Hammerhead (English band)
| Hammerhead | |
|---|---|
| General information | |
| origin | Workington , England |
| Genre (s) | New Wave of British Heavy Metal , Rock |
| founding | 1977 |
| Website | www.hammerhead-uk.co.uk |
| Current occupation | |
| Steve Archer | |
| Tony Steel | |
| Buzz Elliot | |
singing |
Steven "Pecker" Woods |
Electric guitar, vocals |
Brian Hodgson |
| former members | |
Drums |
Baz Ellwood |
Drums |
Maurice Reay |
Drums |
Frank Hall |
| David Taylor | |
singing |
Graham Cayton |
Drums (live) |
Mike Thorburn |
Drums (live) |
Tyrone Larmour |
Hammerhead is an English new wave of British heavy metal and rock band from Workington that was formed in 1977.
history
prehistory
After several years of activity in the band Bitter Harvest , guitarist and singer Brian Hodgson decided to leave the band. Hodgson had also been a guitarist in the band Judas , which had existed since the early 1970s. After leaving Bitter Harvest , he decided to start his own band. Steve Archer joined as bassist. Then came the first songs called I'll Be Back and Feel I'm Falling . After the drummer Dave Heaney came to the cast, the first appearances followed under the band name Destroyer .
In 1975 the group took part in the NME Battle of the Bands at Newcastle University and finished second there. A short time later, Hodgson left the band and joined Bitter Harvest . However, there was a breakup before the first appearance. Then he concentrated together with Archer on the cover band Flight , which was later renamed Hot Property . Other members were guitarist Tucker McCombe, drummer John Moor and singer Roger Ackerley.
Since its founding
After an appearance in 1976/1977 together with the rock band Taurus in the local The Down Under Club , Hodgson and Archer decided to write their own songs. Maurice Reay, neighbor and friend of Hodgson, joined the cast as drummer. Together they rehearsed songs, mostly from the Destroyer era, as well as new songs such as Ton of Bricks and Lonely Man . Then the first appearance in the local club The Matador was imminent. At the urging of the event manager, who needed a name for the band project, which had not been named until then, in order to promote the concert, it was finally decided to use the band name Hammerhead .
During this founding phase, Hodgson became aware of the then 15-year-old Buzz Elliott, who played in a school band called Eight Hertz . They then began to rehearse together. Hodgson also rehearsed with Eight Hertz . This rehearsal took place in 1977 with guitarists and singers Hodgson and Buzz Elliott, bassist Steve Wilson, drummer Paul Knowles and singer Graham Cayton. They also rehearsed the songs Ton of Bricks and Lochinvar . After that, Hodgson and Archer continued to devote themselves to Hammerhead . 1977/1978 the band, consisting of Hodgson, Archer and Raey, recorded a first demo in the Jimmy Henshaw Studio in Carlisle , before Elliott joined the line-up in 1979 as the second guitarist and singer. He then helped with the work on new material and also wrote his own songs. Baz Elwood, who had also worked for Judas , was added as the drummer . This line-up was not changed in the following five years. Towards the end of 1981, the self-financed single Time Will Tell was recorded at Linden Sounds Studios with producer Guy Forrester . The sound carrier had a circulation of 1,000 copies. The publication was followed by appearances, including in Scotland together with Budgie . In addition, a compact cassette with live recordings was put into circulation to draw labels' attention to them, but this did not succeed. In 1984 Mike Thorburn joined the line-up as a substitute drummer for a few months before Frank Hall joined the band as a permanent member in 1984/1985. David Taylor also joined the group as keyboard player for some gigs. In the same year Elliot left the band, but occasionally helped out with gigs. In addition, the songs Don't Look Down and Lochinvar were recorded in 1984 with Forrester as a producer and again at Linden Sounds Studios , with Billy Branch being present as the singer. The latter song was released by Sane Records on the sampler It's Unheard Of! used. After Hall's arrival, the band briefly called itself Frank Hall Band, when the sampler was released that same year, but had already renamed itself again to Hammerhead. 1985/1986 Baz Bunnery, brother of Francis Dunnery , briefly joined the line-up as guitarist. In 1986 David Taylor came back for a few concerts to support the band as a keyboardist. In 1986 Hodgson and Hall joined the band Plateau. After less than a year, a demo and a handful of gigs, however, they split up again. From 1987 to 1996 Hammerhead was not active except for a few local appearances. Tyrone Larmour helped out as a live drummer.
In 1995/1996, Hodgson brought the band together for one night at The Music Farm Studio . The demo recordings were not published for quality reasons. It wasn't until 2005 that the two songs Will to Survive and Crying As I Fall appeared after some overdubs had been made. With Hodgson, Elliott, Archer and Larmour, only a few isolated concerts followed between 1996 and 2005. In 2005 the band got back together for a friend's birthday. The group then decided to rehearse with producer Forrester at Linden Sounds Studios. On October 28 and November 12 of the same year, the album Headonism was recorded in the same studio. Originally only 75 copies were made of the original song sequence. In 2006, the sequence for a record release on High Roller Records was changed. The changed song sequence was retained for later CD releases and the album title was changed to Headonizm . The album consists only of songs that were created in the early 1980s, but had never been recorded in a studio before. In 2015 the album The Sin Eater was released , on which the singer Steven “Pecker” Woods can be heard. The download and CD version includes the song Behind Your Eyes as an add-on, which originally dates from the 1990s. Since it was founded, the band has held various concerts, including with Michael Schenker .
style
According to Malc Macmillan in The NWOBHM Encyclopedia , the single Time Will Tell and the B-side Lonely Man are reminiscent of bands like Crucifixion, Bashful Alley and Omen Searcher in terms of the arrangement and the electric guitars . The single is one of the more impressive works of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal. The song Lochinvar differs a bit from the single because it is heavier and more atmospheric, which evokes memories of Overdrive and Cynic . He also drew a comparison with Bleeding Heart by Ethel the Frog .
Matthias Mader from Rock Hard found an influence from classic rock on the album The Sin Eater and made a comparison with UFO . In an interview with Mader, Buzz Elliot stated that he is a fan of Michael Schenker and the album Strangers in the Night . He also worked with Tony Steel for Paul Raymond in the past . As a guitarist, he not only used Blues - scales , but also oriental melodies, which he this Ritchie Blackmore called as an influence. For the album intro he used a guitar with a sitar effect. In the same issue, Wolfram Küper reviewed the album and found that the band had preserved the New Wave of British Heavy Metal sound of the early days. The album is atmospheric, dark and a little psychedelic . Küper also assigned the music to hard rock .
Discography
- 1978: 1978 demo (demo, self-published)
- 1981: Time Will Tell (single, Linden Records )
- 1984: 1984 demo (demo, self-release)
- 2003: Live Rarities (compilation, self-publication)
- 2005: Will to Survive (compilation, Cult Metal Classics Records )
- 2005: Headonism (album, self-published)
- 2006: Headonizm (album, High Roller Records )
- 2015: The Sin Eater (album, High Roller Records)
Web links
- Official website
- Hammerhead at Discogs (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d History. (No longer available online.) Hammerhead-uk.co.uk, archived from the original on December 21, 2015 ; Retrieved December 8, 2015 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ a b c d e Malc Macmillan: The NWOBHM Encyclopedia . IP Verlag Jeske / Mader GbR, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-931624-16-3 , p. 268 f .
- ^ A b Matthias Mader: Hammerhead . Orient and Occident. In: Rock Hard . No. 339 , August 2015, p. 69 .
- ↑ Wolfram Küper: Hammerhead . The Sin Eater. In: Rock Hard . No. 339 , August 2015, p. 92 .
