Soft Machine - Hope for happiness

[stellarfunk72]

i have a question, do you know where the complete video can be seen because it looks like these are excerpts of the whole video.

other than that great vid!!!

[rocconrollo]

Who brought these Pink Floyd rambling kids here,they shouldn't be allowed here.

[kristoscan]

druggy man for real. the softies were organlicious.

[PAULLONDEN]

Fucking Great , but Ayers looks like bloody ridiculous psycho drag queen there.

q\♠ _ ♠/p

[Silvamedalist]

HOLY SHIT!!! Drummers are allowed to have microphones now?

[johntechwriter]

Mike Rattledge was England's finest keyboard player now and maybe forever. I'd love to hear what he could do with a modern synthesizer.

[MrEbertScientist]

@johntechwriter I can't imagine Ratledge playing anything besides a piano or that crazy distorted organ.

[thrashmetalkills]

the best lineup, either Kevin Ayers or Hugh Hopper is fine with me, I can't really enjoy the band without Robert Wyatt

[jdmac44]

This is what Pink Floyd wished they sounded like in their early days.

[bslz65]

@jdmac44 funny because now i bet soft machine wishes they sounded like pink floyd in their later days

[jonterhaar]

@jdmac44

ARE YOU KIDDING? They were all best friends.

[kuujjuaq58]

Robert's still with "us", appendages or not. Great stuff, as always!

[markveien13]

wow...

[wouldntyoulike2know]

So darkly psychedelic.

[spager]

RW's drumming is perfection!

[Adamboms]

I think this is the only Soft Machine video I've seen where you can actually see Wyatt's face

[TageSavage]

KEVIN AYERS FUCK THE WORLD

[drmJB23]

wow - incredible footage

[sptfgpn]

Robert Wyatt is nice attired in this.

[JustOneMeatPuppet]

the sky the sky the sky the sky the sky

[JHDthe8]

A Clockwork Orange anyone?

[joapmel]

na gostei

[TallFastLoud]

this still sounds remarkably relevant and forward looking, much more so than anything in the "rock critic canon"

[splayjanx]

o man. it doesn't get better… except unedited.

What are the details of this incredible footage?

[NewWaver80014]

@splayjanx This was from a French television program called "Dim Dam Dom" broadcast in 1967. There is another clip on YouTube where they do this song plus an improvisation.

[danielgalarza]

Every one plays very good his instrument

[spiralcosmosart]

Awesome. Never knew much about them until I just discovered this piece and I already love this music. Show me a modern active band that incorporates these lsd keyboard sounds with bass rhythm like this. Show me something like old Rick wright of the Pink Floyd and Ray Manzarak of the Doors and I will be your visual album cover art promotion servant till death do us part. REvive this style. Please Someone talented out there please!. Today's popular musIC sucks!

[theachtungtree]

ahead of it's time

[fabiodenaromonello]

matruzza................!

[marcfedak]

amazing early soft machine performance. It's amazing what an inspired ruckus only three guys can make.

[irvingmoses]

A real bad hair day for Mike, taking it out on the keyboard, and enviously eyeing Kevin's silky tresses with barely-concealed fury: you could tell Kev's days in the band were numbered.

[animalmother4]

While I love the Soft Machine, I feel they could have benefited more from a lead guitar through a fuzz face.

[fregot]

@animalmother4 Now, that is a stupid remark! Read your musical history before making such a fool of yourself!

[thrashmetalkills]

@animalmother4 the second album

[maurtene]

Not entirely, the song is cut at 0:57. I sayed because is the best par!

[EtherialMoon]

whoa man! incredibly cool

[GibsonSG1994]

Sounds like Deep Purple !!!

I love it ;)

[davivas679]

@GibsonSG1994 No it doesnt

[charlenesoraia]

i wonder how robert wyatt would have sounded if hadnt have had his accident... i still love what he makes now... i love to hear his progression of music throughout his life... but... my fucking god do i love his drumming!!!...

big time into his album rockbottom... i found a soft machine cd when i was 16 and im so happy... i only listened to it cos i liked the cover!! hahaha!!!

big love x x

[PeregrineTrousers]

Some real hair gonig down, not to mention the iffy pink n yellow tie wid der pink shirt. And...yes less we forget sinister black eye make-up in juxta wiv der ginger mullet?

