Henry Cow appreciation society

Not at all!  It's good to hear from fellow Cow fans - there's not that many of us!!

If you are (like me) a guitarist, you might naturally find Fred Frith's gear interesting. I also found out about that 1961 Burns Bison guitar of his. He did use it in one of the previous vids from French TV that I posted. It's also visible on the "Tubular Bells" clip below, where he played with Mike Oldfield, Steve Hillage, Mike Ratladge, Mick Taylor, Terry Oldfield, and some other faces I can't put my finger on.



That Burns guitar seems to be giving him a much more treble-oriented, bity sound than his ES-345. Notice how he also plays bass guitar (a very similar looking one belonged to John Greaves, so who knows!).

Flight123 wrote: There were three other Cow members performing in that clip: John Greaves (but playing keyboards), Tim Hodgkinson and Geoff Leigh.  Also, Pierre Moerlen on percussion and Karl Jenkins on oboe.

Man, is there something you don't know about Henry Cow? Seems like I've got a lot of homework to do on the band.


Edited by ALotOfBottle - May 17 2016 at 10:20

Nogbad_The_Bad wrote: A Henry Cow thread gets 80+ posts in a week, there is hope for the universe

Half of which are mine, trying to prevent the thread from dying

No, but really, there is hope for universe


Edited by ALotOfBottle - May 17 2016 at 10:36

Flight123 wrote: Well, I have been a fan for over 40 years so I guess I have had a lot of time to pick things up!  Here's a mini-quiz for Henry Cow fans (without Googling!): 1. Which famous band did Henry Cow support for their very first gig? 2. Two members were once fired from Henry Cow - who were they? 3. Who did a cover version of 'War'?

I know a partial answer to #1. Pink Floyd and... I dunno. I know they played with Gong in 1971. Hmmm...
#2 I believe it was Geoff Leigh and someone else....
#3 No clue


Edited by ALotOfBottle - May 18 2016 at 08:15

Wrong with #2?

Wasn't John Greaves fired of conflicts on availability and musical direction? Not sure on the other one. No idea on 3.

Edited by Nogbad_The_Bad - May 18 2016 at 08:25

Getting warmer there - one of them was indeed from the 'merger'.  To give you a clue about the other, Chris Cutler apparently very much regretted it and this person was subsequently invited back into the band anyway!


Edited by Flight123 - May 18 2016 at 08:27

Well, Peter Blegvad admitted to being 'fired' for not being able to play Henry Cow music.  No hard feelings - he produced the wonderful Kew. Rhone with John Greaves a year later and was then in the Art Bears touring band in 1979 - plus many other collaborations afterwards.  'Fired' is probably too harsh a word for the other was Lindsay Cooper, and Chris Cutler did recall the difficulty of the situation.

'War' was covered by The Fall and appears on the Middle Class Revolt album - I like it, jarring and frenetic with Mark E. Smith spitting out the words (which he seems to forget or muddle at various points - sure it was deliberate - worth a listen!)