They helped to spearhead the British blues growth earlier than taking a flip into rock’s left-field for a quartet of traditional albums. They bolstered their sound with Mellotron and synth. They even recruited the drummer from Egg. In 2020 Prog requested the late Tony McPhee: how prog have been The Groundhogs?
Shaped in 1963, and a part of the primary wave of the British blues growth, the Groundhogs initially got here to public consideration as John Lee Hooker’s backing band when the veteran bluesman paid a go to to the UK in 1964. Extra gigs adopted with Jimmy Reed and Champion Jack Dupree, and in 1968 they have been signed to Liberty Data by future Wombles supremo Mike Batt. Nonetheless, it wasn’t lengthy earlier than the band have been embracing the brand new progressive aesthetic with their 1969 album, Blues Obituary, proclaiming in no unsure phrases a transfer away from blues purism in direction of a extra experimental course.
The Groundhogs are a traditional instance of a band who integrated progressive components into their music whereas retaining their core sound; a course of that was rife within the early Nineteen Seventies. Consider exhausting rock’s massive three on the time – Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple and Black Sabbath – after which take into account Stairway To Heaven, Baby In Time and Wheels Of Confusion.
However below the management of singer and guitarist Tony McPhee, the Groundhogs pushed out additional than most. Specifically, the 4 albums they recorded between 1970 and 1972 – Thank Christ For The Bomb, Split, Who Will Save The World? and Hogwash – noticed them changing into more and more bold, each compositionally and conceptually, with the deployment of Mellotron and synth serving to to create an thrilling progressive/blues rock hybrid.
Wanting again, McPhee isn’t totally positive how the progressive affect seeped in: “As a jobbing musician, there was little time to comply with others,” he says. ”We have been gigging consistently, so if it wasn’t on the automobile radio, we hardly bought to listen to it.” However he was decided to maneuver the Groundhogs ahead: “I’ve all the time appreciated getting into new instructions away from ‘the group’ – the blues might be limiting to an extent, and I wished to discover.”
Working as an influence trio of McPhee, bassist Pete Cruickshank and drummer Ken Pustelnik, the band have been decided to make a press release with their 1970 album. “The title got here from a dialogue with Roy Fisher, Groundhogs’ supervisor on the time. John Lennon had stated that The Beatles have been greater than Jesus and bought loads of publicity, so we have been attempting to think about one thing that was as contentious as that. Roy stated, ‘Thank Christ for the bomb,’ and all of it clicked in my head.”
McPhee set about writing a set of songs filled with contrasting riffs and chords – nonetheless recognisably blues rock, however skewed into dynamic new shapes. The lyrics have been additionally a serious advance from conventional rock’n’roll platitudes; the primary facet of the album relies across the theme of alienation, whereas the second tells the story of a wealthy man who renounces his standing and embraces poverty as a substitute.
Soldier deftly portrays the brutalising results of struggle, set to an irresistibly catchy riff: “We actually bought our increase when John Peel performed Soldier on his programme, he appreciated the track and the lyrical complexity.”
Thank Christ For The Bomb bought to No.9 within the UK charts, and considerably raised the Groundhogs’ profile. They began enjoying alongside most of the period’s rising prog bands, together with Yes, Curved Air, Gentle Giant and Colosseum – though McPhee admits: “I wasn’t enamoured by among the bands within the progressive scene at the moment. I didn’t just like the mushy, fluffy sound that they produced.” As an alternative, he drew inspiration from the darker, edgier sounds of teams akin to King Crimson.
The Groundhogs have been one of many coterie of underground bands on the Liberty/United Artists roster, which included Hawkwind, Man, Can and Amon Düül II. McPhee remembers an incident at a competition in Hamburg: “We opened the van and far to our shock, it was crammed with a load of Orange gear, which wasn’t ours. The document firm had purchased it for Amon Düül II as a result of VAT was cheaper within the UK than in Germany.
”They got here and whisked it away; however after they performed, they overran their time slot a lot that the Groundhogs didn’t get to play. Not solely had we unknowingly acted as a free taxi for his or her gear, however we’d pushed all the best way to Hamburg with out enjoying the gig!”
The primary facet, and four-part title monitor, of their 1971 album Break up was one other conceptual piece, this time targeted on psychological breakdown and schizophrenia. The lyrics have been based mostly on a daunting expertise McPhee himself had lived via. Having beforehand smoked hashish to no in poor health impact, he remembers politely accepting a joint: “It was the beginning of a nightmare.
“I suffered what I now name my ‘aberration.’ The day had been sizzling and I’d bought burnt within the park – a mixture of heatstroke and hashish led to a month of terror and confusion. Writing about it in all probability helped work my approach via it, though I bought nervousness flashbacks for a very long time afterwards. I by no means touched medication once more.”