Yet they is der shit... freak out...later.......

[valentynesuite]

wonderful cheap drumset

[68generation]

I didn't know them well, so I just bought their first two CDs, what an original band with a really sound so ahead of their time!

[killuminati63]

play that fuckign keyboard !

[xxxratedbuzz]

this is the shit!

[sheltershed]

punk my ass this is the prelude to trance and all house music.....for real wake up

[VINCENTECT]

Just purchased The History & the Mystery of Gong. The song I Am A Tree was truly "Green" before our time. Psychedelic music is simply Psychic reflex without barriers. I simply must have walked amongst the Hippies just a few years before my birth.

[PentaSwan]

I love Robert's outfit! Wow!

[VINCENTECT]

God, where is/are my Soft Machine albums? Thank you blessed vinyl!!!

Always wanted to lead a band like this, yet with a Punk thrust.

Ne'r too late to lay down tracks...all on a single chance. You just might influence some future leaders.

[evajom1]

@VINCENTECT

Why invoke Punk? Aesthetically this has absolutely nothing to do with Punk music, which is rhythmically foursquare and harmonically primitive. It's drive and aggression come from rhythm and blues and free jazz.

Why the "year zero" mentality about Punk (which began for all practical purposes with the release of "Anarchy In The UK" in 1976, almost a decade after this clip)?

It's like the Mormons, who feel that they have to baptise their non-Mormon ancestors.

[NeilThompson30]

@evajom1 - it has a lot to do with punk. Sex Pistols played to an audience with the very same ideas as this lot in 1967 - it was just dressed differently. It's all two fingers to the establishment. Have you read the story of Robert Wyatt having a job getting past the bouncers to play the Albert Hall - he's the first to say it was a noise - a beautiful noise though - I told Elton Dean that the Softs were punk - he was horrified - but I knew what I was talking about.

[VINCENTECT]

@NeilThompson30 You see that my impression was not so off the cuff, as it was a primal impression from a soul who was a young man when the Sex Pistols came onto the scene. Bless the whole mess. Follow your dreams and realities beyond the seems/seams.

[cherfirefly]

so so light years ahead. a power trio if ever there was...

[pinkfloydas]

one of the best psychedelic LP ever is the first LP of the Soft Machine!

[AristYdes]

this is crap like the pink floyd stuff right after syd barrett left

[mobile513]

@AristYdes

Nah. There's some similarity, but they didn't have half the energy and aggression Soft Machine does here.

[leach1527]

this is pretty wild now so you can imagine how this sounded to the ears of pop pickers in 1967

[dariu1s]

orgasmic, my fav fab softs.

why there are no such bands nowadays

[renzolikescheez]

@dariu1s Music stopped being made for the love of music. Now its made for the lovee of money.

[RodrigoOsO87]

@renzolikescheez sab but true ,dude

[1dotonly]

I'm pretty young but Soft Machine's music is just timeless to me.

[luke2963]

It's been cut around a bit this video.

[ulliheupel]

WOW !!!!

[Pur11zz]

I got my Softmachine 5th album autographed in white ink by the band. I still have it.

[acosebede]

shitty. listen to some gentle giant

[gugelhopf28]

is there a record without these short breaks all the time? a bit uncomfortable to listen...

[amriirma]

they were surely out of this world...

but I still remember 'the reversed alphabet' by heart.....

[beaverteeth92]

RIP Robert Wyatt's legs...

[Gonzalokraut]

@beaverteeth92 LOL

[spacemeddle]

@beaverteeth92 did he get paralyzed or something?

[SonofMrPeanut]

@spacemeddle Yep. June 1st, 1973 (only a year away from the classic live album), he was at a party and fell from a 4th story window.

