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photographer unknown
Gatecrashing a local talent night at the
All Saints Hall,
Notting Hill,
they were so disorganised as to not even have a name, opting for "Group
X" at the last minute, nor any songs, choosing to play an extended
20-minute jam on
Eight Miles High by
The Byrds.
BBC Radio 1 DJ
John Peel
was in the audience and was impressed enough to tell event organiser,
Douglas Smith, to keep an eye on them. Smith signed them up and got them
a deal with
Liberty Records on the back of a deal he was setting up for
Cochise.
Eventually, the band settled on the name "Hawkwind" after briefly being billed as "Group X" and "Hawkwind Zoo".
Ian Fraser Kilmister, aka
Lemmy, was an English musician and singer-songwriter who founded and fronted the rock band
Motörhead. His music was one of the foundations of the
heavy metal genre.
Hawkwind is best known for the song
Silver Machine, which became a number three UK hit single in 1972, but they scored further hit singles with
Urban Guerrilla (another Top 40 hit) and
Shot Down in the Night. The band had a run of twenty-two of their albums charting in the UK from 1971 to 1993.
Nik Turner is on tour with Nik Turner's Hawkwind. Turner is still at odds with band co-founder Dave Brock (
link below).
For their 31st studio album,
Hawkwind has collaborated with songwriter and conductor
Mike Batt to recreate a selection of their songs with an extra, orchestral ingredient.
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