Graham Bond

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For other people with the same name, see Graham Bond (disambiguation).

Graham Bond
blues-rock, blues, jazz
Instrument(s)Keyboards, saxophone, vocals
Years active1960s–1974
LabelsDecca
Websitegrahambond.org

Graham John Clifton Bond (28 October 1937 – 8 May 1974) was an English rock/blues musician and vocalist, considered a founding father of the English rhythm and blues boom of the 1960s.

Bond was an innovator, described as "an important, under-appreciated figure of early British R&B",[1] along with Cyril Davies and Alexis Korner. Jack Bruce, John McLaughlin and Ginger Baker first achieved prominence in his group, the Graham Bond Organisation. Bond was voted Britain's New Jazz Star in 1961.[2][3] He was an early user of the Hammond organ/Leslie speaker combination in British rhythm and blues[4] – he "split" the Hammond for portability – and was the first rock artist to record using a Mellotron.[4] As such he was a major influence upon later rock keyboardists: Deep Purple's Jon Lord said "He taught me, hands on, most of what I know about the Hammond organ".[5]

Biography

Bond was born in

Blues Incorporated[6] before forming the Graham Bond Quartet with musicians he met in the Korner group, Ginger Baker on drums and Jack Bruce on double bass,[6] together with John McLaughlin on guitar; and adopting the Hammond organ as his main instrument.[4] The group then became The Graham Bond Organisation (GBO), while John McLaughlin was later replaced by Dick Heckstall-Smith on saxophones. Their album There's A Bond Between Us of October 1965 is considered the first recording of rock music that uses a Mellotron.[7]

The group was plagued by substance abuse problems, particularly Bond's, as well as the relentless bickering between Baker and Bruce. Due to his declining situation, Bond entrusted running of the band to Baker, who then used that power to fire Bruce, which saw the band continue, albeit with declining success as a trio. Baker would leave soon after to start his own band, with the first invite going to Eric Clapton, at the time guitarist with the UK's premier blues band, John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers. Clapton accepted with the caveat that Jack Bruce be added as vocalist and bassist. Meanwhile the Organisation carried on as a trio with Jon Hiseman on drums, but Bond's mental and physical health continued to deteriorate, until the band eventually dissolved in 1967. The group's lack of commercial success is generally put down to Bond being "unable to find a commercially successful niche. Some jazz fans regarded Bond's band as too noisy and rock-based, while the pop audience found his music complicated and too jazzy".[4] Heckstall-Smith and Hiseman went on to form Colosseum, recording Bond's song "Walkin' in the Park" for their first album.[4] According to John Steel, in that same period over the 1960s, Bond gave the rock band The Animals their name before they hit fame after seeing them perform at the Club a’Gogo in Newcastle.[8]

After the break-up of the Organisation, Bond continued to exhibit mental disorders, with manic episodes and periods of intense

magick, and in 1970 Holy Magick, which recorded a self-titled album and We Put Our Magick on You. He was also re-united with old band members while playing saxophone in Ginger Baker's Air Force and spending a short time in the Jack Bruce Band.[4]
Solid Bond, a double-album compiling live tracks recorded in 1963 by the Graham Bond Quartet (Bond, McLaughlin, Bruce and Baker) and a studio session from 1966 by the Graham Bond Organisation (Bond, Heckstall-Smith and Hiseman) was released that same year.

In 1972 he teamed up with

Carolanne Pegg and bassist Pete Macbeth, which disbanded around Christmas 1973 without recording. During that same period, he discovered American singer-songwriter-guitarist Mick Lee, and they played together live but never recorded. Plans to include Chris Wood of Traffic never materialized due to Bond's death.[citation needed
]

Bond's financial affairs were in chaos, and the years of lack of commercial success and the recent demise of Magus had badly hurt his pride.[

Refugee.[citation needed] On 8 May 1974, Bond died under the wheels of a Piccadilly line train at Finsbury Park station, London, at the age of 36. Most sources list the death as a suicide. Friends agree that he was off drugs, although becoming increasingly obsessed with the occult (he believed he was Aleister Crowley's son).[9]

In 2015 his work was the focus of a two-hour special on the

Dr Boogie radio show.[10]

Discography

With The Graham Bond Organisation

  • The Sound of '65 (1965)
  • There's a Bond Between Us (1965)
  • Solid Bond (1970, recorded 1966)
  • Rock Generation Vol. 3 & 4 (1972, recorded live 1964 at Klooks Kleek)

Other

  • Roarin' (with Don Rendell New Jazz Quartet, Jazzland, October 1961)
  • Love Is the Law (Pulsar, 1969, as Grahame Bond)
  • Mighty Grahame Bond (Pulsar, 1969, as Grahame Bond)
  • Holy Magick (Vertigo, December 1970)
  • We Put Our Magick on You (Vertigo, October 1971)
  • Two Heads Are Better Than One (with Pete Brown, 1972)

Bibliography

References

  1. AllMusic
  2. ^ Unterberger, Richie. "Graham Bond". AllMusic. Retrieved 4 May 2012.
  3. ^ Riverside Giants of Jazz, album JET 1A-B, released in the UK by Fontana Records, sleeve note
  4. ^
    ISBN 0-7535-0149-X
    , p. 69
  5. ^ "Jon Lord, Interviews". Thehighwaystar.com. 12 February 1968. Retrieved 18 October 2013.
  6. ^
    ISBN 1-86074-129-0
    p121
  7. ISBN 978-1-4408-3514-8
    .
  8. ^ Pingitore, Silvia (27 April 2021). "The House of the Rising Sun & the 1960s British Invasion: interview with The Animals' John Steel". the-shortlisted.co.uk. Retrieved 5 July 2021.
  9. ^ "Meek but not so Mild Charlatan | British Occult Society". Britishoccultsociety.wordpress.com. 27 March 2013. Retrieved 22 July 2017.
  10. ^ "Séquence Spéciale – Graham Bond". Rtbf.be. Retrieved 22 July 2017.

Further reading

  • Richie Unterberger, Unknown Legends of Rock 'n' Roll: Psychedelic Unknowns, Mad Geniuses, Punk Pioneers, Lo-fi Mavericks and More. Miller Freeman Press, 1998.

External links

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