[spacemeddle]

@SonofMrPeanut Holy Shit dude that sucks

[LSDCoatedBrain]

@beaverteeth92 holy shit i was like HES DEAD and then i was like ohh, his legs cus he fell out a window or something, god that must have been a fucked up night.... or day? But it doesnt matter, since really, day and night no meaning, its just that on a relatively regular basis we happen to be night and day. If it wasn't so fuckin cold I would go outside now.

[namaste91]

@beaverteeth92 the fucking life :P

[DanielBowden1975]

@beaverteeth92 Hahahah now that was a lol

[juiaob]

Haha, what's with that crazy inverted cymbal? And wow, did they do good stuff. I hope I could stuff 50 cent's ass with acid, give him a korg keyboard and see what happens...

[steffenla4]

It would most likely be rubbish, but it's certainly worth a try...

[obsidiansands1]

I adore the first Soft Machine album, think they kinda lost the plot on the second, but the jazzy stuff (right up to the point where Wyatt split) is really great material....

[66gadus]

totally far out! if mike ratledge took of his glasses all you would see is oblong holes looking back into infinity...........!

[VINCENTECT]

@66gadus Very insightful comment. Reminds me (as I've heard) that Syd Barret's job was done here. Helped by paving the way for the future wave of Psychedelic thinking. May all truly rich aural canvas' bleed music and muse, crossing thru denominations and skins and hues.

[H0spitaller]

ahhh you just have to love live psychodelics they seem so raw and full of energy ...

[Soulvigilante]

Woah; Kevin Ayers was years ahead of his time with the glam concept. Appropriately freaky for it's era as Jimi Hendrix's opening act.

[6907lankershim]

I saw them when they opened for Jimi Hendrix in Philadelphia in 1967. They were as awesome as Hendrix. Seems funny now because Woody's Truck Stop opened for everyone in Philly. Maybe Woody's Truck Stop opened for the Soft Machine.

[drunksingsheep]

So Rundgren met Hendrix and SM then? You saw Todd in WTS when he was 18? God I wish I was there! Did you ever see Nazz in Philly?

[6907lankershim]

I left Pennsylvanina in 1971, when I was 21, I didn't even know, until relatively recently, that Nazz, Todd and Woodys Truck Stop were related. Saw Alice Cooper in Philly (on Orange Sunshine). Those were the days. How'd I survive that era?

[drunksingsheep]

Yeah! It looks like Alice Cooper copied his eye makeup?

I'm so glad to have all of those early records, though I feel that Volume II will always be the best of the Wyatt vocal records.

Of the later: (Jenkins - Marshall - Holdsworth) era, "The Land of Cocayne" is spectactular! God that is such cool music! Karl Jenkins is a genius for sure!

[animalmother4]

they would have benefited from some tape echoes

[cyatheac]

my first ever album was SM6...never gave the earlier stuff (except 5) a listen, then moved on to Can etc...all the better to go right back and discover this and other SM gems 35 years on...

[flyspeckjiggle]

i was born wrong place wrong time. where can you find a band as good as that these days? r.i.p. hugh hopper by the way. (not in this vid but he was the king).

[Scotsyfication]

@amriirma: the song is "A Concise British Alphabet" (parti I and II), you can find it in Volume II.

[amriirma]

thanks scotsy>I found it!

[Marktheoldgit]

This band is my favourite of all time !!!

Fantastic !!!

[Julcisko]

Great, great, one more time great!

[amriirma]

ah the soft machine! from my cannabis history...

can someone please tell me (or better>post!) the song where they said the alphabet in reverse order? I don't know what the song is titled. I DO know, that I still can give the english alphabet in reverse order.... That much impact a song can have...

[cshaw419]

I'm sure there isn't a live performance of it floating around but it is called, "A Concise British Alphabet part II" from their albume, "Volume Two".

[DucdeCroissy]

2:08 2:10 nice light effects

[sigmapleide]

ROBERT WYATT. The last dadaist.

[subwoofer1975]

what names is the vocalist? sorry and thanks

[cshaw419]

this is just so great, thanks for posting it.

[Cheximus]

Why does that happen?

Robert was never too fussed about being a drummer, but loved being a vocalist.

