Greenslade were never the most popular prog rock band, probably because they didn’t usually have a guitarist and preferred to keyboard instead.. Nonetheless, they were very exciting for us teenagers precisely because of this. They stood out and were regarded as ‘serious’ music. Not for tourists to flirt with. Greenslade were for students of rock like us.
It didn’t harm that the first two albums were some of Roger Dean’s best artwork and the fourth by Patrick Woodroffe. It confirmed their hip status for us, To go to school with a Greenslade album under your arm or Dave’s Cactus Choir solo record was to be very cool or at least we thought so in 1975.
I looked up their discography to see how well they’d done and was surprised to find that only Spyglass Guest, the third album got to UK No. 34 and that was all, which was surprising because the first two were a constant in our world in the mid 70s.
They even released a couple of singles in 1973 & 1975 but I can't imagine anyone thought they'd chart.
They appeared on Whistle Test in 1073 and toured that year, somewhat bizarrely, as support for Rory Gallager. Strange pairing and later were supported by the Gary Moore Band on one tour. They only broke up because they fell out of love with the management team who wouldn’t release them from their contract without being paid more than they cou;d afford, so Dave broke the band up instead. Their time was probably up by then anyway
Hands up if you bought The Pentateuch of the Cosmogony with the lavish artwork by Patrick Woodriffe, Coming out in 1979 it was very much against the prevailing trends and was comprehensively panned by critics. I seem to recall it was expensive too. In truth the music was at times quite dense but I liked it as I got older.
He disappeared from view in the mid 80s for a decade and died recently at 83 but he always seemed to me to be a 70s musician and Greenslade pioneers in the golden age of prog.
