Keep It Together! Cosmic Boogie With The Deviants & Pink Fairies
by Rich Deakin

Days of the underground

Mick Farren & The Deviants made a significant contribution to the fermenting of punk’s DIY ethic from the trenches of the 60s underground. Farren was an unlikely frontman; The Deviants a most unmusical concoction; their first album, Ptooff!, an early instance of a band eschewing the mainstream record companies and self-releasing their product. When they did achieve a level of musicianship, recruiting Canadian guitarist Paul ‘Blackie’ Rudolph, the whole thing collapsed and gave way to the anarchic madness of the Pink Fairies.

Deakin clearly knows his subject matter inside-out and has produced a veritable treasure trove of information. Those great festivals of the early 70s, Phun City, Glastonbury Fayre and the Isle Of Wight, where the Fairies played outside for free, are dissected. The socio-political context of the swinging 60s and its drug-addled fag-end is analysed, and the interpersonal relationships of the self-styled ‘Cosmic Family’ laid bare, while it’s all topped-off with a substantial amount of illustrations.

It’s a huge shame, then, that the text is drab and over-written, with a distracting amount of double-dipped facts. Unfortunately this makes the reading of what should be a classic story of rock excesses set against the counterculture backdrop, rather a chore.

ISBN 9781900486613

Reviewed by Ian Abrahams
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