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Joe Banks

@joebankswriter.bsky.social

1.8K followers 92 following 860 posts

'Hawkwind: Days Of The Underground' voted a book of the year by MOJO, Uncut, Prog & Shindig. Visit www.daysoftheunderground.com. 'Rock And Role: The Visionary Songs Of Peter Hammill + VdGG' out 21/11/25. Pre-order: https://kingmakerpublishing.com/

kingmakerpublishing.com

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · Aug 27

Announcement! And cover reveal! Pre-orders for Rock and Role, my biography of Peter Hammill & Van der Graaf Generator, are now open. Over 500 pages and 400 images. Details here: kingmakerpublishing.com

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 15m

The rockandrole.net site brings together nearly all of Peter Hammill's TV and radio sessions. This 1983 Saturday Live session is particularly rare - listen to PH deliver an incredible version of Don't Tell Me, then get interrupted during Labour Of Love! www.rockandrole.net/post/ph-satu...

PH/Saturday Live - 27 August 1983

Saturday Live – BBC Radio 1 (UK)Don’t Tell Me / Labour Of LoveRecorded: 27 August 1983 at Broadcasting House, London W1ABroadcast: liveLISTEN:Don’t Tell Me / Labour Of Love

www.rockandrole.net

Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 1d

And me too ;-)

Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 1d

Correct!

Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 1d

Also popped into the Edward Burra exhibition, who I knew even less about. His work inspired by the Spanish Civil War and WWII is grotesque and quite disturbing, while his later landscapes are often uncanny and deeply hauntological. Both shows are on until this Sunday 2/2

Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 1d

Better late than never, I saw the Ithell Colquhoun exhibition Tate Britain yesterday. A British surrealist and mystic (she seemed to be a member of every occult society going), her use of colour, abstract forms and dreamlike/sexualised landscapes is often stunning 1/2

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 2d

I can only assume it's being released again due to the massive interest generated by the podcast ;-)

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 3d

Yeah, that's a very speedy, jittery riff...

Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 3d

Yes, I thought so too. No details online.

Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 3d

Just shared by Michael Moorcock on FB - didn't know a new Blu-ray was coming out, but sounds good... @breakfastruins.bsky.social

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 4d

So this is where we are now... What's really bizarre about all these 'one world government' conspiracy theories is that we've never been further from such a thing existing, given the tilt towards rabid nationalism/isolationism...

Sarah Kirchberger @sarahkirchberger.bsky.social · 4d

Tech-investor Peter Thiel, best known for sponsoring J.D. Vance and co-founding Palantir, goes theology:

“Over the past month, Thiel has hosted a series of 4 lectures on the downtown waterfront of San Francisco philosophizing about who the antichrist could be and warning that Armageddon is coming.“

Inside tech billionaire Peter Thiel’s off-the-record lectures about the antichrist

The political svengali and investor has been giving lectures on ‘an evil king or tyrant … who appears in the end times’

www.theguardian.com

Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 4d

Released on this day 50 years ago: Godbluff! My first Van der Graaf Generator LP - picked up in 1984 from the blessed Selectadisc second-hand vaults on Market Street, Notts - and still my favourite. It is amazing. If you've never heard it, now is the time www.youtube.com/watch?v=3prX...

Van Der Graaf Generator ‎– Godbluff (1975) [FULL ALBUM]

YouTube video by Kyuby

www.youtube.com

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 4d

Eek. I was a younger man then, and managed to stay the whole course without a pee break!

Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 5d

I felt both annoyed and embarrassed!

Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 5d

Saw Ghost Stories at The Peacock Theatre the other night. It's always fun seeing something performed live, and there were certainly some jumpy members of the audience, but is it heretical to say that I preferred the film? Hard to top the performances of Paul Whitehouse and Martin Freeman...

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 5d

I haven't spoken to her for a while, but she does pop up occasionally on FB

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 6d

And then a year later, 18 Sept 1977 at the Glasgow Apollo, here's a couple of great pics (by Ian Storarr) of Calvert in full flight with Hawkwind...

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 6d

Ah, of course, that's what I was thinking of

Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 6d

Robert Calvert with Hawkwind, performing Steppenwolf, 1976? (photo restored by Christopher Scurrah) Does he have the fake severed head in his other hand that I've heard mention of??

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 7d

My new book - Rock and Role: The Visionary Songs of Peter Hammill and Van der Graaf Generator - is off to the printers, and will be published 21 November!
Officially launching today, here's the book's site, which I'll be updating regularly. But check out the A/V section now! www.rockandrole.net

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 7d

but in between, there's an entertaining sub-plot about a messianic Lithian child causing havoc within Earth's repressed society... It's a novel packed with ideas, some more engaging than others, and Blish doesn't always wear his learning lightly, but I really liked it. A genuinely original work. 3/3

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 7d

even if ultimately it doesn't really amount to much. A biologist/Jesuit studying a paradisical alien planet called Lithia, populated by intelligent but God-less lizards (David Icke, look away), becomes convinced that it's a Satanic trap. Returning to Earth, he has an audience with the Pope... 2/3

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 7d

My slow tour of classic SF slowly continues with 1958's A Case Of Conscience by James Blish, a book that's become renowned as one of SF's most serious attempts to tackle the role of Christianity in the context of a non-terrestrial, but supremely civilised world. It's a dense, fascinating read... 1/3

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Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 8d

Thanks, yes, must listen!

Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 8d

Here's a chest-swelling, patriotic Hawkwind headline from Sounds, 13 May 1972 😉 Plus mention of dates with The (Morrison-less) Doors - though the 11th was at the Mayfair in Birmingham rather than The Roundhouse...

Joe Banks @joebankswriter.bsky.social · 9d

I've just DMed you on Xitter