Brand X - credit as a jazz rock group?

A interesting (to me) thread/debate has just started up on the jazzrockfusion web discussion site FUSENET,  about the status of Brand x, which should bring contributions in from  friends here.

To bring you up to running speed, the three letters to date, are from Welshman EN, East Coast Jody  (who is a Percy Jones completist) and me

Here's another possible little thread - did any of you guys have those eureka
moments where you happened to hear a track on the radio and for whatever reason
the memory has stayed with you or it changed your tastes in music? In my case I
have various memories, most clearly centred around an institution in the UK
which was Alan Freeman's weekend rock show. In the 70s he played a lot of prog
and jazz rock and when he really rated something would play a whole side or
whole album! I was at my mates house on 2 occasions and clearly remember Alan
playing stuff from J Beck's awesome Wired, Brand X's Unorthodox Behaviour (why is it that Brand X are not spoken of in the same light as the great fusion bands like RTF etc ???) and Colloseum 2's Electric Savage - I was hooked! I also
remember the lenegendary John Peel show playing stuff from the newly released
first Ramone's album, Beb Bop Deluxe's Futurama (what a great album!) and Nils
Lofgren's Cry Tough! And for all those Be Bop fans out there it looks like Bill
Nelson is finally going to tour, and the tour name is Be Bop Deluxe and Beyond -
here's hoping Bill will revisit those halcyon days - I still dream of Bill doing
fusion too!!!

 

>I was at my mates house on 2 occasions and clearly remember Alan playing
stuff
>from J Beck's awesome Wired, Brand X's Unorthodox Behaviour (why is it that
Brand X
>are not spoken of in the same light as the great fusion bands like RTF etc
???)


That's a good question, I dont get it either. It's not like it's a huge
musical leap from RTF or Mahavishnu Orchestra to Brand X. I think maybe not
enough people have actually heard Brand X, or just heard them briefly. But one
person in particular I know, he's into all the great 70s fusion and he says
Brand X to him always seemed like a "jam band".... which I don't get either,
maybe that was true of some of their old live performances, where they did
stretch the tunes out quite a bit.... but that just reminds me of early Weather
Report style fusion. In any event, old Brand X still seems like a perfect 70's
fusion band to me, nice musicianship, nice soloing, great compositions.
I think another aspect might be that Brand X wasn't as "serious" as a band
like RTF or MO. There was always an element of humour (spelled with a 'u') to
their music evidenced by some of their song titles, and their onstage antics.
They were like a bunch of very talented musicians goofing around. Having
John Cleese write some of your liner notes doesn't help either.

 

EN JODY

>That's a good question, I don't get it either.


DITTO

Let's face it there were comparatively few jazz rock fusion bands in the UK (cf US): Machine (plus the more jazz-oriented but minor Canterbury bands - and the likes of Just Us and Matching Mole were more avante jazz/RIO than jazz rock; Gilamesh was less obvious wrt those jazz rock creditials, say  compared to Weather Report), Nucleus, Isotope, Stomu Yamash'Ta dabbled, the one off
by Suntreader (and I'm sure En can pack these numbers out). Perhaps because few of these bands were signed to mainstream record labels (remember
Columbia/CBS/Epic/etc had many US jazz rock bands signed by 1977), meant you had to be a real fan to keep track of the Brits. American jazz rock had relatively more chance of radio airing with better publicity machines.

And then Brand X came with the Genesis spin-off tag. It was what established 'dynosaur band members' did: "solo albums" in the mid/late 70's. Specifically,
Gabriel had completely spun off into another orbit, then Hackett and Rutherford did their own things. Inevitably the Artful Dodger would want to do something on his holidays. And you can't forgetting  those track on Genesis albums,  post-Gabriel, which were jazz rocky, jazz rocky enough to have jazz rock players augment Genesis live - Daryl Stuermer (sp. remember he 'partnered' Holdsworth on "Enigmatic Ocean"), Chester Thompson. And then Brand X has been tarred with being a progressive rock band (quite why I don't know) rather than a jazz rock fusion band - remember the bolloxxx written by that so-called intellectual Rod Liddle, bashing prog rock lyrics last January in the London Times, and implying Brand X was one of the main culprits for writing tosh words............ such inaccuracy goes some way to reinforce your contention:

>I think maybe not enough people have actually heard Brand X, or just heard them briefly.


>But one person in particular I know, he's into all the great 70s fusion and he says Brand X to him always seemed like a "jam band"....


Perhaps one day somebody might explain 'jam band' and what music they play to me - when Primus, Phish, MMW, (who's that banjo player?) etc. are crowded under that heading? However, surely it is nonsense to categorise a band by using terminology coined decades after Brand X started (and  finished) - too many  have done that to 60's bands by using prog rock definitions concocted in the 80's and 90's.

Brand X did some awesome stuff, all top shelf musicians (damn, I love Percy Jones bass work), and Phil did some really great drumming on those he appears on. Not just jamming out either, but well constructed, tight pieces, but not run of the mill, albeit very well performed, as many fusion bands sounded then. 

Brand X is an awesome fusion band!

On the unorthodox behaviour album, Collins plays his best drums in carrer!

 

1976 = Phil Collins!

Edited by greenback