Shagrat

Steve Took, R.I.P.

The late 60’s were a period of great musical inventiveness.  In particular, there was a lot of musical cross-pollination, with musicians forming new groups, side groups, and other experiments with like-minded others.  Bands constantly swapped members and lineups changed frequently.  This led to large amounts of experimentation and innovation,  and blues, rock, psychedelia, and hard rock all mixed and blended to form new genres.  Groups like John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers and the Yardbirds expanded the boundaries of blues rock and many members of both bands went on to form other, even more successful bands.  Eric Clapton eventually left the Yardbirds and formed several “supergroups”, first Cream, then Traffic,  Blind Faith, Derek and the Dominoes, and so forth.  

A similar level of collaboration characterized the Ladbroke Grove scene I discussed in my previous post.  This scene grew out of two main groups, the Deviants and the Pretty Things, both of whom had their roots in other, earlier blues and R&B influenced English bands, as well as other groups such as the Rockin’ Vickers and Famous Cure.  Out of the ashes of these groups arose two groups that would eventually be hugely influential in 70’s music, the Pink Fairies (whom I discuss in the previous post) and Hawkwind (more on them in a future post).  These two bands often played gigs together, swapped members, and on occasion even jammed together as a larger collective known as “Pinkwind”.

But the collaboration didn’t end there, as members of this scene also formed other side projects with one another and/or collaborated on one another’s solo albums.  One of the most bizarre of these collaborations was known as Shagrat, named after the orc of the same name from the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy (Tolkien was becoming huge at this point).  Shagrat consisted of Steve Peregrin Took (who himself was named after a hobbit from LOTR) on vocals, Larry Wallis on guitar, and initially Tim Taylor and Phil Lenoir on bass and drums and later Dave Bidwell on drums and Took on bass.  Mick Farren, ex-singer of the Deviants, was also involved in the inception of the band but never played with them.  Larry Wallis was mentioned in a previous post; he played with a couple of obscure late 60’s blues/hard rock bands (Entire Sioux Nation and Lancaster’s Bombers, which grew out of Blodwyn Pig; sadly, no recorded material seems to exist of either band)  and eventually went on to play in the Pink Fairies after Paul Rudolph’s departure, in UFO as a touring guitarist, and in Lemmy’s first incarnation of Motorhead.  Dave Bidwell left Chicken Shack, an English blues rock group (where Christine McVie of Fleetwood Mac got her start).

Steve Took, like Twink in my previous post, is another of those unsung heroes of the late 60’s English music scene.  Took got his start as the percussionist in the acoustic hippie folk band Tyrannosaurus Rex, started by Marc Bolan upon his departure from John’s Children in ’66.  Bolan and Took eventually disagreed over the direction of the band and their respective contributions of each to it and Took left (Bolan of course morphed the band into T. Rex and went on to huge success in England as a glam rocker and icon to the emerging English punk scene) .  Took then collaborated with Twink on Twink’s solo album and formed Shagrat shortly after.

Alas, Shagrat proved ephemeral:  they played only a couple of gigs and recorded a handful of demos, which is all that survive as any sort of musical documentation.  The demos are not readily available commercially but snippets of four acoustic songs and three electric songs exist on the Steve Peregrin Took website.  These are mostly very muddy and poorly recorded but give some indication of the sound of Shagrat. Recently someone has also posted cleaned-up versions on YouTube as well. Like Tyrannosaurus Rex, they show that the group was striving to keep one leg firmly planted in the acoustic hippie scene while also making a harder, more electric sound.  “Beautiful Deceiver” and “Amanda” are pleasant enough acoustic tracks that remind me of Oasis or Blur. “Strange Sister” is another acoustic song but one with a more primal stomp than “Beautiful Deceiver” or “Amanda”.  Though tinny and scratchy,  “Peppermint Flickstick” is one of the best electric tracks, and shows early flashes of the guitar prowess of Larry Wallis, who as mentioned would go on to bigger and better things in the 70’s.  This song purportedly tells the tale of a man who spends his life savings on candy bars because he develops a crush on a Cadbury's Flake girl.  Sonically it shows flashes of “Raw Power” era Iggy and the Stooges (impressive considering it precedes that recording by about 3 years) and “Ziggy Stardust” era Bowie. “Boo I Said Freeze!”, another electric track, sounds like early Pink Fairies (though a trifle less over-the-top) and tells the tale of Took’s arrest while wandering the freeway on acid in Los Angeles in ’69.  Anyone interested in hearing any of these songs should check out the Took web site:  http://www.stevetook.mercurymoon.co.uk/welcome.html or the YouTube postings by butlincat2.

Shagrat never came together beyond these demos and a tiny handful of shows.  Wallis joined UFO and Bidwell returned to Chicken Shack as they re-formed into Savoy Brown.  Took continued to perform acoustically as a solo act, often opening for the Fairies or Hawkwind, and continued to collaborate with various members of the Ladbroke Grove scene before dying tragically young in 1980 due to asphyxiation from choking on a cocktail cherry.  A sad end to another legendary 60’s persona.