In 1967, four young musicians from Nottinghamshire,
England, Leo Lyons, Ric Lee, and Chick
Churchill together with Alvin Lee,
formed Ten Years After and became one of the
biggest names and the most explosive quartet on the world stage.
Their now legendary encore, I’m
Going Home performed at The Woodstock Music
and Arts Festival in August 1969,
was captured on film and exposed their jazz, blues, rock amalgam
to a large audience who were blown away by the intensity of
the band’s performance when the Academy Award winning
documentary was released. Their ten-minute appearance in the
film is an acknowledged highlight and established Ten
Years After a place in rock history.
From 1968 to 1975 constant touring,
playing important musical events like The Newport Jazz
Festival, The Miami Pop Festival,
The 1970 Isle of Wight Festival, The Toronto Peace Festival
and huge venues like The Albert Hall London,
Madison Square Gardens, NY and The Budokan,
Tokyo, exposed the band’s music to a global audience.
It is estimated that they performed to in excess of 75,000 new
fans a week. Almost four million people a year, not counting
those who saw the band in the Woodstock film.
Between 1967 and 1974, Ten Years After recorded
and released ten multi-million selling albums.
Sadly, Alvin Lee decided to go
solo in 1975 and the group ceased touring and recording. However,
there has always been a demand for Ten Years After
and, over the following twenty-plus years, there were to be
three short-lived attempts at reformation and one new studio
record, About Time. Each time, Alvin quit to
return to his solo career.
Starting in 2001, to take advantage
in the growing interest in legendary bands like Ten
Years After, EMI and Decca
Records in conjunction with Ric Lee, digitally re-mastered
and re-released the whole Ten Years After back
catalogue, most with bonus tracks, including a “find that
had lain unnoticed – the 1970 live recording of the band
at its peak at the Fillmore East in
New York. Ric and Chick both approached Alvin with
a view to touring to support the releases, but Alvin declined.
It was a frustrating situation and once again it seemed that
fans would be denied hearing the music played live.
A chance opportunity early in
2002 for the three founder members of Ten Years After
- Leo Lyons (bass), Chick Churchill (keyboards) and
Ric Lee (Drums) to work together gave them an insight into the
intense, re-awakened interest in the band. By public request,
the band is back together. With new member, sensational, twenty-seven
year old guitarist/vocalist Joe Gooch, they
are recreating the music, energy and excitement they’ve
been known for over the past four decades.
Ten Years After
plays most of their classics, but it is not an oldies band riding
around on past successes. It has taken up the reins and is riding
into the future. Joe Gooch is fully conversant with all of Ten
Years After’s previous triumphs, but he has a
distinct personality that breathes new life into the band’s
performance and helps forge a new direction with this highly
respected team of legendary musicians.
Ten Years After... Now,
the band’s first studio album, was released in
April 2004 in Europe and came out
on July 18th 2005 in the USA
and Canada on the Fuel 2000
label. Throughout 2004 the band toured Germany, Belgium, Holland,
Italy, Switzerland, Scandinavia, France, Czech Republic and
Canada. 2005 proved to be even busier with tours completed in
Europe and concerts being finalized for 2006 in USA & Canada,
South America, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Dubai and
many other territories.
August 2005 saw the release
of TYA’s double live album “Roadworks”
in Europe to great critical acclaim. The band toured Europe
and the USA relentlessly during 05, 06, 07 and 08 but somehow
managed to find time to record a bunch of new material. November
2008 saw the release of the latest studio album - “Evolution”.
A long-awaited DVD, LIVE AT FIESTA CITY, was released
in 2009.
© www.tenyearsafternow.com - 2009
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