Biography
Formed amid the Canterbury scene in 1966, Soft Machine navigated repeated personnel shifts until activity tapered off in the late 1970s, yet the thread of “Soft” ensembles persisted long afterward. Former members sustained the connection through projects such as Soft Heap, Soft Head, Soft Ware, and Soft Works, leading to the arrival of Soft Machine Legacy during the mid-2000s. By autumn 2015 the Legacy configuration—already containing three musicians who had recorded together on the 1976 album Softs—removed the word Legacy from its title and resumed performing and recording simply as Soft Machine. In 2018 the quartet marked the fiftieth anniversary of the band’s first album with an international tour and issued Hidden Details that September.
The sequence of these “Soft” ensembles originated in 1978 when saxophonist Elton Dean and bassist Hugh Hopper reunited with Canterbury associates keyboardist Alan Gowen and drummer Pip Pyle under a name that openly referenced Soft Machine, the ensemble that had brought Dean and Hopper their greatest visibility. The resulting quartet, Soft Heap, produced an electric-jazz approach distinct from both the psychedelic pop and jazz-rock phases of the earlier group. That year the four recorded a self-titled studio album for the Charly label; it appeared in 1979 and received a remastered Esoteric CD reissue in 2009. In effect the same musicians had already debuted on disc with the 1978 live album Rogue Element, issued under the name Soft Head because drummer Dave Sheen substituted for the unavailable Pyle during a French tour. Thus Hugh, Elton, Alan, and Pip constituted the “HEAP,” while Hugh, Elton, Alan, and Dave constituted the “HEAD.”
More than two decades later, in 1999, Dean and Hopper assembled another “Soft” unit, Soft Ware, joined by a third Soft Machine veteran, drummer John Marshall, and by pianist Keith Tippett, whose prior work with the saxophonist and bassist lay in free and avant-garde jazz. Although no album resulted, the collaboration indicated that alumni interest in referencing the original band remained active. Early in the new millennium Soft Works emerged, releasing the 2003 album Abracadabra, whose spacious contemporary jazz tone carried Canterbury and fusion inflections. The quartet comprised entirely former Soft Machine members: Dean, Hopper, Marshall, and guitarist Allan Holdsworth. Their tenures had never overlapped within the original group—Hopper appeared on Volume Two through Six, Dean on Third through Fifth, Holdsworth on Bundles, and Marshall on every album from Fifth onward until the Karl Jenkins-led edition disbanded around the same period that Dean and Hopper were performing in Soft Heap.
Holdsworth departed Soft Machine after Bundles in 1975 and likewise left Soft Works after only Abracadabra. Dean, Hopper, and Marshall therefore recruited guitarist John Etheridge, who had replaced Holdsworth in Soft Machine for the 1976 album Softs. In October 2004 the resulting quartet launched under the name Soft Machine Legacy, explicitly acknowledging the source of their prominence rather than merely alluding to it. While concentrating on new material, the group also reinstated at least one earlier composition, Hopper’s “Kings and Queens,” originally featured on the 1971 album Fourth, widely regarded as the classic-quartet peak with Hopper, Dean, Mike Ratledge, and Robert Wyatt.
MoonJune began documenting the ensemble with the May 2005 concert recording Live in Zaandam, issued later that year. A self-titled studio album followed in 2006, then two releases drawn from a December 2005 New Morning performance in Paris: the DVD New Morning: The Paris Concert and the companion CD set Live at the New Morning, the latter containing Dean’s “Seven for Lee,” first heard on the 1978 Soft Head album Rogue Element. Dean’s declining health prevented the planned February 2006 tour; he died that month at age 60.
Soft Machine Legacy elected to continue and enlisted saxophonist/flutist Theo Travis for the 2007 studio album Steam. Although Travis had never belonged to Soft Machine, his jazz credentials and prior associations with Canterbury-linked acts such as Phil Miller’s In Cahoots and later editions of Gong and Hatfield and the North made him a fitting addition. Further losses followed: Hugh Hopper received a leukemia diagnosis the year after Steam and died in June 2009 at age 64. With both Dean and Hopper gone, the remaining members—Marshall, Etheridge, and Travis—again resolved to proceed, recruiting bassist Roy Babbington, who had guested on Fourth and then joined full-time after Hopper’s departure, appearing on 1973’s Seven, 1975’s Bundles, and 1976’s Softs. The revised Legacy lineup therefore reunited three musicians who had performed together on Softs: Etheridge, Marshall, and Babbington.
In October 2009 the quartet toured Europe and recorded Live Adventures at German and Austrian dates; the 2010 release included Hopper’s “Facelift” along with Karl Jenkins pieces “The Nodder” and “Song of Aeolus.” Three years later the same personnel delivered their first studio album since Steam, the all-original Burden of Proof (save for a fresh reading of “Kings and Queens”), issued by MoonJune in early 2013.
