The cult-like following of Captain Beyond
As more and more music legends die, Bobby Caldwell has a simple message for fans: See your favorites while you can. You never know when the next time they play near you will be the last.
Both Johnny Winter and Greg Allman, who Caldwell drummed for in the early ‘70s, are gone. He can be heard on both their seminal live albums recorded at Filmore East, along with Rick Derringer’s All American Boy (that’s him drumming on Rock and Roll Hoochie Koo) and its follow-up Spring Fever.
He has played with John Lennon, Eric Clapton and Ringo Starr. Some have died. The others, you should see while you still can, urges Caldwell.
“I don’t think there’s any doubt about that view point,” he says. “I tell people to go do it. If you’ve always wanted to see Roger McGuinn and the Byrds, you better go see him now.
“They may just retire. Jeff Beck could retire tomorrow and say ‘I’ve had enough of this.’ If people never saw him, well, they never saw him.”
The same could be said of Caldwell’s legendary cult band Captain Beyond. Their devoted following feared the moment to see them was gone forever until Caldwell whipped up a new incarnation and hit the road this year. Much to some fans’ disbelief.
Caldwell says it was simply a matter of giving the group’s small but devoted following what they want. And what they wanted was to hear tracks from the band’s spacey, influential early ‘70s albums performed live.
Local fans get their chance Aug. 25 at the Seneca Niagara Casino’s Bear’s Den Showroom.
“It’s really about the demand, because it just seems to grow and grow about Captain Beyond,” he says. “It’s unbelievable. A friend of mine, a big music fan, said ‘Bobby, you’ve got to remember something — all these things are just turning over.’”
Formed in 1971, Captain Beyond was pieced together with members from Deep Purple (Rod Evans) and Iron Butterfly (Lee Dorman and Larry ‘Rhino’ Reinhardt). The band’s self-titled debut in 1972 is one of prog rock’s unheralded gems of the decade, a complex mix of rugged rock with jazzy detours.
They weren’t quite like bigger acts like Yes, ELP or Genesis, which was by design.
“We were doing our own thing,” says Caldwell. “We did not try to sound like a blues band, we didn’t try to sound like somebody else, and we seemed to gain a lot of separation from the other groups. Which is the name of the game. You don’t want to be lumped into that same basket, or you’ll never be found.”
Caldwell briefly left after the first album to play with Derringer, and while the band’s second album, Sufficiently Breathless, was wellreceived, tensions were taking over. Lead singer Evans quit, and the band split the following year.
“Just when we were at that pinnacle, headlining everywhere we went, is when the singer decided he had enough. That’s all you need to let the air out of the tires.”
Though the band took one more crack with 1977’s third album, Dawn Explosion, they pulled the plug in 1978.
And their legend grew. Drummers like Jimmy Chamberlin of Smashing Pumpkins and Taylor Hawkins of Foo Fighters gave them shout-outs, and the band’s first two albums gained an all new following over the decades.
Which prompted Caldwell to bring them back. He’s the only original member in a new line-up that includes Simon Lund, Jamie Holka, Jeff Artabasy and Don Bonzi.
“I wasn’t trying to re-invent anything as much as I was trying to find some competent people that identify with the music,” he says. “If you like to play a certain style of music and you’re a good player but you don’t identify with it, it isn’t going to mean anything.”
Fans, meanwhile, are thrilled to finally hear the likes of Dancing Madly Backwards and Distant Sun live.
“A lot of these people never heard the music performed, so they’re ecstatic about that.”
And they should be. While prog rock often gets sneered at, only a select few can play it.
“This music is extremely difficult,” he says. “It is demanding, it is not the kind of rock and roll you just cruise through. There’s no cruising with this stuff. If you make a wrong turn, you’re in trouble.”