The Thanes

An Edinburgh group tracing its roots to 1980 first adopted the name Green Telescope before becoming the Thanes of Cawdor and has experienced repeated membership turnover across the decades, yet singer/guitarist Lenny Helsing has remained the constant leader. Jangling 1960s garage rock has supplied the defining stylistic thread throughout the band’s history.

Their debut LP, The Thanes of Cawdor, appeared in 1987 and earned opening slots alongside the Soup Dragons, Primal Scream, and the reconstituted originals who had shaped them—the Remains, Sonics, and ? & the Mysterians. The Complete Undignified Nobleman Sessions emerged in 1997 via Italy’s Misty Lane imprint, mixing original tracks steeped in 1960s textures with renditions of songs by Caretakers of Deception and the Guess Who. Third studio effort Downbeat & Folked Up, issued by Screaming Apple in 2003, was tracked at Liam Watson’s Toerag Studio in London and included a version of the Beau Brummels’ “Don’t Talk to Strangers.”

Material recorded through 2001 is collected on the 2004 Rev-Ola compilation Evolver, while the 2007 Larsen live set A Night in Great King Street carries the cover notation “recorded live in a dingy cellar.” From 2010 to 2012 the Thanes participated in the revived lineup of fellow Scots and 1960s beat/psych outfit the Poets; they resumed their own studio activity in 2013 once Angus McPake (guitar/organ/vocals), Mark Hunter (bass/vocals), and Mike Goodwin (drums) joined Helsing. The State Records single “She’s Coming Back to Me” paired an original with a cover of the Poets’ “Love Is Fading Away” on the B-side, and 2014 brought the Dirty Water single “Dishin’ the Dirt.”