Name That Tune Special

9 Songs I guarantee you never heard before.*
During my absence (leaving for England tomorrow morning, back monday evening) I thought it would be a good idea to leave you with something to do. Here are a number of great songs that you have certainly never heard before. I hope you will be able to get to the right answers by the clues and by discussion. In order for a discussion to take place, I will change the comments settings so that they will appear immediately.

No points for guessing the answers, just good fun!

What I am really after is the name of the Band or Artist involved, but I will of course take any information you would like to share with us – name of song, bio etc. As I say, any comments you make will be published immediately, giving you the opportunity to talk about it

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1. Would you believe that The Police once appeared as special guest for this band? Although they never hit it big time, the musicians were more than competent. The name of the band changed from LP to LP, but it was always centered around one letter of the alphabet. The lead singer was known simply as “Pix” and comes from the British Channel Isles. The featured song was the title track of their last LP and is an epic tale of drug misuse. The lyrics are very vivid and disturbing (not in the clip though). Do you know this band?

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During their career this band were known as “O”, “A Band Called O”, as well as “The O Band”. This song is the title track from their last LP “The Knife“, which is credited to “The O Band“

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2. A great bass player and member of various “Supergroups” this song is from his own band from the mid-seventies. Although he was basically also the lead singer, he is in fact not singing on this one. I saw this band live about 77 and experienced the greatest drum solo I have ever heard. The drummer, at that time ostensibly a studio musician, became famous as drummer with Toto. This album was called weird, and it certainly is. Tip: Listen to the bass passages on this song and you might arrive at the answer.

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Guitarist Hughie Burns on vocals here on “Baby Jane” taken from the Jack Bruce Band‘s LP “How’s Tricks”. It wasn’t enough to fool Alan however – I always forget about his friendship to Leslie West. The drummer I mentioned by the way, is Simon Philips. Making the band complete on keyboards is Tony Hymas

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3. A song by a legendary scottish band who sing predominantly in Gaelic, they call themselves Scotland’s premier celtic rock band. They are very popular in Germany for some strange reason. This song is their tour de force, the title being Gaelic for Scotland. The name of the band is gaelic and means the rut that is made in a field by a plough

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This is Runrigs most famous song Alba

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4. No points for the title of the song, but who sang it? This version was extremely popular in the UK, but apparently failed to chart at all in the USA

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Ha, well you all got Michelle I imagine, but did anyone know that the artist was “The Overlanders“?

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5. This very popular live band was a spin-off from Lindisfarne. In the first half of the 70s they cut a number of albums on the Charisma label before they were chucked out after the one featuring this song. They cut one last LP on United Artists before disbanding. Anyone know who I am talking about?

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Jack the Lad singing “Rocking Chair“

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6. The guitarist on this clip went on to make his fortune with Whitesnake. The fortunes of the singer were however the other way round as he lost his job as Procol Harum’s drummer just before “A Whiter Shade of Pale” was released – talk about bad luck! This LP is by the way one of my Desert Island Discs

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Micky Moody the guitarist and Bobby Harrison on  vocals spell the name “Snafu“, a UK band that cut 3 albums in their career, all 3 being very different. At one point they went very country-like to come back funky on “All Funked Up” from which this song “Lock and Key” is taken. The latter of the LPs is in my opinion the only one worth listening to

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7. A very interesting prog-rock band in the 70s, they cut one LP in their 4 years of existence. The vocalist went on to form Back Street Crawler with Paul Kossoff

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The one that beat you all. Terry Wilson-Slesser was the founder and lead vocalist of Beckett. This song “My Lady” appeared in this version as a floppy record adhered to the Sounds Newspaper in the 70s. It didn’t do the band any good however, the song failed to chart. But if you do like progressive rock, then you should give this band a listen… Beckett on the Old Grey Whistle Test (youtube video)

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8. This band, who shares its name with that of an english boy group, tried to defend their name against the latter in High Court, but had to give up in the face of high costs involved. They cut one magnificent single (the clip) before being joined by Jimmy McCullough before he went to Wings

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Blue – Little Jody received plenty of airplay in 1973 as well as accolades from the Rolling Stone magazine and from John Peel. However there was unfortunately no commercial success for the band

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9. This 80s band were known as the Great German Hope. They had one very successful single “Blueprint” before cutting the LP from which this clip is taken. The (female) singer parted company with the men in the band and continued with another woman. And that’s the end of the story as far as success is concerned.

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The Rainbirds made great inroads in the German rock scene, and no song was finer than Sea of  Time featured here

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* with one exception. But you never heard this version I think!