this time it's not the picture which
is interesting, because it's just a photo of the captain live
'upon the
my-o-my', taken at one of his depressing concerts in england
in may / june 1974 - as
you can immediately
tell by the ugly shirt (which was in loud yellow in
real life).
no, the most important thing is the accompanying
text. for i always thought that after his ('unconditionally
guaranteed'
and 'bluejeans and moonbeams') mis-adventure with mercury
records beefheart late 1974 was so depressed that he wanted to
quit the music business [true]
- and only started thinking about playing again right before
frank zappa's
'200 years old united states' tour in april 1975 - which would
become the 'bongo fury' joint venture when don passed the
audition as a guest singer....
so i really was stunned to read thís
in the 18 january 1975
english magazine MELODY
MAKER:
captain beefheart
and his magic band,
scheduled to tour britain during a two month european visit in
february
and march, have run into theatre problems for their manchester
concert.
the original dates had beefheart playing manchester opera
house on march
2, but this now has been cancelled because the venue is too
small, according
to chrysalis agency's john jackson. they still hope to play
manchester,
preferably the free trade hall. and arranging this could mean
a change
of date for hanley steam machine and hove town hall,
originally set for
march 11 and 4 respectively.
beefheart's
european tour opens in copenhagen
on february 13 and ends in paris on february 26. british
dates: newcastle,
mayfair ballroom (february 28), leeds university (march 1),
birmingham
town hall (5), edinburgh university (7), glasgow strathclyde
university
(8), bristol colston hall (9), southampton university (10),
tunbridge wells
assembly hall (13), london rainbow theatre (14 and 15). the
manchester,
hanley and hove concerts will be slotted in among these dates.
*
although, later
i
found out that the message was a sequel to a
few words in
the 19 october 1974 issue:
MAGIC
BAND BACK IN NEW YEAR
captain beefheart and the magic band are
returning to britain early in the new year. and they will be
playing two
dates at london's rainbow.
beefheart is coming
to europe for a tour
starting on february 13 and continuing until march 16. the
latter part
of the itinerary will be british concert dates. and already
scheduled are
two concerts at the rainbow, on march 14 and 15.
a new beefheart
album, meanwhile, is being
rush-released within the next three weeks. the album,
'bluejeans and moonbeams',
features most of the musicians who accompanied beefheart on
his recent
european tour, although guitarist 'fuzzy' fuscaldo has been
replaced by
winged eel fingerling (aka elliot ingber, who had been a
member of the magic
band on earlier occasions - t.t.).
*
but eventually don faced so many
problems
the whole tour was cancelled, leaving us with some questions:
* why?; but
in particular: * with which line-up was he supposed to
perform? * and which
songs did he have in mind?
now, i think - but you don't have
to agree
- the following was the case:
after the disastrous
'unconditionally guaranteed'
album and tour he realized the poor level of the session
musicians of his
band and soon replaced one of the tragic guitarists by elliot
ingber (winged
eel fingerling) and the bassist by his brother ira ingber for
the contractually
obliged 'bluejeans and moonbeans'. that record came out in
october 1974,
and then he discovered mercury records had erased every note
elliot had
played!
it made him so angry that he
refused to do
the above mentioned tour, of course - that is: with the
'tragic' rest of
the band, as it seems he still was convinced to be able to
build up a new
magic band around the ingbers... in fact, that's not so
strange: because
when that plan (which he still had in early january, as this
news item
shows) failed - still want to know: why? - and after the
following 'bongo
fury' outing he managed to form the 'knebworth crew' in just
over a month
(including elliot ingber)...!
an indication of what beefheart
intended
to play, can be found in the repertoire which that short-lived
band played:
moonlight
on
vermont, dali's car, ella guru [trout mask
replica],
beatle
bones and
smokin' stones, gimme that harp boy [strictly
personal],
and golden oldies like
electricity,
abba
zaba [safe as milk],
mixed with stuff such as the new
sam
with the showing
scalp flat top hat [beefheart original from
the 'bongo fury'
tour].
anyone who knows (more), may
tell......
