Lee Belsham
Keith York
This album is AMAZING! I owned a tape of it for about a year and then lost it somewhere (...or maybe it was pinched...). Saw them several times in the early nineties supporting Spiritualized & Mercury Rev, at the late lamented Phoenix Festival, at the Buckley Tiv and at Glastonbury when the Dr Phibes´ balloon hovered over the site for the entire weekend - the rubbish bins also moved of their own accord but that´s a different story. I still have dodgy recordings of the sessions from Mark Radcliffe on Radio 5 (I just can´t tape over them...) A mate of mine still treasures one of Howard´s plectrums and another mate saw them in a pub years ago winning a ´Battle of the bands´ competition near Chester. Still one of my favourite bands, never gave up the faith, this album was easily one of the best I´ve ever heard and the soundtrack to my life at a very strange time. hope Howard gets out and carries on - I´ll be at the front.
Dr Phibes...an outstanding and inspirational band... Couldn´t recommend Hypnotwister enough to people! (ahhh... takes me back everytime, the memories of many a great evening spent in our old flat, getting stoned listening to ´moment of truth´... (or ´track five´, as it was referred to) ~ "a package complete", indeed... If you´ve never heard Hypnotwister(or Whirlpool), hunt down a copy - well worth the look...
Great band and great bunch of guys. One very cold night in 1990 I was hitching from Hull to LIiverpoool along to the M62. A van pulls up and Dr Phibes gave me a lift. Great days!
The L.A. Woman track you refer to DID get released, but not in the U.K. It was in fact released on a 3-track French Promo CD Single of ´Mr Phantasy´ which contains the tracks ´Mr Phantasy (7 inch Remix)´, ´Argonaut´ & ´L.A. Woman (Peel Session Version)´. I´m quite sure this single never received a commercial release due to copyright reasons. It´s amazing however!!
They released a four track remix EP of Deadpan Control Freak - amazing
I had the pleasure of hanging about with Keith a little bit during the summer of ´97 whilst he was doing his ´Lightening Seeds´ stint and i have to say he was a top guy and a pleasure to be around. Awesome drummer and funny guy is all´s i can say. The Phibes kicked ass. I remember seeing them a couple of times at Gladstonbury and The Pheonix Festival in the early 90s and they impressed emmensely on both occasions. They were an insperation to many, back then. Their records still sound brilliant to this day. I was also lucky enough to hear a cover of "L.A Woman" by The Doors at some point as well, which they had recorded during a radio session and it was, predictably, magnificant. It never surfaced though, probably due to copyright.
I´ve been listening for both records for more than ten years. Never heard somethings like this since. I couldn´t find any infos about them on the web. If anybody has please let us know.
I was good friends with the Phibes and hung out loads at the house on Seel street. I think they were THE best band to come out of the Liverpool scene of the early ninties and that there was certainly more to those guys than the music.It was like a scene out of 710 with people coming and going and crashing out and jamming and sharing stash. I never owned the albums on cd until around two years ago when I casually asked in a second hand record shop for it and he had both. Cost eight quid for the two, best bargain I ever got. Shame what happened to everyone it was so special for a while.
This is still one of my favourite albums. Dr. Phibes were a fantastic band and I was lucky enough to see them live on many occasions as Howard used to live in my town (Connah´s Quay). It was a real tragedy what happened to Howard (I won´t go into it here but will say it´s ironic they covered Talking Heads´ Psycho Killer on the brilliant EP Misdiagnosedive - track it down if you can, also their Moment of Truth/Deadpan Control Freak EP). A brilliant trio of musicians for whom the drugs DID work but which no doubt also aided their demise.
Great album and it was definately released on C.D.!