Gentle Giant ( B7 )

Before embarking on the Octopus tour, the band played a gruelling set of dates supporting Black Sabbath, during which they proved to be very unpopular with the majority of the headlining band's fans. Derek Shulman recalled "It was perhaps the most ridiculous pairing of groups ever in the history of show business. For the most part we got booed off the stage." Following the tour, Gentle Giant underwent their most significant line-up change when a burnt-out and discouraged Phil Shulman left the band following disagreements with his brothers. Derek Shulman took over all lead vocals for live concerts and consequently became Gentle Giant's de facto lead singer (although Kerry Minnear continued to sing his own share of lead vocals on records).

Gary Green later recalled "As I remember it, when Phil announced it at the end of an Italian tour, he said he would leave the band. He couldn't continue on. There was too much stress being on the road and the family. Plus the brothers were having a bit of a difficult time. They're brothers and they argued like hell, sometimes to the point where you thought they were going to hit each other. But I guess it was brotherly love [laughs]. But when Phil said he was going to leave, we were all like stumped, 'Oh! What are we going to do? All right we'll buy a Moog synthesizer!' That's kind of trite; I don't mean it quite like that. We had to do something."

''Growing up, family, two sons, lovely little daughter, a wife who was getting lonelier and lonelier… No decision really, it was a foregone conclusion. My brothers, in fact, quite frankly wouldn't speak to me for years afterwards because I said "that's it, I'm going. I've got to go back to my family and I've got to go back and be a normal man."... I'm not saying how important (or not important) I was to the group, or anything like that, but my brothers thought that that was the end of the band. And that's absurd. When five-sixths of the band are still there, [and] I go - no trouble. And they did: they carried on for seven more years, folks, and that was touring the world and getting great acclaim as a very fine five-piece outfit. But for me it was the only thing to do. It obviously took something away because I wasn't able to listen to music for a few years afterwards.

Phil Shulman on his reasons for leaving Gentle Giant, 2008

continuare