Fat Mattress

Fat Mattress gained their chief recognition through Noel Redding’s involvement immediately after his time in the Jimi Hendrix Experience, issuing two albums at the close of the 1960s and the start of the 1970s. That link probably secured most of the notice the group received, yet the association cut both ways: the music bore no resemblance to Redding’s prior work with Hendrix, favoring instead lighter folk-rock, psychedelic, and early prog-rock approaches rich in vocal harmonies. Redding played a vital but non-dominant role within what was genuinely a collective, as fellow members Neil Landon and Jim Leverton supplied roughly equal shares of the songwriting.

The band took shape in late 1968, shortly before Redding’s definitive departure from Hendrix’s lineup. Redding had grown frustrated playing bass when his background lay more with guitar and when opportunities to contribute original material on Experience releases remained minimal. Fat Mattress offered wider scope for him to handle guitar and vocals while committing more of his own compositions to record. The remaining musicians, like Redding, originated in Folkestone, England; vocalist Landon had previously spent time in the Ivy League, and multi-instrumentalist Leverton had worked in Engelbert Humperdinck’s backing band, where he first met drummer Eric Dillon.

Attention from the industry arrived swiftly, fueled not only by Redding’s presence but also by the group’s support slot on an American tour by the Jimi Hendrix Experience, during which Redding performed simultaneously as the Experience’s bassist and Fat Mattress’s guitarist. Polydor signed the act, and their self-titled debut, released in 1969, drew heavily on American West Coast psychedelic and folk-rock acts as well as British pop-psych bands such as Traffic, whose reedsman Chris Wood contributed flute to one track. Though the record never matched the most distinctive work in those idioms, it featured several agreeable and skillfully executed pieces and achieved modest commercial traction, reaching number 134 on the U.S. chart while “Magic Forest” became a substantial hit in Holland.

Difficulties mounted soon afterward when the band attempted their own American tour, completing just five of thirty scheduled dates before returning to England. The follow-up, the plainly titled Fat Mattress 2, retraced the stylistic territory of the first album yet with diminished invention and personality, remaining imitative and suffering by comparison with other groups pursuing similar paths. Unable to reach a higher tier, the group disbanded shortly thereafter.