Gentle Giant

[sun!toto!duane@seismo.CSS.GOV (Duane Day [Do you guys know _Proud Mary_?])]

Well, now that I know where all the people with great taste in rock are,
let me ask you this: are there any other Gentle Giant fans out there?  Yeah,
I know they haven't been around for years, and the last I heard Derek Shulman
was an A&R man for Mercury Records, but in their time GG were the most      
interesting band around.  Music that was incredibly complex, but it still   
grooved!  These 5 guys would lug 20 or so different instruments to their shows
and they were at least competent on every one of them - the typical rock
instruments plus violin, cello, recorder, sax, xylophone/marimba/vibes,
etc.  In the early days they had a sixth member who added trumpet and
french horn to the above list, along with more saxes.  The keyboard player,
Kerry Minnear, has to be the most underrated progressive rock musician of
the era - but the real joy of GG was the songs!  If it's hard to imagine  
half the band playing in 6 and half the band playing in 7 (some one beat
behind the others at that) and still being bouncy as hell, pick up a copy
of _Free Hand_ (available in the states as a Capitol mid-line re-issue)
and check out the first tune, "Just the Same".  I think GG was an important
predecessor for groups such as XTC.

The point, then, net.folks, is to find out if there are any other die-hard
GG fans out there.  Also, since I know this news.group has readers in the
U.K., I'd like to ask you if there is any GG available on CD over there
(or anywhere else, for that matter).  Finally, since you people seem to be 
more well-informed about your musical heroes than anybody except maybe the
Deadheads, does anybody know what any of the members of GG are up to now?
I'd really appreciate any information at all!!

Thanks - Duane Day

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