Play For Today
This month’s impossible particle in rock’s quantum foam: the hauntological Moody Blues go via the Radiophonic Workshop.
Ithaca A Game For All Who Know MERLIN 1973
ALUMINARY of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, Peter Howell’s dynamic synth arrangement of the Doctor Who theme was beamed into millions of UK homes from 1980 to 1985. But back in 1973, he and musical partner John Ferdinando – AKA H&F Recordings – had more modest ambitions for A Game For All Who Know, the sole album from the project they named Ithaca.
“We only pressed 50 copies,” he says. “It was the minimum amount you could do. I think we sold about 30 of them to friends and friends of friends… even our relatives weren’t that interested!”
If mass acclaim was not to be, the imaginative private-press world the East Sussex duo realised was rich indeed. Bandmates since 1966, their first two, gently haunting recordings were 1968’s score for an am-dram production of Alice Through The Looking Glass (Alice was played by the BBC Today programme’s Martha Kearney), and 1970’s Tomorrow Come Someday – a soundtrack for a film depicting an English village threatened by motorway construction. The same year, Fly Away was credited to Agincourt, and moved into clean-cut, English-Aquarian sunshine pop. The albums are often described as psych-folk, though Howell avers, “Psychedelic folk isn’t something we were aware of.”
In terms of psychedelic, A Game For All Who Know most suits the description. Unlike its predecessors, it was entirely written by Ferdinando, who was then a trainee property sur veyor into Pink Floyd, King Crimson and, particularly, the conceptual grandeur of The Moody Blues’ Days Of Future Passed, On The Threshold Of A Dream and more. Howell’s tastes, meanwhile, included
Bert Jansch, The Shadows and Vaughan Williams.
“The Moody Blues were a bit cosmic in their lyrics and I can’t deny I was influenced by that,” says Ferdinando. “The songs were sort of anthems to, What the hell’s happening in the world? It was what was going around my head at the time, you know, as it does when you’re 25 and think, I want to change the world. Later you realise that’s not possible, but you have to dream, and there’s a fair thread of dreaming going through the album.”
He goes to explain how, as 1972 turned into 1973, they spent six unhurried months working evenings and weekends in their L-shaped, acoustically tiled studio set-up in Howell’s parents’ spare bedroom in Hove. Vocalist Lee Menelaus from nearby Haywards Heath was recruited via an advert in the local paper; drummer Brian Hussey had played in Howell and Ferdinando’s former band, then called The Tudor Mood. As co-producer and co-arranger, Howell made the most of their modest gear: his dad’s Hohner home organ was, it was discovered, able to deputise for a mellotron with the right microphone placement. Tracks were bounced using two Revox tape recorders (“a very good signal-to-noise ratio, so there’d be less hiss,” says Howell), while old telephones and odd pocket instruments from Hayllar’s music shop in Brighton were also employed.
“We’d put down a basic track, come back another day, do a bit more,” says
Ferdinando, who queries Howell’s description of the record as “John’s solo album”.
“It was very much a collaboration, a together-thing,” he says. ”We were working with very primitive equipment, but Peter’s very good at that – give him a tape and a razor blade and he’s away! Someone used the phrase ‘potting shed charm’ about it, which is exactly right. It was something we enjoyed doing, so we just messed about until we felt tired. There was nobody telling us what to do or when to stop. It was a luxury, really.”
Forty-seven years on, A Game For All Who Know remains the kind of absorbing oddity that could only be created in obscurity. A concept album of the then-current type, the six portentously titled acoustic folk-pop tracks fold into one another, enhanced with Radiophonic pre-echoes of manipulated tape and treated sounds. The lyrics speak of questing and despair, with intimations of cosmological apocalypse as the Barrettesque Questions (Did You Know? – Will We Be Alive?) posits: “Can you see the end in view… the moon and stars will disappear.” The more earthbound Feelings (Look Around – I Want To Feel You) moves from a rustic, orchestral prog reverie to a melodic rocker giving voice to the serious young man who also needs love in his life; closer Journey (ii) (A Game For All Who Know) brings a curious resolution, with its tape loops, Toccata In Fugue guitar, and quietly-epic baroque comedown ending with the sound of pages being torn from a book, crumpled up and thrown in a bin.
Promotional activities were practically nil, though Ferdinando does remember playing with Menelaus and Howell at the village hall in Ditchling as part of a variety show. Then, as 1974’s fifth album – the fresh pop sounds of Fragile, by Friends – was being recorded, Howell got a full-time job at the BBC’s Radiophonic Workshop and moved to London. The two continued to work on stage shows, but the end of their association came in 1978.
“It was professional work taking over from the amateur,” says Howell. “I’m sure John was a bit sad about it, and looking back so am I.”
Both, though, are pleased that their collaborations still have life and admirers.
“The thing you have to remember is that we weren’t interested in making it in show business or being pop stars,” says Howell. “In fact, we would have laughed at the idea. We regarded everything that we did as a new project. It was totally innocent… don’t ever use the words ‘vanity project’, though!”
Ian Harrison
“The songs were anthems to, What the hell’s happening in the world?” JOHN FERDINANDO