The Gods of Rock are Dying - Part I, Alvin Lee

The Gods of Rock are Dying - Part I, Alvin Lee

Dear Hank,

I read in Time Magazine this week that Alvin Lee died. (The Time with the new Pope on the cover. When did he get elected? How long did that take? Five minutes? I missed it. Oh well.)

They did a good write up on Alvin. He was the lead singer and lead guitarist of the band Ten Years After, so named because they came along ten years after Elvis. (Elvis was ’57, they were ’67, and the Beatles were in between in ’63.) 

Time correctly points out that Ten Years After made a big hit at Woodstock, both live and in the movie. I think Alvin Lee ended up carrying a watermelon off-stage that someone gave him - such were the times. Ten Years After made three albums and then faded from the scene, apparently Alvin Lee was more interested in long solos then hit records. They had a certain in-your-face bad-boy image. One of their signature songs was School Girl. The original had a chorus something like this, “Wake up, little school girl, hey hey.” By the time Ten years After did it the chorus was, “I want to ball you. I want to ball you all night long.” Clearly, things had changed. 

When I saw Ten Years After it was the year after Woodstock. They were playing in New York City in Central Park. Schaeffer Beer used to put on this summer music festival at The Wolman Skating Rink. I saw Led Zepplin there - first tour. It may have been their first stop because they weren’t very good, or very well known. Tickets were $2; $3 if you wanted to sit in the grand stand at the back.

Ten Years After came to play. I knew their songs because I had bought at least two of their albums. They had a song that had a several chord lead in to the vocals. The first vocal was a growly scream by Lee. 

Think of House of the Rising Sun as done by the Animals. There are some minor chords that lead into the first words, think of that cadence, that pace and you’ve got the timing and the sense of this song’s lead in. Think of the opening words as if they were chords: There is ... A house ... in New .. Orleans .

Now imagine that at that point there’s a big growly yell - similar to what Eric Burton does but more primal - more Ted Nugent.

Alvin Lee starts the song. He begins to play the chords. He’s ten, maybe twelve feet from the microphone. The microphone is center stage on a stand all by itself. He’s smoking a cigarette. Not actually smoking as much as dangling from his lips. A long thin white stick sitting casually almost forgotten on the right side of his mouth. He’s looking down at the body of his guitar as he begins to play. His hair is parted in the middle and comes down in an extended pageboy to below his chin. Because his head is leaning forward his hair is coming down on either side of his face. The cigarette is almost holding back the hair.

I know the song. I know the lead in chords. I know he’s got only so many chords before he has to be at the mic to belt out the scream. The pace to the chords is key. Yet, he’s got the cigarette in his mouth. How is he going to put that down? He has no break in the lead in. He’s too far from the mic to even make it in time to hit the growl.

As if to answer all those questions that had barely formed in my mind; Lee took two big steps forward and on the third he spat out the cigarette and it shot across the stage just as he got to the mic stand, and let out the scream, just in time. It was a three part play in a few seconds: the steps, the cigarette ejection, the scream.

It galvanized the crowd. They went wild.

That was Alvin Lee.

That was Ten Years After.