* Original gatefold artwork. Insert with notes and images. * Eerie, dissonant and hypnotic, Third Ear Band sounded like no one else on the British underground scene. Their second album - often referred to as 'Elements' - was released in June 1970. Spanning classical, jazz and folk, with clear original influences, it's a lost classic that's reissued here in its original gatefold artwork and with an insert offering images and background info.
Formed in 1968 around a nucleus of Glen Sweeney (percussion), Paul Minns (Oboe), Richard Coff (Violin, Viola) and Ursula Smith (Cello), the Third Ear Band were unique in their exploration of exotic baroque music fused with experimental rock. Signing to Blackhill Enterprises in 1969, the quartet opened for many of the legendary Hyde Park free concerts by Pink Floyd, The Rolling Stones and Blind Faith. One of the early signings to EMI’s progressive imprint, Harvest, their debut album, “Alchemy” was released in June 1969.

This, the band’s second album, was issued in June 1970 and gained good reviews in the underground music press. Always fluid with their line-ups, Ursula Smith and Richard Coff departed the band in September 1970, some weeks after recording a soundtrack to a German television film, “Abelard and Heloise”, to be replaced by Ben Cartland and Paul Buckmaster. At this point the Third Ear Band began to explore a more experimental rock direction, stating that they would go “electric” for their next album, tentatively entitled “The Dragon Awakes”. Despite an album’s worth of studio sessions being recorded at Abbey Road studios in late 1970 and the Spring of 1971, the project was eventually shelved