Has it occured to you, kmellis, that you are just really, really stoned and just *think* you don't know who Hawkwind are?

In the UK they are probably best known for Silver Machine. This is unfair as it only hints at what the band were really like; it's more like Status Quo on acid than it is like anything important they did.

They also gained notoriety when their song Urban Guerilla was banned.

Other than that, I really don't know what to do other than spew out every piece of trivia I know about them and YSI their entire ouvre. I'll try not to.

Lemmy, so the story goes, wanted to name his new band after Hawkwind. His manager felt that calling his band "Bastards!" might make getting airplay difficult, so they settled instead on the name of one of the songs he wrote while playing for Hawkwind: Motorhead.

Michael Moorcock (the SF author) played a few times with the band (live and on the occasional album).

Poet Robert Calvert (warning: auto-loads music) was the real heart of the early band, but his mental health prevented him from being as involved as he ought.

Dancer Stacia really deserves a whole post of her own.

It could be argued that Del Dettmar and DikMik introduced the electronic synthesiser into British rock.

In short, if Ladbroke Grove was England's Haight Ashbury, Hawkwind were the British equivalent of the Grateful Dead. (Except they didn't look back to folk for their sound, but rather forwards to and through technology).

Oh yeah. Calvert also made a solo album called Lucky Leif and the Longships (sometime erroneously called "longboats" by some).

I'm not sure why I mention that. I can think of 101 reasons not to really.

And I've.
Got a washing machine.
Makes the things go clean.
It's my washing machine.

Man, I haven't heard that for ages! It was actually Hawkwind too, wasn't it? Now I'm going to spend all night trying to remember what it's from.

Curse you, seanyboy!

*cackles, go's to work*

Maybe I am fabulously stoned. Because I also tonight came across the wikipedia entry on Stadia and I immeditately thought to myself, "Self, a huge photo of her would make a great poster on the wall".

Then I remembered I wasn't 17 anymore and I figured I'd need to get some fancy photographer's print of her, install some spot lighting, and invite people over where we'll drink wine and say, "Man, that's a cool poster print."

Interesting. Thanks for the song, GeckoDundee! Here's a Stacia gallery page that has a (more?) recent photo... She looks great.

Michael Moorcock wrote some lyrics for Hawkwind, on an album called Warrior at the Edge (or maybe End) of Time. That's all I got.

Yeah, Warrior on the Edge of Time. He does some poetry on the album and also gets a writing credit on "Kings of Speed" from the same disc.

Look, I can't let this go without adding this. It's over 20MB and runs for more than 15 minutes, but this track gives you a far better idea of what they were doing back then than Silver Machine. You don't need a cone before you listen to it, but not doing so wouldn't be in keeping with the Spirit of the Age.

Thanks for the link, taz. Stacia not only looks great but is one of the originals of the whole London psychadelic scene. She's probably a lot more too; I'd love to read a biography.

Your first time with both those outfits, really? Your in for a treat, man.

And yeah, Stacia was hot in that crazed hippie chick way.