HAWKWIND`S SPACE ROCK TOOK PSYCHEDELIC ROCK TO THE EDGE OF THE EXPERIMENTAL UNIVERSE

https://youtu.be/lccpRd-Oe8I?si=O-Z_rfRkgEc0B8vl

There was nothing kocha about music in the seventies, even if most of it had lost a lot of the rough edges and unrefined experimentation that was the hallmark of flower power rock in the preceding decade.

Britain was a breeding ground for most of the post-60`s blues rock which dominated the charts both in the US and UK, none more so than Led Zeppelin and eventually the mark 2 line up of Fleetwood Mac, which was enhanced greatly by the addition of one most underated guitarist, Lindsay Buckingham.

However the Mark 1 line up of the Mac, although less refined and easy on the ear than the band post-Rumours, was a powerhouse of hard pumping blues with a degree of substance inspired deviations which were both artistically progressive and destructive in equal measure. 

If you go digging for early 70`s British rock, you will find so much crazy and weird stuff in the vein of Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, latter day Beatles and Pink Floyd to eat your heart out with. 

Psychedelic distortion, guitar feedback, echoing overdubbing and a heap of other studio manipulated trickery which was applied on so many psychedelic blues and progressive rock recordings to keep up with the trends of the time. 

There was one band from Britain which was way out of its depth really, a real band of wannabes, who nonetheless took psychedelic blues rock to a new level, or as they termed it, `space rock`. 

They were or maybe are still known as HAWKWIND. Lemmy Kilmister, who was the bassist and eventual lead vocalist in HAWKWIND, would go on to form a very different kind of band following his dismissal in 1974, but he managed to hang around long enough in HAWKWIND to create some inspired but technically flawed
`space rock` as well as a heap of controversy while on tour thanks to the influence of mind altering drugs and bubbling tension between the various band members. 

Lemmy, far and away the most well known member of HAWKWIND, was fired shortly after being busted for possession of cocaine at the Canadian border while on tour.

A friend of mine was the one who suggested I have a listen to HAWKWIND to see for myself just how original and vital the band was for its time, they certainly weren`t the next Led Zeppelin or Jefferson Airplane as far as flower power eccentricities go but they still held their own in the stakes of open minded improvisation. 

The album I have of the band is a live affair, `Live `74`, recorded at the Chicago Auditorium on the 21st March, 1974, but I should point out that the edition of the album that I have is a shortened one with some omissions from the original song list. 

Songs like `Brainbox Pollution`, `Brainstorm`,`The Psychedelic Warlords` and `Master of the Universe` says it all, it`s a very loopy affair with absolutely nothing to speak of in the sophistication stakes, it`s characterised by lengthy jam-outs which at times are barely listenable but are a headbangers dream. 

This is as rough and tumble as psychedelic rock ever got, at least with the stuff I have listened to in my life. HAWKWIND probably owed a lot to the likes of Zeppelin and Floyd for making progressive rock and progressive blues rock fashionable on the US concert circuit, the band was always unceremoniously panned by just about every rock music critic in the big cities of america, but they always attracted a big crowd to their gigs.

Especially outside the big cities where metal loving fans were barely influenced by what the music mag critics were saying was kocha and `cool`. 

Lemmy Kilmister`s new band by the way

was the unmistakable MOTORHEAD, an ear splintering metal band which was light years away from the psychedelic brew of HAWKWIND.

Lots of drugs and lots of internal strife probably would have prevented HAWKWIND from achieving greatness with or without LEMMY, but for a few years, it was one band which was capable of taking its fans to places where no man had gone before, and Spock was nowhere to be seen.