Chapter 3 - River Man

Available on bootlegs for many years their IOW session has now been formally released on CD. Whatever the success of their live performances Terry was still tied to his contract with Mickey Most and desperate to record. Legal negotiations continued getting nowhere as the band honed their skills.  The legal impasse was only finally sorted by the personal intervention of Ahmet Ertegun co-founder of Atlantic records who'd taken a personal interest in Terry. Top man in an internationally successful record company taking the time to sort out the legal wranglings of a  struggling english rock singer, happy days when record companies were as interested in the art as much as the product.

Let’s not overdo the angst though, Terry was making good use of his time. May 71 he got an invite to play at Mick Jagger's wedding to Bianca in St Tropez. Terry recalls arriving at the airport and watching crates of champagne being loaded onto the plane. He and the other passengers gazed thirstily at the crates, assuming the drink was being flown over for the main wedding event. In fact it was to keep the invited passengers lubricated for the trip by plane and coach and emblematic of how the next few days went.

Back in the real world, England, and the first proper Glastonbury festival known as Glastonbury Fayre was being set up. Terry was invited to open the event and the band with Alan White back in the drum seat duly kicked off; what has become the main event in the UK for 3 decades. They encored their set with a superb rendition of Dean which segued into a jam with Terry trading vocal tricks with Linda Lewis. Terry and the band at their best. Thankfully this song was caught on the film ‘Glastonbury Fayre’ oddly not available on DVD but, if you're lucky occasionally shown on television. Now thanks to the wonders of YouTube this clip is available to all.