Celebrating the “Spirit of the Age”!
Written by author on August 23, 2015
With Classic Jams off the air for a short break, Harry Thomson will be celebrating the 74th birthday of space-rock legend Dave Brock, leader of Hawkwind, with a 2-hour special on Monday 24 August. Formed in the heady days of the underground movement in late 60s Ladbroke Grove, Hawkwind have been influential on a myriad of movements, from punk, through the New Wave of British Heavy Metal to 90s dance, and beyond. Staring his career in jazz bands during the British Jazz Revival in the late 50s, and playing at Eel Pie Island with the young Eric Clapton, Brock came to prominence as a busker alongside the likes of Don Partridge, but it was when he teamed up with Nik Turner, Terry Ollis, Dik Mik and Mick Slattery as Hawkwind that he took his place in the centre of a musical revolution.
Though troubling the charts only with their 1972 hit “Silver Machine”, Hawkwind’s 28 studio albums and myriad live releases and compilations have influenced the likes of John Lydon, The Buzzcocks, The Levellers and The Chemical Brothers. Personnel have included Simon House, Huw Lloyd Langton, Tim Blake, Lemmy, Ginger Baker and many (famously many!) more, but at the core of the band has always been Dave Brock. Now 74, and still enjoying a heavy touring schedule, Dave and Hawkwind have a new release scheduled for next year, based on a science fiction novel by E.M Forster.
A long-time fan of Hawkwind, with 30 or so gigs under his belt, Harry will conduct a whistle-stop tour through Hawkwind’s albums, which are in themselves almost a history of British rock music since 1970. Join him at 9pm 0n 107.3 fm or via aliveradio.net
