melody makers of rock – Daily Business Magazine

Andy Powell with trademark Gibson Flying V and Mark Abrahams (pic: Terry Murden)

One of the long-playing legends of rock have been back in Scotland with a new Glasgow-born drummer, writes TERRY MURDEN

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With a catalogue of 24 studio albums stretching back to 1970 there is no shortage of material for one of rock music’s longest-performing bands to choose from during their annual tours. Wishbone Ash are also just one shy of that number of members after Glaswegian drummer Windsor McGilvray joined at the turn of the year.

He had been working with former Stranglers frontman Hugh Cornwell and had previously stood in at Wishbone Ash gigs, having known the sole surviving original member Andy Powell since 2021.

McGilvray, who has also worked with Fish, Blondie and the Undertones, was back home this month performing with his new bandmates at Oran Mor ahead of a gig at Edinburgh’s Queen’s Hall.

The audience is now typically made up of those who have grown old with the band and are now of mainly pensionable age.While Powell is 76, he’s showing no sign of giving up on the touring schedule.

The latest Time Was tour takes its name from the opening track on the band’s legendary and mystical album, Argus. The tour celebrates the passing of time, resilience, and the band’s noted twin-lead guitar anthems that inspired later bands such as Iron Maiden and Thin Lizzy.

While the original music drew on traditional blues, jazz, and even folk, it was the melodic guitar work that made the original duo of Powell and Ted Turner stand out from the more indulgent soloists. For that they took their lead from the delicate and hummable tunes of The Shadows, Britain’s first guitar band, and tonight, towards the end of the classic Phoenix, Powell sneaked in a few bars from F.B.I, one of the Shadows’ biggest hits.

Andy Powell and Bob Skeat with new drummer Windsor McGilvray (pic: Terry Murden)

Sadly, while their forebears continue to perform with three of the 1961 line-up, Ash followers have watched in dismay as the band tore itself apart, with legal action over the name which means there are in effect two versions, with the band’s co-founder Martin Turner (no relation to Ted) focusing on the original material that he was largely responsible for writing.

So which is the real Wishbone Ash? Powell owns the rights, but some fans say Turner is the true inheritor of the legacy. To afficionados, both are tribute bands, each led by an original member, and with no chance of ever re-uniting one more time.

The set-list for Powell’s band features several of the early tracks, Blowin’ Free, Sometime World and Throw Down the Sword from Argus as well as Life Line, Front Page News, Underground and Helpless (encore) from the Laurie Wisefield era.

There was a sprinkling of material written post-1994, the year that Ted Turner left for a second time. Drummer Steve Upton had retired in 1990 and Martin Turner was fired shortly afterwards. To many followers that marked the end of Wishbone Ash.

Andy Powell performing in 1980 (pic: Terry Murden)

Powell decided to carry on, winning a legal battle over the name and this latest set featured some of the more memorable contributions to the catalogue, Enigma from the 2002 album Bona Fide, and In Crisis from The Power of Eternity, (2015). However, his vocals on Tales of the Wise struggled to match those of Tony Kishman who sang on the 1996 album Illuminations.

The guitar playing at times drifted into too much self-pleasing improvisation that was not the Wishbone way and tonight competed with Bob Skeat’s booming bass. The band needs to remember that it was known for its ability to make rock melodic, not just fast and loud.

For me, who first saw the band as a 15-year-old in the front row at Sheffield City Hall in 1972, there was one track that I was waiting to hear. Once again I took up a front of stage position as Powell began those opening chords to The King Will Come.

I was taken back 54 years to seeing the band stride out from the shadows [no pun intended] and the dry ice mist as Ted Turner hit the wah-wah pedal to play one of the greatest and most evocative opening solos in rock music history. Tonight it was Mark Abraham’s turn, and he did a great job, recreating the night that started a lifelong affection for a band that, even after nearly six decades, remains one of Britain’s best kept secrets.

Powell thanked the Edinburgh audience for helping to keep music live. Likewise, it’s long-performing bands like Wishbone Ash, now playing in smaller venues, that are doing the same.

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