you have a fair point, sir.

Let's not forget the German TV companies who also filmed a lot of this stuff.

I think you're right, though the Germans were pretty good at recording all sorts of out-there music on "Beat Club". I'm not sure if they had Soft Machine on though, I'll have to check. Anyways, this video is incredible. The sinister, bone crunching fuzz bass, the massively distorted organ and super experimental keyboards of Mike Ratledge, and the frenetic, hard swinging free jazz space rock drumming of Robert Wyatt.

These guys were a musical force. So cool.

in englan' the tape would have been ERASED

Underrated by who? He's an integral part of this incredible band...

@@greengenie7063 He's underrated because you never hear him mentioned anywhere, soft machine in general is a seldom talked about band. Obviously to fellow soft machine fans he's not underrated.

Totalmente vero. Infatti, quando si parla di Soft Machine, si parla di Wyatt, Hopper, Dean, Ayers. Il ruolo di Ratledge, importante, anzi preminente dal 1969 al 1972/73, è stato molto trascurato dalla critica musicale.

As much as I adore Keith Emerson and ELP, his spot light should've been Mike's

You aren't kidding. He is incredible.

From the moment you begin to improvise, you are a Jazz drummer. After that it's technique, knowledge and experience.

But don't forget about the music. Don't get pretentious or use technique just for its own sake lest you want to bore your listener to death. I don't listen to Elvin Jones for a lecture.

Read Wyatt's biography - you'll find it on Amazon. It's a great, sometimes sad, sometimes awe-inspiring story.

And you will be a great jazz drummer some day! It's not an easy instrument though... I can play slower rhythms, but drumming requires not only both arms but also both legs to be co-ordinated, drums are among the most difficult instruments I've played! I'm sure you can do it though Soft Machine as a whole had a huge influence on my own musical style though, hugely underrated band

Kit was a gift from Mitch Mitchell

​@davidmarshall8201 thank you Noel an' Mitchtchtchch

SM were much better than ELP though..

Previous to that it was Wyatt, Ratledge and Kevin Ayers, another great lineup.

Brian Hopper played sax on Vol.2 (recorded around this time) as well as the early BBC Session version of Facelift, and occasionally live too. A little surprised he's not on this...

Well I never!

The three are really fantastic: Mike Ratledge very brilliant on organ , Robert Wyatt on drums and vocals, (his voice is so particular) , and Hugh Hopper on this astonishing bass, whose fuzz makes it sound near like a saturated 6 strings guitar, maybe with a little less power...

@@Marc-lq2qf Ha! Listening to Hopper's buzz saw fuzz tone, think he, Jack Bruce and John Wetton might all have been fans of each other back then?

you mean first 3! afterwards it becomes a non psychedelic jazz band.

@@schizoidman4646 i still like it in the background... long as Mike was involved it always had a bizarre beautiful angular sorta compositional bent. you're right though, the heart and wildness seemed to chill down over the years. "4" has wyatt's drumming at what i consider to be his absolute apex though, the opening track "teeth" is what a human in full ability and flow taste sounds like on the drums

ahh and the rest also. try moonjune records

You're absolutely right ! No SM without RW !

Check out the band 'Magic Bus' -- the UK one not the US one.

The cultural milieu is not conducive to this type of freedom and experimentation.

Merci à vous

not Wyatt it's Ayers

@@alexanderkomov2951 you're mistaken! ayers wasn't present after soft machine's first album, this video doesn't include ayers.

In 7/8 too!

Complete seperation of body and mind.... never seen anything like him getting the words out during drumming like that!! Beyond mental

@@alexanderkomov2951 Ayers ha lasciato i Soft Machine subito dopo "The Soft Machine".

Nel 1967, il timbro degli organi di Ratledge e Wright era identico.

I know right, this is dansable music...

What, Hugh hopper, hahaha

This indt prog, it's psychidelic, experimental, but certainly not prog at all - just master musicians going all out full of acid making music. King Crimson isn't prog either.....up tharrr

​@@JSTNtheWZRD You just tainted your credibility when you said king crimson aren't prog.

