Soft Machine
Moon In June

Moon In June is an important milestone in the recorded history of Soft Machine. It is the last track on any of the ordinary Soft Machine albums to include vocals, Robert Wyatt's vocals.

For anyone not familiar with the band - named after a William Burroughs novel - here is the story in brief: Formed in Canterbury, Kent, England in August 1966 by Daevid Allen (later Gong and solo artist), Kevin Ayers (later his own Whole World band and solo artist), Mike Ratledge and the aforementioned Wyatt. The band finally folded in 1980, I believe, without any of the original members left. Different line-ups have included Andy Summers (later of Police fame), Elton Dean (well known and respected jazz sax player) and Allan Holdsworth (guitarist extraordinaire) among a host of others. At the beginning their music was a blend of pop, rock, soul, jazz and psychedelia with quirky and funny lyrics, what later has been known as Canterbury music. Soft Machine was among the most important pioneers of the British psychedelic underground movement along with Pink Floyd and the Move in 1966 and 67. Later the band turned more and more into a jazz-rock and pure jazz outfit. For further information about Soft Machine, check out the excellent Calyx web site of Canterbury music, or an article in the English MOJO music magazine of this very moon.

After two exhausting tours of North America supporting the Jimi Hendrix Experience, it seemed Soft Machine had come to an end by October 1968. Kevin Ayers sold his bass to Mitch Mitchell of the Experience and fled off to Ibiza to recover. Keyboard player Mike Ratledge went home to London while drummer Robert Wyatt - the last of the trio at the time - enjoyed the company of Hendrix, Eric Burdon and other musicians in California and New York where he did a couple of recording sessions in October and November. One of the songs he recorded was Slow Walkin' Talk by Brian Hopper (the elder brother of Hugh Hopper - the Soft Machine roadie at the time and soon to be full time Softie) with the left-handed Jimi Hendrix on a right-handed bass guitar held upside down. Another one was the first demo version of Moon In June which only lasted 3 minutes. Here Robert sings about the free and easy life in New York though he is homesick and misses the trees and rain of old England. Maybe it was an excuse to his wife and baby at home because he had stayed behind and had a good time on the other side of the Atlantic. Apart from the nice opening of the song where Robert plucks some metal rods or piano strings or something, the way the organ, piano and light hi-hat percussion are played and recorded is remarkably similar to the sound of his recordings in the mid 1980s and early 90s.

Anyway, another Soft Machine trio got together again in London by the end of the year with Hugh Hopper substituting Kevin Ayers on bass. They recorded the innovative and highly recommended Soft Machine Volume Two album during the winter of 69. By 1970 Elton Dean had joined the band too, and they had turned into a much jazzier combo. Robert Wyatt was not happy with the direction the band was taking which eventually lead to his departure in 1971. When he insisted on the inclusion of Moon In June on the Third album, the others were not very keen. It was eventually recorded - in May 1970 - though the first "vocal" part of the track was very much a Robert Wyatt solo recording. Both lyrics and melody had been expanded, the recording lasts for more than 19 minutes and covers the entire side 3 of the album (there are only four tracks on this double LP all in all). It's a very good version and together with Hugh's composition Facelift, it is one of the all time high from the ordinary Soft Machine recording catalogue along with most of Volume Two in my opinion. At the start there are traces of That's How Much I Need You Now, a song from early Soft Machine or pre Machine days. Robert demonstrates he is a competent keyboard player, and we get a healthy dose of fuzz bass and organ during the edited second half of the track, the trademark of the group of this era. Close to the end Rab Spall guests with experimental and manipulated electric violin while Robert recites from the lyrics of Kevin Ayers' recently released single Singing A Song In The Morning.

But we need to get back almost a year - to June 10 1969 at one of BBC's studios at Maida Vale - to find the best doughnut in this bag. That day Soft Machine made a live in the studio recording for John Peel's Top Gear show of the medley Facelift/Mousetrap/Backwards/Mousetrap Reprise and Moon In June. This version of our Moon lasts 13 minutes, and some 13 minutes it is! The playing by the Hopper, Ratledge, Wyatt trio is splendid throughout. Parts of the lyrics Robert put together minutes before the recording:

"I got fed up with songs where the main accents would just make you emphasize the words in a way you wouldn't if you were saying them, and I got interested in the technique of writing songs where the melody line fits the way you'd say the words if you were just talking. ... And that meant singing about things that were true as far as I understood it. And if you're muddled, the only things you're certain are true, are that there's a tea machine in the corridor and it works or it doesn't. This is true, it's not wishy-washy bullshit. It may be low profile, but it's true."

Here's the special lyrics for the occasion:

I can still remember
The last time we played on Top Gear
And though each little song
Was less than 3 minutes long
Mike squeezed a solo in somehow
 
And although we like our longer tunes
It seems polite to cut them down
To little bits
They might be hits
Who gives an afterall
Tell me how would you feel
In the place of John Peel
You just can't please all of the musicians
All the time
 
Playing now is lovely
Here in the BBC
We're free to play almost as long
And as loud
As a jazz group
Or an orchestra on Radio Tree
 
There are dance halls and theatres
With acoustics worse than here
Not forgetting the extra facilities
Such as the tea machine
Just along the corridor
 
So to all our mates like Kevin,
Caravan and the old Pink Floyd
Allow me to recommend Top Gear
Despite it's extraordinary name
 
Yes playing playing now is lovely
Here in the BBC
We're free to play almost as long and as loud
As the foreign language classes
And that John Cage interview
And the jazzgroups
And the orchestras on Radio Three.

What more is there to say. This version of Moon In June is probably the track that I've listened most frequently to since first I got hold of a copy some 15 years ago. The combinations of fuzz and non-fuzz bass and organ are more striking than ever. After about 12 minutes there is a break where Hugh plays one bass-note while Mike produces a fluctuating organ drone. You can hardly get closer to Nirvana (the state, not the band) with clothes and headphones on...

• Moon In June 1968 demo version:
  - Robert Wyatt: Flotsam And Jetsam - A special CD of rare recordings featuring Robert Wyatt (Rough Trade 1994)
• Moon In June ordinary 1969 studio version:
  - Soft Machine: Third (CBS double LP 1970, also released as a single CD)
• Moon In June BBC 1969 version:
  - Soft Machine: Triple Echo (Harvest triple LP 1977)
  - Soft Machine: The Peel Sessions 1969-71 (Strange Fruit double LP and double CD 1990)
  - Robert Wyatt: Going Back A Bit - A Little Robert Wyatt History (Virgin double CD 1994)
  

Most important source (where the quotation is taken from too): - Mike King: Wrong Movements - A Robert Wyatt History (SAF Publishing 1994).

Copyright © 1997 JP