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The Latest Breaking News from Peter Hammill

“Overwhelming to the uninitiated… it’s progressive as hell, of course, but also utterly unique”: Peter Hammill’s The Charisma & Virgin Recordings 1971 – 1986

183-song box set offers a colossal overview of the Van der Graaf Generator vocalist and eternal musical outlier

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“If you see him live, it’s insane! He’s just ripping his heart out in front of you”: King Crimson’s Jakko Jakszyk on his favourite prog vocalist – also loved by David Bowie, Johnny Rotten and the guy who did The Sooty Show

Known for a Marmite voice, personal songwriting and a powerful sense of drama, his influence runs deeper than most people realise

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“Let me just put this record on and clear the room! Or play it to a girlfriend and then wonder why she threw herself out the window”: Iron Maiden’s Bruce Dickinson on the cult prog rock mavericks who inspired him – but were too out-there to be successful

They played a gig at Bruce Dickinson’s school when he was 15 years old

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"There are so many elements I never expected to see or hear!" New Van der Graaf Generator film shines light on only US gig from the 1970s

Van der Graaf Generator - NYC '76 captures prog legends Van der Graaf Generator at their only US live show prior to 2009

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New Peter Hammill biography to be published in November

The 500 plus page ROCK and ROLE: The Visionary Songs of Peter Hammill and Van der Graaf Generator features many rare and previously unseen photographs

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“Do I ever look at Steven Wilson and think, ‘Why is he having top-five albums and I’m not?’ No”: Tim Bowness found catharsis in exploring forced isolation on Late Night Laments

With songs for the lost and the lonely, detailing trauma and loss – but hardly ever his own – Bowness’ intensely personal sixth album is another fine addition to his impressive body of work

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Peter Hammill to release 20-disc The Charisma & Virgin Recordings 1971 - 1986 box set in September

Peter Hammill's solo albums for Charisma and Virgin Records have been newly remastered from the original master tapes.

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Peter Hammill announces live dates for England and Scotland in September and October, his first UK solo shows for seven years

Van der Graaf Generator frontman Peter Hammill will play shows in Edinburgh, Manchester and London

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Rare, recently found 1976 Van der Graaf Generator live footage hailed as "extraordinary" by Peter Hammill

Watch rare, recently found live footage of Van der Graaf Generator playing live in Toronto in 1976

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“When the saxophone started we laughed and skipped it… The reason I dismissed them then is exactly why I like them now!” How doom and occult keyboardist Carl Westholm was converted by Van der Graaf Generator

Ex Candlemass and Avatarium member was won over by prog veterans’ Godbluff album – and it started with a photo of Mikael Åkerfeldt with Peter Hammill

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“I lie to them and change the goalposts… you build up techniques of throwing the curveball of discomfort. If it gets comfortable I change it”: David Thomas calls Pere Ubu “avant-garage” – but how prog are they?

They’re unmistakably American, but their lead visionary names Henry Cow, Soft Machine, Gentle Giant and Van der Graaf Generator among his motivators, and explains why his band is definitely not punk

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"One of the great man's most powerful creations": The expanded version of Peter Hammill's Incoherence offers a unique glimpse into the febrile mind of a restless genius

An ambitious peak from a prog maverick revisited

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“Bands that went from beauty to absolute hideousness attracted me – Van der Graaf and King Crimson managed to create fragile music that was then utterly destroyed”: The roots of Tim Bowness’ Powder Dry

Struggling to express conviction, the serial band member and collaborator went it alone for his most experimental album to date… although he didn’t use the pedalboard Peter Hammill lent him

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“We were held together by Sellotape and sealing wax… We knew our days were numbered”: Tired, broke and losing members, Van der Graaf Generator went down fighting with The Quiet Zone/The Pleasure Dome

Peter Hammill remembers trimming down the music and the name to spend 18 months in a ferocious punk-tinged endgame that resulted in stunning live album Vital

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Peter Hammill announces Italian live dates for November

Van der Graaf frontman Peter Hammill will also play two live dates in Athens in Janaury 2025

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"My girlfriend had to leave the room when I played the album": The 10 records that changed Fish's life

Former Marillion frontman Fish takes a trip to the past to explore the records that shaped his path through music

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“A Whiter Shade Of Pale hit people’s ears and rang some sort of bell… it’s always been a great mystery why it did that”: The life and times of Gary Brooker

Procol Harum singer’s first-ever song was one of the biggest hits imaginable, but he enjoyed many more career highs with and without the band that made his name

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“One doesn’t so much listen as feel it deep in the bones… their stark inventiveness and originality remain outstanding”: Van der Graaf Generator’s Still Life and Vital reissues

1976 studio album and 1978 live double album return from era of new momentum for Peter Hammill and co

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"It’s a maths geek’s love song to maths!" The story of Van der Graaf Generator's A Grounding In Numbers

Van der Graaf Generator's third reunion album, 2011's A Grounding In Numbers saw the trio working with shorter form but no less complex material

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“We were making very peculiar music not particularly well played. We got a record contract because the record companies thought, ‘We better get weird’”: Inside the mind of Judge Smith, the man who named Van der Graaf Generator

Inspired by the work of bandmate Peter Hammill and Frank Zappa, Smith aimed never to sound like them – and after working on large ensemble pieces and stage musicals, admitted he’d quite like to “just roll in with a guitar”

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"When he agreed to sing it just blew me away": Sheryl Crow releases cover of Peter Gabriel's Digging In The Dirt and he's on board

Sheryl Crow's version of Peter Gabriel's Digging In The Dirt comes from her upcoming album Evolution

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“Lyrically, it’s something that makes Samuel Beckett sound like Tommy Cooper." Tim Bowness and the story of Flowers At The Scene

Tim Bowness may explore morose subjects like murder and divorce on his new album, but this collection of “cinematic short stories”, featuring an impressive prog line-up, is certainly not all doom and gloom…

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“Our contemporaries had numbers that got people up on their feet cheering. We didn’t… We wondered if A Plague Of Lighthouse Keepers was the way to go. I thought, ‘We can’t even play this!’”: Van der Graaf Generator’s struggle through the 70s

Keyboardist Hugh Banton on deciding not to emulate Keith Emerson’s stage persona, how he got the band signed, and why it took him so long to accept the “prog” label

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The 6 prog bands John Lydon says he loves

Hawkwind, Van der Graaf Generator and even Pink Floyd – they’ve all had ex-Sex Pistols singer John Lydon’s stamp of approval

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“We broke up after debating the exact time signature of Solsbury Hill!” Before being able to enjoy lively debate with Peter Hammill, Tim Bowness dated an argumentative prog fan

If he hadn’t discovered the genre via a childhood Subbuteo tournament, he might have wound up working in flavoured crisps

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