The halcyon days of Middle earth – London’s legendary 1960s psychedelic HQ are revisited and re-lived in this comprehensive 64-track, 3CD collection from Cherry Red Records
Release Date: 21st March 2025
Label: Cherry Red Records
Formats: 3 x CD boxset
NO REVOLUTION, BUT LOTS OF LEGENDARY ACTS
For a short while, way back then, we thought we could change the world. Our music could make the world a better place. People would hear it and become more like us, less like them. We really believed that. Trouble was, there were so many who didn’t – and never would – believe like we did; hostile market porters, voracious drug squads or people who just felt plain daft sitting cross-legged on the floor of an incense-and-dope-scented, oil-disc illuminated, low ceilinged room for hours on end. They just didn’t get it. So the revolution never happened, but we had so much fun trying to MAKE it happen…
This new 64-track, 3CD boxset collection from Cherry Red Records tells the story of the halcyon period – August 1967 to June 1969 – of Middle Earth, London’s famed and fondly-remembered psychedelic club. During that period, the club hosted performances by acts as legendary as Ike & Tina Turner, Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band, Family, The Yardbirds, The Who, Tyrannosaurus Rex, Canned Heat, Barclay James Harvest and Traffic. The list is, almost literally, endless. After the club was, by necessity, relocated from its King Street, Covent Garden, origins to the larger Roundhouse in Camden Town, it even hosted the first London performance by Led Zeppelin. It’s no exaggeration to suggest that, without Middle Earth, the Story of British Rock wouldn’t have got far beyond its “Once upon a time…” introduction.
But I’m getting ahead of myself.
THE EMERGENCE OF MIDDLE EARTH
Initially, the needs of London’s emergent psychedelic scene were met by UFO, the Covent Garden club that was the brainchild of underground figures John ‘Hoppy’ Hopkins, Barry Miles and Joe Boyd. Proud of its claim to be run “…by the underground, for the underground,” UFO held weekly Friday all-nighters and provided the venue in which bands like Soft Machine, Pink Floyd, The Crazy World of Arthur Brown and Fairport Convention learned their ‘chops.’ Sadly, following lurid interest from the tabloid press and the associated police harassment, UFO was forced to close its doors in mid-1967. And that’s where Middle Earth came in.
Housed in opulent premises in the basement of 43 King Street, Covent Garden – a building originally constructed in 1716 for the First Lord of the Admiralty before becoming The Grand Hotel in 1780 and subsequently playing host, variously, to a music hall and supper club, The National Sporting Club, The Players’ Theatre Club and a fruit and vegetable storage facility – Middle Earth opened for business in August 1967.
During daytime, the venue offered operated as a café, a rehearsal space for hippy bands, a clothes exchange and provided space to the drugs bust advice charities, Release and SOMA, the Society for Mental Awareness. Initially concerts featuring new, upcoming, bands were held each night except Fridays, the first of such being a performance by Shivas Children, Sam Gopal’s Dream and Steve Roth on Thursday 24 August. The venue’s first all-night event took place on Saturday 26th August 1967 and featured The Graham Bond Organisation, Sam Gopal’s Dream (again) and Fairport Convention.
RISE
The rise of Middle earth was a rapid one. The house DJs, John Peel and Jeff Dexter weren’t afraid to push the musical envelope, playing an eclectic selection of new music from both sides of the Atlantic. Multiple projectors flooded every conceivable surface within the club with bubbling liquid light – “…enough to make you feel high, even if you’d not indulged, particularly when strobe lights were [also] used,” according to sleeve note author Jon Newey – and house staff included Jenny Fabian, co-author with Johnny Byrne of Groupie – ostensibly a novel but, in reality, a memoir of life in and around Middle Earth. And the punters came a-flooding in.
According to boutique owner Jo Cruikshank, quoted in Jonathan Green’s 1990 book, Days in the Life – Voices From the English Underground 1961-1971, “UFO was exotic, but it wasn’t nearly as memorable for me as Middle Earth, which took your breath away. You’d go through these desolate, wet, streets into this basement in King Street. Into this great place filled with music, incense and drugs, this great huge warehouse with pineapples and bananas [note: the building was still in use as a store for the adjacent Covent Garden Market]. You’d go out on this wonderful surge.”
The list of artists that played Middle Earth reads, today, like a who’s who of everyone you’d ever wish to see. As well as the aforementioned examples, Middle Earth hosted acts such as The Byrds with Gram Parsons, Peter Green’s Fleetwood Mac, The Nice, Spooky Tooth, The Doors, Jefferson Airplane, Joe Cocker, The Small Faces and Mabel Greer’s Toyshop, the band that would shortly evolve into Yes. But, along with the blues, comes trouble…
FALL
Indo Jazz Fusion were performing at an all-nighter on Saturday 2nd March 1968 when Middle Earth was raided by 150 police. A further raid took place on Sunday 9th June during a benefit performance for the Release charity and, this time, the police stirred things up further by tipping off the already hostile market porters that they believed a child sacrifice was about to take place in the club. The porters invaded the premises and smashed the place up.
