Janita “Jenny” Haan (vocals) / Chris Wade (guitars) / Dave Hewitt (bass) / Geoff Layton-Bennett (drums, percussion)
We’re definitely into murky water now… I was away at college 1976-1979 and used to find it very difficult getting home (an awkward combination of having no wheels, having to use trains and having little cash) so I usually only made the effort for known favourites such as The Enid and A Band Called O, but this gig seems very familiar. I had already seen Jenny Haan twice in Babe Ruth and I recall being keen to see how she would hold up in this new band. So was I there? I’d like to think so…
Haan had left Babe Ruth after the fourth album in 1975 – to be replaced by Ellie Hope – and formed Lion soon after. BR bassist Dave Hewitt had left at the same time, joining her in this band and although they didn’t record anything that I am aware of, they gained a small cult following not far removed from that of their previous band. Haan’s raw vocals have often been compared to those of Janis Joplin and her constant leaping about and gyrating on stage were always winners with the predominantly male audiences. Pictures of this band are really hard to find so I was pleased to locate the one below, showing her doing just this!
In an online interview, Haan says of this time, “After the withdrawal of Babe Ruth, D. Hewitt and I moved up to West Yorkshire and started to putting together a band with musicians that David knew and also we advertised for another guitarist. We started to put together the band and in the meantime I had meetings with management company called Quarry Music who managed Status Quo who were very keen to manage us so we gave in to them. I think that after thought, when they had agreed to it, that I said (..laughing..) I wasn’t doing Babe Ruth. I think that they originally thought, oh you know here is a business and we’ll have you; but we continued and Jenny Haan’s Lion toured all over the England , Ireland and Wales. It came at a funny time because at that point it was just when Punk Rock really started kicking off and Johnny Rotten used to came down to a gig, very nice guy, and then we toured with Status Quo in Europe and during the latter part of that time I was being heavily pushed to go solo, which I was not happy at doing at all. I really didn’t want to do anything like that and I fought it tooth and nail for as long as I could, but in the end the music machine or the music business, whatever you want to call it they managed to crush the band, and we finished at the Macroom festival in Ireland [in 1978] with Rory Gallagher which was bittersweet. That time Rory and I were possibly going to do a song together which could have been great and there were talks of me working with members of Status Quo as well. Yes, [my single]“We Drove Em’ All Mad” drove me all mad, it was really a compromise on my half because I kept refusing all the songs they kept sending to me, I thought they were a load of twaddle and that one was the least of all evils. In the meantime the BASF commercial had come up and they decided to use Forgotten Dreams, one of my songs. So, I did the commercial for them and did the TV commercial and it came out and it won Commercial of the Year which was fabulous. No, we never wanted to recreate Babe Ruth’s music, Babe Ruth’s music is Babe Ruth’s music, anything that I do else is different. You know, it’s life (..laughing..)” In conclusion, I reiterate that I only might have been there for this one, but I honestly can’t remember 100%.
Setlist: unknown
Jenny Haan with Geoff Layton-Bennett and Dave Hewitt
Gigs'n'Stuff 