RICK WAKEMAN never did anything by halves, not beer or cars (22 in the driveway at the one time) or marriages (he’s currently on his fourth). He lived to excess and played music to excess, as a member of prog-rock potentates Yes. So why shouldn’t I expect an excess of reminiscences about Edinburgh, Scotland and all the visits he can vaguely half-remember through a fug of booze and bombastic chord sequences?
“The first time I came to Edinburgh would have been 1970 with the Strawbs. After that I left, which enabled them to become successful, ha ha.” An immensely jolly man, Wakeman is 64, shorn of most of the girlie blond locks that qualified him to be prog’s closest thing to a pin-up, and with his wispy white whiskers now resembles a sagely walrus. “Ah yes the Strawbs,” he continues. “We were a folk band back then so we played these spit ’n’ sawdust pubs. Not just Edinburgh but …Arbroath.
“We travelled around in a Humber Super Snipe Estate, all the gear on the roof rack. When I got my Hammond organ these lovely lads called Forevermore – they became the Average White Band, by the way – let us borrow their Transit. They also had a roadie – very posh – called Gordon who drove but wouldn’t lift Hammonds. ‘Nah, I’m not carrying that’.”
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