Why, I hear you ask.
Well, as I’m sure you all know, “Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts
Club Band” was released on this date. No surprise there – probably the most
significant album release since the long playing record was invented.
But did you also know that “Piper At The Gates of Dawn” by
Pink Floyd was released on the same day? Also recorded at the Abbey Road
studios, and at the same time as Sgt Pepper was being recorded, it was the first
ever real incidence of proper, real progressive rock being issued by a
mainstream label (EMI). Even today,
“Piper” with its beautiful Syd Barrett lyrics and inspired introduction to
“Interstellar Overdrive” is a beautiful thing to listen to. Even today, I still hear new things, things
that I’d never heard before in the recording (digital rendition of the tracks
helps!)
But – on top of all that – and released on the very same day
on the Decca label, was David Bowie’s very first LP, entitled simply “David Bowie”. At first glance this had nothing to do with rock
music – Bowie’s first LP was a whimsical piece - Bowie himself sounding something
like a cross between Ray Davies and Anthony Newley. The tracks themselves were
little nursery rhyme like stories, sung with skill and panache, but containing
little of ‘rock’ emphasis that would be evidenced in later albums. However this first release – and the young
Bowie was only 20 years old on the album’s release date – was to be the
forerunner of, among other things, “The Man Who Sold The World” released three
years later and possibly one of the all-time great prog rock classics.
The incidence of three of the greatest rock icons of all
time releasing their albums (two of them being debut albums) makes June 1st
1967, for me, possibly the most important and influential day in rock history.
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