Iconic STRAWBS Revisit the USA

Strawbs have sold more records in the USA and Canada than anywhere.  In the USA the band had seven consecutive albums in the Billboard Top 200.  Their album, Hero & Heroine, was listed last year by Rolling Stone magazine as “one of the 50 greatest prog rock albums of all time". 

And, founding member Dave Cousins has been described by All Music Guide as: “the most talented Dylan influenced songwriter to come out of England”. He previously released, in December of 2014,  his long awaited, and critically acclaimed, autobiography  Exorcising Ghosts: Strawbs and Other Lives (out via Omnibus Pr & Schirmer Trade Books).   It was listed by influential critic Richie Unterberger in his “Top 10 of 2014 rock books”.

Strawbs are often mentioned in the same breath as progressive rock bands like Yes, King Crimson, and The Moody Blues. It is well known that keyboardist Rick Wakeman left Strawbs for Yes. Rick was followed by Blue Weaver; who left Strawbs to join the Bee Gees, John Hawken; from the original
Renaissance, Don Airey; now with Deep Purple, Adam Wakeman, and Oliver Wakeman, who, like their dad, left Strawbs to join Yes!

The Strawbs emerged out of the British Folk Movement of the mid-1960s, starting their musical life as the Strawberry Hill Boys, playing bluegrass. They moved into the mainstream in 1967 by making the first Strawbs album, All



Our Own Work, with Sandy Denny, a full year before she recorded her first album with Fairport Convention. That album attracted the attention of A&M Records in Hollywood who signed Strawbs as the first British band on the label.  Strawbs albums Hero & Heroine, Bursting At The Seams, Ghosts, and Grave New World define their music perfectly and are a must in any Brit folk, prog rock music collection.

Back again in the USA on tour, the current Strawbs line-up consists of Dave Cousins, lead guitarist Dave Lambert, bass player Chas Cronk, and drummer Tony Fernandez, who recorded and toured together in the 1970s. They are joined by keyboard virtuoso Dave Bainbridge of Iona, a band whose mystical blend of rock, folk, Celtic and ambient music has endeared them to audiences across Europe and North America for the last 25 years.