer of 1960s pop band Amen Corner (band), Amen Corner, and in recent years has toured extensively with Roger Waters, Eric Clapton ...

and others, and was in a later band called Wellington. Adrian Moloney returned to the Midlands, where he worked alongside several well-known artists and groups. A solo career as a jobbing musician and minor impresario took him all over the Midlands, and also to Tenerife for several summer seasons. He was working right up to his death in 2010. Pat Moran became a notable record producer and worked with

Lou Gramm Lou Gramm (born Louis Andrew Grammatico; 2 May 1950) is an American singer-songwriter, best known for being the lead singer of the rock band Foreigner from 1977 to 1990 and 1992 to 2003 during which time the band had numerous successful albu ...

, Robert Plant, Iggy Pop, Edie Brickell and the new Bohemians, as well as many others. On 25 May 2015, a double CD of Spring was released on Esoteric Records, a part of Cherry Red Records.

Spring's self-titled album

Track listing

All tracks written by Spring. # "The Prisoner (Eight By Ten)" - (5:34) # "Grail" - (6:44) # "Boats" - (1:53) # "Shipwrecked Soldier" - (5:08) # "Golden Fleece" - (6:59) # "Inside Out" - (4:49) # "Song To Absent Friends (The Island)" - (2:47) # "Gazing" - (5:54) #*The following three tracks were added in the CD edition # "Fools Gold" (1st album outtake) # "Hendre Mews" (from unreleased 2nd LP) # "A World Full Of Whispers" (from unreleased 2nd LP)

Personnel

* Pat Moran -

vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or without ...

* Ray Martinez - 6- and 12-string guitars,

* Kips Brown -

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

organ Organ may refer to: Biology * Organ (biology), a part of an organism Musical instruments * Organ (music), a family of keyboard musical instruments characterized by sustained tone ** Electronic organ, an electronic keyboard instrument ** Hammond ...

* Adrian "Bone" Maloney - bass *

drums A drum kit (also called a drum set, trap set, or simply drums) is a collection of drums, cymbals, and other Percussion instrument, auxiliary percussion instruments set up to be played by one person. The player (drummer) typically holds a pair o ...

glockenspiel The glockenspiel ( or , : bells and : set) or bells is a percussion instrument consisting of pitched aluminum or steel bars arranged in a keyboard layout. This makes the glockenspiel a type of metallophone, similar to the vibraphone. The glo ...

Reception

Paul Stump's 1997 ''History of Progressive Rock'' describes the band as "over-rated", while acknowledging that their sole released album has some merits: "... its spacious and supple musical explorations into relatively sedate artistic territory (undemonstratively poppish motifs, textbook rock solo developments) possess an emotional punch lent by the tasteful use of Mellotron, showcasing one of the most notable deployments of the instrument anywhere on record."

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Spring English progressive rock groups