Biography
In 1972 the Habibiyya came together as a psychedelic worldbeat ensemble steeped in Middle Eastern textures, coalescing around Ian Whiteman once the musicians returned from an earlier, transformative journey to Morocco in 1971. The experience proved decisive for Whiteman, Conrad Archuletta, Susan Archuletta, Mike Evans, and Roger Powell—several of whom had earlier founded the British rock groups the Action and Mighty Baby—leading them to embrace Sufism and, that same year, to record the now exceedingly scarce Moroccan psych landmark If Man But Knew.