Fifty years after the 1968 debut album by the original trio of Ratledge, Wyatt, and Kevin Ayers, the 2018 quartet of Marshall, Etheridge, Babbington, and Travis undertook a worldwide anniversary tour and released Hidden Details. Having already dropped “Legacy” from its name in autumn 2015, the group now performed and recorded under the designation of the band that had initiated the entire lineage: Soft Machine.
The sequence of these “Soft” ensembles originated in 1978 when saxophonist Elton Dean and bassist Hugh Hopper reunited with Canterbury associates keyboardist Alan Gowen and drummer Pip Pyle under a name that openly referenced Soft Machine, the ensemble that had brought Dean and Hopper their greatest visibility. The resulting quartet, Soft Heap, produced an electric-jazz approach distinct from both the psychedelic pop and jazz-rock phases of the earlier group. That year the four recorded a self-titled studio album for the Charly label; it appeared in 1979 and received a remastered Esoteric CD reissue in 2009. In effect the same musicians had already debuted on disc with the 1978 live album Rogue Element, issued under the name Soft Head because drummer Dave Sheen substituted for the unavailable Pyle during a French tour. Thus Hugh, Elton, Alan, and Pip constituted the “HEAP,” while Hugh, Elton, Alan, and Dave constituted the “HEAD.”
More than two decades later, in 1999, Dean and Hopper assembled another “Soft” unit, Soft Ware, joined by a third Soft Machine veteran, drummer John Marshall, and by pianist Keith Tippett, whose prior work with the saxophonist and bassist lay in free and avant-garde jazz. Although no album resulted, the collaboration indicated that alumni interest in referencing the original band remained active. Early in the new millennium Soft Works emerged, releasing the 2003 album Abracadabra, whose spacious contemporary jazz tone carried Canterbury and fusion inflections. The quartet comprised entirely former Soft Machine members: Dean, Hopper, Marshall, and guitarist Allan Holdsworth. Their tenures had never overlapped within the original group—Hopper appeared on Volume Two through Six, Dean on Third through Fifth, Holdsworth on Bundles, and Marshall on every album from Fifth onward until the Karl Jenkins-led edition disbanded around the same period that Dean and Hopper were performing in Soft Heap.
Holdsworth departed Soft Machine after Bundles in 1975 and likewise left Soft Works after only Abracadabra. Dean, Hopper, and Marshall therefore recruited guitarist John Etheridge, who had replaced Holdsworth in Soft Machine for the 1976 album Softs. In October 2004 the resulting quartet launched under the name Soft Machine Legacy, explicitly acknowledging the source of their prominence rather than merely alluding to it. While concentrating on new material, the group also reinstated at least one earlier composition, Hopper’s “Kings and Queens,” originally featured on the 1971 album Fourth, widely regarded as the classic-quartet peak with Hopper, Dean, Mike Ratledge, and Robert Wyatt.
MoonJune began documenting the ensemble with the May 2005 concert recording Live in Zaandam, issued later that year. A self-titled studio album followed in 2006, then two releases drawn from a December 2005 New Morning performance in Paris: the DVD New Morning: The Paris Concert and the companion CD set Live at the New Morning, the latter containing Dean’s “Seven for Lee,” first heard on the 1978 Soft Head album Rogue Element. Dean’s declining health prevented the planned February 2006 tour; he died that month at age 60.
Soft Machine Legacy elected to continue and enlisted saxophonist/flutist Theo Travis for the 2007 studio album Steam. Although Travis had never belonged to Soft Machine, his jazz credentials and prior associations with Canterbury-linked acts such as Phil Miller’s In Cahoots and later editions of Gong and Hatfield and the North made him a fitting addition. Further losses followed: Hugh Hopper received a leukemia diagnosis the year after Steam and died in June 2009 at age 64. With both Dean and Hopper gone, the remaining members—Marshall, Etheridge, and Travis—again resolved to proceed, recruiting bassist Roy Babbington, who had guested on Fourth and then joined full-time after Hopper’s departure, appearing on 1973’s Seven, 1975’s Bundles, and 1976’s Softs. The revised Legacy lineup therefore reunited three musicians who had performed together on Softs: Etheridge, Marshall, and Babbington.
In October 2009 the quartet toured Europe and recorded Live Adventures at German and Austrian dates; the 2010 release included Hopper’s “Facelift” along with Karl Jenkins pieces “The Nodder” and “Song of Aeolus.” Three years later the same personnel delivered their first studio album since Steam, the all-original Burden of Proof (save for a fresh reading of “Kings and Queens”), issued by MoonJune in early 2013.
Fifty years after the 1968 debut album by the original trio of Ratledge, Wyatt, and Kevin Ayers, the 2018 quartet of Marshall, Etheridge, Babbington, and Travis undertook a worldwide anniversary tour and released Hidden Details. Having already dropped “Legacy” from its name in autumn 2015, the group now performed and recorded under the designation of the band that had initiated the entire lineage: Soft Machine.
Albums