Pip Pyle
drums
Pip was born in
Sawbridgeworth (Hertfordshire) in 1950 and became friends with Phil and Steve
Miller whose family lived next door. In 1966 at the age of 16 Pip with the
Miller brothers and their friend Jack Monck (later replaced by Roy Babbington
and augmented by Carol Grimes) formed Delivery, whose album Fools Meeting was
recently re-released by Voiceprint. After Delivery Pip played briefly with blues
band Chicken Shack and in February 1971, as he was about to join Steve Hillage's
new band Khan, he got a call for help from Robert Wyatt who was in the studio
recording drum parts for Daevid Allen's Banana Moon album. There was a track
which Robert, for some reason, couldn't face doing himself, so he asked Pip to
do it. This led to Pip joining Gong, taking his family to France where he lived
and worked as part of Gong for a year. Back in England Pip joined singer Paul
Jones' backing band alongside guitarist Gary Boyle and Roy Babbington. In the
summer of 1972 Pip with the Miller brothers and Richard Sinclair reformed
Delivery. Then Dave Sinclair replaced Steve, and was later replaced by Dave
Stewart, at which point Hatfield and the North came into being. Hatfield lasted
until June 1975, with Pip contributing most of the lyrics and a fair share of
the compositions. After the break-up, Pip played with various musicians on the
London jazz scene in clubs and workshops. He had a group with Elton Dean, Keith
Tippett and Jim Richardson on bass, called the Weightwatchers, touring Europe in
1976. In 1977 after Bill Bruford's departure Pip joined National Health, which
was formed after the break-up of Hatfield and played on the band's three studio
albums. He wrote "Binoculars" recorded on Of Queues And Cures (1979). During the
last period he wrote "Foetal Fandango" later used on Equip'Out's first album and
"Seven Sisters" which recently appeared on his solo album Seven Year Itch. By
the time of National Health's demise, Pip had been involved in Soft Heap, a
parallel jazz band, for a couple of years. The original line-up of Elton Dean,
Alan Gowen, Hugh Hopper and Pip underwent changes, with Hugh's replacement by
John Greaves and, after Alan's untimely death in 1981, Mark Hewins on guitar. In
1980-81 Pip was also involved in Rapid Eye Movement, led by Dave Stewart with
Jakko Jakszyk (guitar and vocals) and Rick Biddulph (bass and vocals). Later in
1981, after Alan's death, Pip took part in the reformation of National Health to
do a record of Alan's tunes found written out in Alan's music room plus three
gigs, the Edinburgh Festival and two in London. Pip played on John Greaves'
first solo album Accident and for a few gigs with T-Mit with Richard Sinclair,
Mark Hewins (guitar) and Vince Clarke (percussion). In November 1982, Pip was a
founding member of Phil Miller's In Cahoots and has remained in the band for
nearly fifteen years. In 1984 he met French pianist Sophia Domancich with whom
he formed Equip'Out. The pair's first project was a quartet with ex-Edition
Speciale keyboard player Ann Ballester and Urban Sax bass player Bernard Weber.
In December of that year, Equip'Out was formed with Elton Dean, Hugh Hopper and
Didier Malherbe and a first album was recorded the following year. Apart from
"Foetal Fandango" the material was written by Sophie and Hugh. In 1985-86 Pip
worked extensively with French guitarist Patrice Meyer alongside Hugh Hopper for
several tours and the album Dromadaire Viennois (1987). In 1988 Hugh left
Equip'Out. Charles Calamel, the bass player from Sophie's own Trio Davenport,
joined for a while, as did guitarist Mimi Lorenzini. Eventually, the band became
a quartet again with the addition of British double bass player Paul Rogers. A
second album was recorded in 1990 with one piece by Pip, the others being penned
by Sophie and Elton. In 1991 Pip was a founding member of Short Wave with Hugh
Hopper, Didier Malherbe and Phil Miller. He also rejoined Gong during the
sessions of Shapeshifter (1992), having played at the band's televised
reformation concert in April 1990 and toured regularly with them between 1992
and 1996. He took part in the 1994 25th Anniversary concerts, even replacing
Pierre Moerlen at the last minute in the 'Trilogy Line-Up' set. This led to
extensive American and European tours with Gong in 1996. He has also played in
the backing bands of John Greaves, Mimi Lorenzini, Didier Malherbe, Faton Cahen,
Claude Barthélémy, Michel Godard, Emmanuel Bex and the trio Tertio with Patrice
Meyer on guitar among others. Between 1991 and 1997 Pip was also hard at work on
his long-awaited debut solo album, the aptly titled Seven Year Itch, which was
finally finished in time for an autumn 1998 release. The prestigious line-up
assembled on the album reads like a who's who of the Canterbury scene : John
Greaves, Richard Sinclair, Dave Stewart, Phil Miller, Elton Dean, Hugh Hopper,
Barbara Gaskin, Jakko Jakszyk, Michel Godard, Didier Malherbe, Fred Baker,
François Ovide, Paul Rogers, Alain and Yvon Guillard, etc. In 1997 Pip left Gong
to make way for Pierre Moerlen's return to the fold. In 1998, he joined forces
with Daevid Allen, Hugh Hopper and Mark Kramer in Brainville for dates in the UK
and the US, documented on a recent CD, although he has since been replaced by
Chris Cutler. With Short Wave and Equip'Out both inactive, Pip has joined
Enrique Jardine's progressive trio Absolute Zero, touring and recording in
Florida and California in the autumn of 1999. He also has plans for another solo
album, to be recorded by a jazz guitar-bass-drums trio, and has of course
contributed to Phil Miller 's 'blues' project, "Out Of The Blue".
Bands : Delivery (1966-70), Chicken Shack
(1970-71), Gong (1971), Paul Jones Group (1972), Hatfield and the North
(1972-75), Weightwatchers (1976), National Health (1977-81), Soft Heap
(1978-88), Rapid Eye Movement (1980-81), In Cahoots (1982-), Pip Pyle's
Equip'Out (1984-95), Patrice Meyer Trio/Quartet (1985-86), Short Wave (1991-96),
Gong/Shapeshifter (1992-93), Hugh Hopper Band (1994), Richard Sinclair/RSVP
(1994), Gong (1994-96), In Cahoots, Absolute Zero.
This information is taken from Aymeric Leroy's
excellent website Calyx.
At the Vortex my local jazz club on the 29th
of October In Cahoots played a set commemorating the music of Elton Dean and Pip
Pyle who sadly both died this year. They were 2 of the original members of In
Cahoots and performed with the band from 1983 for over two decades. Both were of
course brilliant individual talents who played with fire and passion and I am
proud to have played with them. For this gig In Cahoots line-up was augmented to
a 7 piece with Simon Finch, Simon Picard, Gail Brand (Trombone), Pete Lemer,
Fred Baker and Mark Fletcher. It was a brilliant gig with many of Elton an Pip’s
musician friends playing together in different combinations. We may perform one
of their pieces as a tribute when we play at the Shinjuku Pit Inn in December .I
think Fred Baker will play the piece Elton wrote called Baker’s Treat in our Duo
performance.