Gryphon: Friday 20th August 1976, The Penthouse, Scarborough

The ‘Raindance’ tour

Richard Harvey (keyboards, clarinet, whistles, recorders, etc.) / Jonathan Davie (bass) / Brian Gulland (bassoon, bass crumhorn, recorders, harmonium, vocals) / Dave Oberlé (drums, percussion, vocals)

What a great night this was! I had missed Gryphon when first they had played the Penthouse in March because it had clashed with Status Quo at Bridlington Spa, so I was never going to miss this chance.

For those of you who are not aware, Gryphon were a progressive band with very medieval leanings, at least in their early days. Their first album is a masterpiece of old English style jigs, folk tunes and little rocky sections, but moving forward they developed a much more prog style. (As an aside, my favourite album by a long chalk is ‘Treason‘; if you’ve never heard it, do check it out – you won’t regret it!)

Publicity photograph.

As far as I can tell, I think that the band would have been touring their 1975 release ‘Raindance‘ because the next album (the aforementioned ‘Treason‘) would not be released until several months away in 1977.

It looks like I didn’t catch the classic Gryphon line-up as guitarist Graeme Taylor had departed by the time of this gig. The photograph below is of the 1977 line-up as I am struggling to find a picture of the band as I saw them. I remember being greatly amused by the performance, especially with the hirsute Gulland playing just about every woodwind instrument that he could lay his hands on, especially the crumhorn – I’d never even seen one before! The music was brilliant and they had us up and jigging about (we normally sat cross-legged on the dance floor unless suitably enthused) for almost the entire performance.

They obviously had four albums to go at in terms of a setlist and there is nothing confirmed on the internet so it’s all guesswork, as ever. Suffice to say that we were thrilled with the night’s entertainment.

I had their first album, ‘Gryphon‘ on cassette and I remember having the next three on LP whilst at college 1976-79. I would replace them all later with CDs, but I now have three again on vinyl (the only way to go!) and enjoy them still on a very regular basis.

A smashing band, great back then, and apparently touring again now (and with a new album out too!)

And as a closing footnote, in reviewing that ‘Treason‘ album Lee Lucas informs us that the original band played their very last gig at the Penthouse on 3rd June 1977; sadly, I wasn’t there because I was away at college.

Setlist: unknown