Constructing on their recognition as an explosive stay act, and coming off the again of opening for the Rolling Stones on their 1971 UK tour, Split was the Groundhogs’ most profitable album, peaking at No.5 within the UK charts. One other set of spiky, twisting songs, it consists of their most well-known monitor, the punk blues stomp of Cherry Crimson – from the place the document label takes its title – which, regardless of not being launched as a single, even secured them a slot on Prime Of The Pops. However McPhee had greater aspirations in thoughts.
Who Will Save The World? is the place their prog inclinations actually grew to become obvious – simply take heed to the jazzy riffs and dramatic Mellotron of Earth Is Not Room Sufficient and Music Is The Meals Of Thought. It’s one other loosely conceptual album, addressing the varied evils threatening the world – overpopulation, struggle, massive enterprise…
However its presentation was something however po-faced, with DC and Marvel Comics’ artist Neal Adams introduced in to create a fold-down caricature sleeve, with the band reimagined as superhero troup The Mighty Groundhogs. “I used to be an enormous fan of Silver Surfer, as drawn by Neal,” says McPhee. “As soon as I noticed the art work he’d provide you with, I wished to jot down all of the songs to hyperlink with it.”
Regardless of attending to No.8 within the UK charts, it bought a decidedly frosty reception in comparison with their earlier albums. “A whole lot of followers and the press didn’t prefer it. To be sincere, it was rushed – I by no means had the time to work on the manufacturing and even take into consideration what we have been enjoying, and I agreed with them for some time.
”It was just a few years later, once I may take heed to it objectively, that I realised its strengths. Now we regularly get folks saying it’s their favorite album.”
He continued to take the band in a extra progressive course, including an ARP 2600 synthesiser to their musical armoury. And following the departure of Pustelnik, the band’s new drummer was none apart from Clive Brooks from Canterbury scene stalwarts Egg, who had supported the Groundhogs on tour.
“Clive was a beautiful man and there was so much much less stress concerned with getting collectively on time, enjoying and touring,” says McPhee. “He was a robust participant who suited the instances and the brand new materials I used to be writing.”
That materials would emerge on the good Hogwash, the band’s most overtly progressive album. Not solely are Mellotron and synth extra to the fore than ever – particularly on You Had A Lesson and Earth Shanty – however the intelligent preparations and segues between songs make for a genuinely refined and highly effective listening expertise.
McPhee’s lyrics are additionally a few of his most difficult. As an example, opener I Love Miss Ogyny is a chilling depiction of home abuse from the viewpoint of the abuser, the track’s stop-start dynamic reflecting its dysfunctional theme.
Alas, the general public weren’t receptive to McPhee’s more and more outré tackle blues rock, and Hogwash didn’t chart. It additionally proved to be their final album for United Artists, with the band signing to WWA, the short-lived label arrange by Black Sabbath’s administration workforce. They launched the album Strong in 1974 – which, because the title suggests, was a retreat from the extra expansive sound of Hogwash – earlier than splitting up for the primary time the next yr.
Earlier than that had come the apogee of McPhee’s experimental impulses, with the 1973 launch of his first solo album, The Two Sides Of Tony (T.S.) McPhee. On one facet was a group of folks blues numbers, and on the opposite an avant-garde digital symphony entitled The Hunt, carried out on the ARP 2600 and a Rhythm Ace drum machine, which nonetheless sounds fully on the market at this time.
“I’d been utilizing the ARP 2600 throughout gigs for the Hogwash tour and wished to discover its potential,” he remembers. ”It additionally gave me a possibility to specific my loathing for individuals who hunt foxes. I stand by what I stated then – there are nonetheless loads of conceited individuals who get a kick out of cruelty.”
The Groundhogs might have existed on the periphery of the prog world, however the best way the style knowledgeable their music within the early 70s is a captivating instance of cultural cross-fertilisation.
And whereas they by no means fairly made it into rock’s premier league, they launched among the period’s most revolutionary and thrilling albums – they usually retain a loyal fanbase to at the present time, with their better-known admirers together with Captain Sensible, Julian Cope, Pavement’s Stephen Malkmus, QOTSA’s Josh Homme and Underworld’s Karl Hyde.
Fireplace Data are holding the band’s legacy alive with an ongoing reissue programme of their traditional Liberty/UA albums, in full session with McPhee. Hopefully, a brand new technology of followers would possibly uncover one of the crucial distinctive bands that Britain has ever produced. As he humbly concludes: “It’s gratifying to suppose that folks regard the music as nonetheless being related.”