More on 1916

I don't often buy CDs at gigs. But only once have I gone to the table at the back of the room and bought the album because I have to have the song the band is playing right now, right now. The band was Stray, the gig was at the Flowerpot in Derby in 2010 or so and the song was Harry Farr.

As Del Bromham had introduced the song, about a young soldier, one of 300 executed in 1916 for desertion when they were almost certainly suffering from shell shock, I thought "what an unpromising subject for a rock song". How wrong can you be?

"September dawn, 1916
He stood before his executioners
With head held high, refusing a blindfold
Face the guns? A coward? No not I!
Harry Farr prepared to say goodbye
Harry Farr looked them in the eye"

All played over churning guitar and a rip roaring break.

Over 300 soldiers who were executed for military offences in WW1, including Private Farr, were pardoned by the Government in 2006. The cases had been reconsidered in 1998, but it was decided then that a blanket pardon was not appropriate as it was not possible to distinguish between those who deliberately let down their country and those who were not guilty of desertion. But in 2006, Defence Secretary Des Browne said that, while the evidence to assess individual cases did not exist and he didn't want to be in the position of second guessing commanders in the field, injustices were clearly done. But Harry Farr was the only executed soldier to request not to be blindfolded, so he could look his executioners in the eye. There was a Channel 4 programme about Farr broadcast in 2007.

"Freedom came at last
Many years had passed
A pardon for the man
Freedom came too late
Oh such a waste
Has justice been done?"

I heard Stray's eponymously titled first album at a teenage party in 1970 and quite liked it, especially the outstanding first track, All In Your Mind. But not enough to go out and buy it with limited resources and a lot of bands to follow, including Floyd, Crimso and Deep Purple. It was around 40 years later that I caught up with them at the Flowerpot, a smashing pub venue, albeit a bit of a dive. We had to leave early but not before I'd bought the CD "Valhalla". A year later they were back and watching Bromham hang his guitar from a hook in the ceiling and give it a spin at the end of set closer All In Your Mind, walking off stage leaving it wailing feedback, rivalled seeing Richie Blackmore trash his guitar at the Liverpool Philharmonic about 40 years earlier. I realised I'd been missing out on a great band.

As my son said when he came with us to that second gig, there are bands filling stadia who aren't a patch on Stray. After a string of reasonably successful albums Stray's profile slipped with the advent of punk and new wave. But Bromham is a very good guitarist, as witnessed by this quote from The Encyclopedia of Popular Music (1989): "The first wave of guitar idols were usually considered to be Jimmy Page, Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck. [I assume they were talking British guitarists here, Hendrix fans]. Bromham's past work should be reappraised as he clearly slipped through the net." This reappraisal started with Iron Maiden covering All In Your Mind in 1990 and finally came with the release of their 2009 album Valhalla, which includes Harry Farr and which was declared album of the year by Get Ready To Rock magazine. In 2012 Bromham received a lifetime achievement in music award at the Newark Blues Festival along with Andy Rogers of Free and Tony McPhee of the Groundhogs.

You can hear Harry Farr (album version with some relevant still pictures) on youtube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTUDJtSIyVM and see a live version from the Flowerpot no less (in 2014 - not one of the gigs I saw) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-XO18SUhso; this was posted by current Stray bassist Stuart Uren.

Many other tracks come up via Google or youtube, but I'd recommend:
All In Your Mind (full 9 minute original 1970 studio version): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVytzYONBic
and Jimijam, Del's super 1997 tribute to Jimi Hendrix, at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyR-VIFZG98 which I saw him play live in 2012. See if you can pick up all the references in this one!