Middle Earth relocated to the larger premises of The Roundhouse and things went well for a while but the writing was on the wall and, on 8th February 1969, Middle Earth staged its last show, an all-nighter featuring Family, Egg, Arcadium and Steamhammer. A sad ending, but it sure was good while it lasted!
THANKS FOR THE MEMORIES
And, so, we’re left with the memories, and thanks to Cherry Red, we now have a chest-full of those memories all stored, conveniently, in a clamshell box, on three CDs and in an entertaining booklet. Packed with photographs, reproductions of gig posters, commentaries for every one of the 64 selected tracks, a fascinating interview with club DJ Jeff Dexter and a detailed, hugely informative essay from Jon Newey, the booklet is the sort of document that those of us fascinated by this period in music will find ourselves browsing for years to come.
And, as for the music, Cherry Red really have pushed the boat out this time like never before. Virtually all of those mega-bands mentioned above (…OK, so there’s no Zeppelin, Doors or Cocker) are featured here to provide an extensive taste of what a night at Middle Earth would be like (bring your own incense…)
DISC ONE
Selected songs are sequenced chronologically and interested listeners will be familiar with much of the music selected for inclusion. Pleasingly, though, Cherry Red have plumped for songs that aren’t too obvious, even from the better -known bands. For example, Family, the band that get Disc One of this compilation under way are represented by Good Friend of Mine, B-side to the band’s 1969 No Mule’s Fool single and previously featured on the 1971 Old Songs New Songs retrospective. Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & The Trinity and Elmer Gantry’s Velvet Opera get the same treatment with, respectively, A Kind of Love-In (B-side to This Wheel’s on Fire) and Salisbury Plain (another B-side) chosen for inclusion.
Amongst the established favourites, listeners can sit back and enjoy Fairport’s Time Will Show the Wiser (opening track to the band’s eponymous 1968 debut album) and The Crazy World of Arthur Brown are represented by their debut single, Devil’s Grip. The Bonzos are here, with Canyons of Your Mind and Blossom Toes – once leading lights on the UK psychedelic scene – are here, too, with Telegram Tuesday, a track from their 1967 debut album, We Are Ever So Clean.
DISC TWO
Disc Two highlights include The Incredible String Band’s Way Back in the 1960s, a song originally intended as a bit of satire but now serving as an interesting and accurate time tunnel. Ten Years After’s debut single, Portable People is an inspired choice, as is Mark Time, the final single from Eclection, the band that featured fledgling Sailor frontman Georg Kajanus as well as future Fotheringay-ers and Fairporters Trevor Lucas and Gerry Conway. Drinking Muddy Water is a late-period single from The Yardbirds and features Jimmy Page on bluesy lead guitar, whilst Beefheart chips in with Yellow Brick Road, a track from The Magic Band’s Safe As Milk album and the current single when the band made their first appearance at Middle Earth in January 1968. Similarly, Fleetwood Mac made their debut appearance at the club to coincide with the release of their single, Black Magic Woman, also included here.
DISC THREE
I’ve always rated The Byrds’ 1968 album, The Notorious Byrd Brothers, as one of their best and it’s good to see that album’s opening track, Artificial Energy, included on Disc Three of this set. The Mindbenders and The Small Faces each made a single appearance at Middle Earth, both during their days of psychedelic ‘dabbling’ and each offer up a slice of English whimsy with, respectively Uncle Joe, The Ice Cream Man and Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, whilst Free and The Edgar Broughton Band bring a heavier feel to proceedings with established favourites I’m a Mover and Evil. Canned Heat’s On The Road Again is a welcome addition to any compilation album, as is Still Worried About My Woman, the gritty, rocky, 1968 single from Chicken Shack. Magic Bus is probably my least favourite of anything ever recorded by The Who but, no matter, we can skip that one to move onto the delights offered by Barclay James Harvest (Poor Wages, the B-side to 1968 single, Brother Thrush), The Gun (Sunshine, B-side to their 1968 hit single, Race With the Devil) and Love Sculpture’s Wang Dang Doodle.
AN OUTSTANDING COMPILATION
Middle Earth – The Soundtrack of London’s Legendary Psychedelic Club 1967-1969 is an outstanding compilation, perhaps one of the best ever from the Cherry Red stable. If your musical roots lie, like mine, in the productive, boundary-pushing, experimenting-without-fear days of the late 1960s, this is a collection that you’ll love. And, if that period is, hitherto, a closed-book to you. This is a splendid place to start your investigations – it could change your life.
Not to be missed!
Get a taste for life in Middle Earth – watch this video of Tyrannosaurus Rex (featuring a young Marc Bolan) performing Sarah Crazy Child at the club in September 1967. With an introduction by John Peel!
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