The consequence being he was a great drummer and a - singular! - vocalist

[afkhajiit]

bozt cerpek

x

x

x

x

[sternumagnum]

One of my favorite vocalists.

Incidentally, one of my favorite drummers as well.

(MIke Ratledge was doing music for commercials awhile after the Softs. Bless 'em all, they gave us so much.)

[13mg96]

ROMPAMOS TODO

[xTjPx]

roger who?

[hcfcsonny]

kevin ayers mouth noises dont trump roger waters at all. x

[BRailman]

I LOVE THIS VIDEO

[CaptainHappenin]

wow! vintage piece

[filiesillo]

and that's how DJing was borned  azk anyone

[blackballplayer]

Did Wyatt's cymbal fall down? Hate the edit though.

[McMunchy]

Alright, Kevin Ayers' mouth noises definitely trump Roger Waters'.

:D

[burf69]

YES!!! Amazing amazing amazing!

[orlockcz]

Ehi... someone knows which is the name of kevin's bass in this video???

[meanalcohol]

Maybe... Fender Jazz Bass?

[progjazzfusion]

the bass Kevin uses here is either a gibson EB-2 or an epiphone Rivoli. they are nearly identical. epiphone was/is a division of gibson that makes cheaper versions of gibsons that look similar but cost less.

[progjazzfusion]

ok, it's the gibson EB-2. I could see the gisbon name on it in another soft machine video.

[orlockcz]

thans

[garygomesg]

That is a Lowrey organ; a Lowrey Festival I think. The Beatles also used a Lowrey (the intro to "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds") as did the Who ("Baba O'Riley").

[progjazzfusion]

Lowrey Holiday Deluxe. you can find them at rummage and estate sales all the time for like $25 to $50 or even free.

[majk2006]

RIP

[guswilliamr]

R.I.P Hugh Hopper, writer of this great song, you'll be missed :(

Angus

x

[BassLudeman]

His brother Brian wrote this one, but Hugh wrote I should've Known/Why Am I so short, A certain Kind, and a whole bunch of other early songs.

[bigboots]

what organ is that?

[clickswitchh]

hope for you to stop singing

[guswilliamr]

Did you know, that, Hugh Hopper wrote this song, even though he was not in the line up.. OOHHH

[ministercreek]

Great Song!

[amaro9009]

lsd

[plasticcanon]

ohh the snare rolls....

[Mickdog2112]

The fact that Kevin wore make up here is amazing, such a statement its a shame that whole look went the way of stupid metal bands

[jamalam17z7]

the days go by i watch the sky

[kocisko]

Just....FANTASTIC LOONATICS!!!!

BRILLIANT!

[RLW1967]

The Soft Machine were brilliant.

[ChristineCreature]

Love that you posted this!!! They are one of my favourite bands of all time.

[PAULLONDEN]

WEIRD to say the least...

It's good that they backed all that bullshit

up with those first two brilliant albums.

[ChristineCreature]

This is from Volume 1... Live performing is great for it gives creative space for improv.

[avialableman]

Here's another developement of Gene Simmon's makeup.

[nubient]

I think this is 1967, Kiss weren't even though of.

[avialableman]

The influence can be from many many years before Kiss. 6 years between is not so long.

[yhcranaalex]

SO Alice Cooper is another candidate you would say, just because he wore make up too?

[avialableman]

By the way! His makeup was even closer to Kevin's.

[yhcranaalex]

Who really cares?

[gharrincia]

CRAZIE

[twolunches]

Love that Ratledge university challenge look. The guy's a don.

[lynus111]

I hate Kevin Ayers, why out of all the canterbury lot do I feel he is the only one trying hard to play "Rockstar"

[chaspagano]

God.

[savenolanow]

i really like this song! i can definitely see the similarities to pink floyd.

and in 67...this must have been crazy to hear

[lumpagogo]

These people were jazz musicians/acid rock types. To some of us, it's ear-splitting noise. Ouch. It's an ouch-me!

Stop this. Where's my stoppage?

[guswilliamr]

truly fucking aweful?

