R.I.P. John Gustafson

[Hörnisse]

 

http://ultimateclassicrock.com/john-gustafson-dies/

[lowend1]

Damn, that guy could sing.
Vaya con dios...

(with Ian Gillan at the end - great bass line too)

[Highlander]

I remember visiting Kingsway Recorders in the late seventies and seeing IG's Decca gold disc for the JCSS recording on the wall; it was shortly after taking this picture of John at the Marquee with IGB...

RIP, John... rip...



None of us is getting any younger...

[nofi]

no quatermass fans here.

[Hörnisse]

My first exposure to him was this cool bass line.

[Pekka]

Very sad news. Big Gus fan here, both his bass playing and singing. Love the Quatermass album and some of my fav sessions he did include
Roxy Music: Country Life & Siren
Shawn Phillips: Furthermore
Ablution: s/t
Ian Hunter: Lounge Lizard (off "Ian Hunter")

Has anyone heard the The Big Three album from the early 70's called "Resurrection"?

[uwe]

That is soooooooo unsettling ... I just visited this thread for the first time and you know what blared on my office stereo? The Ian Gillan Band's Poor Boy Hero from Scarabus, with John Gustafson on bass.



And I was thinking, Uwe you're getting older, you can't be the credible hard rocker much longer, you should consider playing music like the Ian Gillan Band did (I just had dinner with the keyboarder of our band who wants to leave and take me with him for something new).

What can I say ... John Gustafson is among the top 10, possibly even top 5 of my favourite bassists, I loved his work with Quatermass (you're not alone, Nofi!), Roxy Music and of course the Ian Gillan Band. Not to mention the Merseybeats, Hard Stuff, Gordon Giltrap, Rick Wakeman, The Pirates - he was quite a journeyman. So sad. Huge influence. To this day, when I pretend to funk, most of the licks are ripped off him.

He wrote (and played) that bass run here and you actually see him in the vid:



I think this song fits perfectly right now, him and Ian Gillan exchanging vocal lines on this poignant ballad fron IGB's debut:



A pick player (like me), he was always a little ahead of the beat (like me!).

[uwe]

With Roxy buddy Eddie Jobson (violin and cheekbones) and a couple of other luminaries (Eddie Hardin, Ray Fenwick, Les Binks, Mo Foster, Jon Lord etc) at the vanity project of some "one hit wonder" (quoted after the Rock and Roll Hall of Shame) bass player (in silly blue hippie vest) whose name I have miraculously forgotten ... Roger Simper-Hughes, right!



That is the great Mo Foster on fretless on that track!

[Highlander]

I didn't get the reference to the blue top at first... irony...

[uwe]

A lasting affliction with me.

[gweimer]

What I remember most is the stuff he laid down on Country Life.

[uwe]

 I thought you yanks weren't allowed to see that cover for fear of getting carried away ...  Two fine German girls btw.

[gearHed289]

With Roxy buddy Eddie Jobson (violin and cheekbones) and a couple of other luminaries (Eddie Hardin, Ray Fenwick, Les Binks, Mo Foster, Jon Lord etc) at the vanity project of some "one hit wonder" (quoted after the Rock and Roll Hall of Shame) bass player (in silly blue hippie vest) whose name I have miraculously forgotten ... Roger Simper-Hughes, right!



That is the great Mo Foster on fretless on that track!

Cool vid. Big Jobson fan. Geez, he was only 20 years old here! What is this from?

[uwe]

Roger Glover's first solo album post DP-resignation: The Butterfly Ball & the Grasshopper's Feast (a children's illustrated book that was supposed to be turned into an animated movie, it was basically a soundtrack work).



He delved back deeply into his Beatles background for the music.

The financing went awry and a live concert was staged (with Vincent Price as the narrator) with lots of Purplelites (even from the then new Burn line-up, Roger was graceful enough) and assorted Brit rock stars. But that didn't garner the necessary financial interest for the project either though the concert was well-visited (it was also Ian Gillan's return to the stage after his departure from DP, he deputized for Ronnie Dio who had sung on the album, but Blackmore - by then his boss in Rainbow - didn't allow him to do the concert with Roger).

The studio album is still readily available in remastered form, but the live gig (which was recorded and turned into a concert movie at the time) has all kinds of publishing rights hassles affiliated to it, a VHS that came out ages ago was quickly injuncted from the market. Since then Roger has talked again and again about remixing it properly and bringing it out again, but I think he has given up by now, it's just too difficult. I'm surprised the stuff is on Youtube, I've never seen it before myself and I'm the resident Purp Nerd!

The project even spawned two reasonable single hits, the Dio-sung Beatles spoof "Love is All (you need)" ( a pun on All You Need is Love), note how the cheap animation in it has nothing to do with the intricate drawings in the book





and the John Lawton sung Little Chalk Blue (a blueprint for many Uriah Heep ballads he would sing when he joined that band in part on the strength of that particular gig which gave him visibility in the UK, he lived in Germany at the time)



The album is full of little gems of people singing out of their mold, here is the boy from Redcar long before he became entangled with C movie American actrices who would crawl on Jaguar hoods...

[Pekka]

John penned two tracks for this session, one being this:


He could have been a great singer for some heavy metal band:


I believe he played also with Al Jarreau, don't know if he is on any of his albums 'though. Uwe?

Any Shawn Phillips fans? His 1974 album "Furthermore" features John and Peter Robinson and some great playing from both gentlemen.