@@dylanhoke8991 they aren't. Not at all. It would be like saying Arthur Brown or Matching Mole is prog., they're all just psych. Or here's another good example - Os Mutantes - was and will never be prog. either. People throw that word around at any polyphonic exploration these days. Another good example is Gorguts - some people would say it's progressive metal. It's just creative - Pink Floyd also just creative. There's alot of Gothenberg progressive blackmetal, and Opeth, Yes, Emerson Lake and Palmer. But not Caravan or The Millennium, though it seems like it - dig?

I'm guessing this is in France. The French loved this stuff way more than anyone else. It's why Daevid Allen used France as the launching pad for Gong.

I just wrote that in the comments, then I saw yours, maybe it will get more people to read Pynchon - he didn't write everything under his/or her name - but did most certainly write V.

@@JSTNtheWZRD really? i didn't know that... what was written by another author?

@@dneville3874 not sure, but a few of his books (actually nobody knows who he really is so he can be a she) people have come forth claiming to know him, but people, well, I don't trust people - the association of American authors, writers has no information - I read in a college book about the crying of lot 49, that a few of his books were written by either a woman or an inner circle of friends, and were proven to be written by others later, recently. But I do know he wrote the crying of lot 49, V, gravity's rainbow, all the main ones - I do have reservations about the movie Joakim Phoenix was in - the book, "inherent vice". It's not his style - but I could be wrong..... V. is a masterpiece

As the later "The soft weed factor" was a take on the John Barth novel, "The Sot Weed Factor". Awesome writers, TP & JB, and important counterculture writers in the '60s who were doing to literature what SM was doing for music.

I Soft Machine erano inglesi.

😂😂🤣🤣

Actually it is from the self-titled passage, or rather chapter, "Esther gets a nose job", from the debuting novel of Thomas Pynchon, V.. I am rather surprised to find no relevant mentions in any of the comments.

Brian Auger would

It's not prog, man, jazz rock psych feeeuuusssiiiooonnn

And to the devil with zappa

He did a couple more albums with The Soft Machine, I think up to #4, did 2 more with Machine Mole, fell out of a window, lost the use of his legs. Came back in 1974-75 with his first solo album Rock Bottom, still makes albums and sings.

Potted Rodent I'm pretty sure the others members were pushing for a more jazzy sound and vetoed the use of vocals after Third. From what I heard they refused to play the first half of Moon In June leaving Robert to record it himself until the keyboard solo part.

***** Sounds about right. He still say Moon in June at the Amougies, Actuel thing in Oct' 69 so that must have been the end then. Then just the vocalisations. Shame really.

lewlew67 sang!

Hopper and Ratledge told him to shut up ! Big mistake ! Soft machine died a short time later and this band turn to nothing

A collaboration could have easily happened. He was a fan.

the drum kit kit was actually the thermogloss kit that mitch mitchell had in 1968, he gave the kit over sometime in 1969

@@milomeliora7271 yeah, but Hendrix would have to have filled the shoes of the remarkable Daevid Allen, the Softs original guitar player!

@Jeff Sylvester Sounds amazing! Where did you find that jewel, and how could I get access to it? :)

@@dreamerlaurent8291 Honestly, had Kevin stayed in the band, he would have been the face of the group

All entitled to opinions, but frankly you make yourself out to be a toad with such a statement. Wyatt is hugely beloved figure in British music, and his drumming was just first page of a lengthy volume. Do approach his work with an open mind and hopefully you'll reach same conclusion. Cheers, mate.

@@douggray8557 I tried really hard to appreciate him but I can't bring myself to a point where I even tolerate him for anything other than his drumming. In my opinion his drumming was excellent but I won't get past how little I like his singing. It comes off as him not quite knowing how to use the human voice as an instrument. I understand that he's loved but my point is; Mike Ratledge was incredible and is largely overlooked.

@@dreamerlaurent8291 I'm not sure ratelidge really wanted to be the face of the band, I dont think I've ever really heard him talk, or even smile. Some people are content to be in the background