You sir are an arse head

[WillShakespeare2007]

I came to this as a virgin to their music and sorry to say this to those that have memories here but. This is truly fucking awful.

[bishopk99]

Robert Wyatt didnt get enough credit as a drummer. His voice could have used some work, but considering the fact that he has to play while singing, its excusable. Now that i think about it, a good singing voice wouldnt have been relevant to this band because im sure the people who like soft machine are more into the music. I know i don't pay attention to the singing when i listen to soft machine or any other band.

[sparksrule]

He's a lovely sad voice.

His drumming's second to none

[JimMcCartyandCo]

I agree!!! RW has always been a major influence of mine, especially singingwise, as I will never be able to achieve what he's done with the drums in this lifetime, I'm afraid!...

I also wish I'd be running a YT channel tribute for him... but destiny has decided otherwise!...

Thank God, we have Siroen! ;-)

[Beadbud5000]

Awesome film footage and rare! They were proficient excellent musicians, bizarre though they might be. I love it!

[Wormtongue13]

That keyboard guy from the Doors is a poser.

[kzart15]

Dude, you have no idea what you're talking about. Ray manzarek is like one of the greatest and well known keyboardist of all time.

[Wormtongue13]

Facetiousness is even harder to convey via internet than sarcasm. I dig Ray, but [in my exclusive opinion, of course] Mike Ratledge was way out ahead of him as a player of cutting edge music. Ray was great at coming up with show tunes for Jim. I'm sure one day there will be a big Broadway musical based on Doors music, probably not for Soft Machine, even though Robert Wyatt wrote better lyrics, and is still creating brilliant new music. Manzerak keeps tying to milk the past, bless his heart.

[SavagesInMyTown]

this sucks

[RodrigoOsO87]

bad audio:S:S:S:S:S:S:S:

this song is AWESOME

[crom666doom]

Wicked! Love Soft Machine's earlier stuff and I too was born far too late (71), but at least there was a bigger back catalogue of awesome music from round the globe ready when I hatched into a teenager. Got me through the horror of the eighties' music, (shudder)

[CadillacL]

I was SO born in the wrong era (1971) I'd love to be able to go back in time & witness this first hand. Music from the late 60's/early 70's like this can't be beat. All I can say is wow.

[bobgreen623]

me too my friend, born in '56 so I was just getting aware SOMETHING WAS HAPPENING when this was going on. Unfortunately rather than being put off by all the scare stories in the media about wierdos getting high by smoking LSD in syringes and all that it exerted a lifelong fascination. I love this stuff!!

[GecSword]

...Smoking LSD?  What?

[Beadbud5000]

They forgot their comma

[GecSword]

Ok so apparently my question warrents a negative.

Smoking LSD is, as far as I know, not possible.

Explain?

[kharmabum]

Cannot smoke it no.

[MeTube77770]

Wow! Ratledge with an afro and Ayers with mascara! That was the '60s!

[yaiknowscrewme]

bad ass rivoli bass

[11Jamie11]

I like a lot of this old stuff, but this song doesn't do anything for me. At least, not upon first playing; if I ever listen to it again, who knows?

[boogster123321]

what kind of organ is Mike playing?

and can you still get one

[prospero555]

I saw the Softs a few times, the first time at a free open air concert in London. I haev always believed that he used a Lowrey Holiday organ (very untrendy then and now) but a change for the usual Hammond sound I guess. Personally I would always prefer the Hammond sound

[boogster123321]

yeah i saw a video where they said he used that i looked them up and there pretty bizarre and hard to find.

[runway27r]

Alright, so where is the entire clip(s) available????

[koolbossjock]

I saw these guys at the shrine on Ca.They opened for Hendrix.The bill was Soft Machine/Electric Flag/Blue Cheer and Hendrix.I went fron a Beatle haircut to parting it down the middle after that concert.That song we did it again seemed to last for ever.

[borishawthorn]

Yes. This is very rubbish. Although i love GONG. Oh actually, this is fucking ace! They're fucking mental, man! Wow I'm excitededededededed where's Syd Borat?