Ramases

Ramases (actually Barrington Frost, often wrongly with the session sitar player on the album Space Hymns, Martin Raphael, equated ) was an English musician. Together with his wife Dorothy, who chose the stage name Selket, he published 1968-1975 several singles and elaborately produced album Space Hymns and Glass Top Coffin, which are associated with the psychedelic rock. He left shortly after the release of the second album by suicide from the life.

Biography

Barrington Frost was born in the second half of the 1930s in Sheffield. After school he joined the military and became an instructor. In the late 1950s he performed as a jazz singer while getting to know his future wife, Dorothy, whom he married after only three weeks. As a representative for central heating of life Frost and his wife then brought to Scotland. Over time, the couple developed a certain eccentricity by that frost her head shaved, and the pair in 1967, now in Sheffield, his bungalow remodeled in the style of a Roman villa. A mosaic of the Roman Emperor Hadrian adorned the exterior of the house. The extraction technology of the bathroom was planned according to ancient Egyptian principles.

By dealing with ancient frescoes for the house in Sheffield, the pair came across pictures of the Egyptian Pharaoh Ramses II and the Egyptian goddess Selket, where the couple saw a similarity with him and two of which, in the meantime psychedelic music or with esoteric had begun to write. cosmic -tinged lyrics, their stage name herleiteten.

1968 succeeded Ramases & Selket to sign a recording contract with CBS, and the two titles Crazy One and Mind's Eye were recorded. The single was unsuccessful. This unsatisfactory result for both sides, the cooperation was terminated with CBS again.

That same year, another single Screw You was released in the far smaller group Label Major Minor. Track names and artist names were changed several times for later editions, the artists were, inter alia, Ramases & Seleka or Ram & Sel called.

In 1970 Ramases could go under contract, a company specializing in progressive rock sublabel of Philips' Vertigo Records. At the suggestion of Harvey Lisberg, the manager of Herman 's Hermits, Ramases and Selket took the 1971 released album Space Hymns on at Strawberry Studios in Stockport. As a studio musician for the implementation of the compositions of the artist couple were Eric Stewart ( Lead Guitar and Moog Synthesizer ), committed Lol Creme ( Lead Guitar and Moog Synthesizer ) and Kevin Godley (drums and flute), which as a session musician to Lisbergs songwriter Graham Gouldman (guitar and bass) were active. Stewart and Gouldman were previously at Wayne Fontana & The Mindbenders, as a quartet with Godley & Creme two years later formed the band 10cc. The cover of the album Space Hymns was designed by Roger Dean. It could be folded out to six times the size, and shows how the top of a church steeple blown off and rises as a spaceship in the sky. The album was a moderate success in England and Germany. The music was compared with Hawkwind and Quintessence. Characteristic features are the use of reverse tracks, tangled flute melodies and pelvic crescendos to hypnotic repetitions. The title You're the only one, Joe repeated only those text line polyphonic 35 times.

Two singles were released from the album. Jesus come back and Ballroom, entitled Balloon wore on the album. On the album, there is also the already published as debut single song Crazy One now as a new recording entitled Quasar One, as an anthem to a quasar. The reason for the different title transfer error of the record companies are called.

Since LP and singles had only moderate success and there were no live performances, it was quiet in the following years to the musician. The musician couple moved together with Frost's mother to Felixstowe in Suffolk.

Only in 1975 was released a second album with Glass Top Coffin. Production in the Phonogram Studios, London Barry Kirsch has passed, as an accompanist made ​​their appearance: Jo Romero, Pete Kingsman, Roger Harrison, Bon Bertles ( Nucleus ) and Colin Thurston, moreover, were members of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and the London Symphony Orchestra involved in the uptake and for choral singing had one committed Sue Glover and Sunny Leslie of Brotherhood Of. It was a concept album, the anthemic choruses about orchestral music ( Golden Landing I & II ) as well as contains dynamic progressive rock ( the title track Glass Top Coffin ). The cover was again elaborately designed, now appears as a gatefold sleeve with die-cut silhouette of a man to dive like an astronaut into space. Due to the design of the cover, there were differences between the record company and Frost, who saw his original intention inadequately implemented and at the last second before going to press last corrections undertook the printing plates, which, however, only marginally optical on the design and the further manufacturing process impact. Despite its advanced production the album experienced no noticeable reception.

The artist, who was considered a car fanatic and his personal environment was not free of problems, then withdrew from the public. The press still reported lower success as an airbrush painter, so to have experienced more widespread than printmaking one of his paintings. He also is said to have worked as a designer of chess pieces and worked on a philosophical book. Shortly after the release of Glass Top Coffin ( according to different sources 1976 or 1978 ) retired the artist by suicide from the life, but his death until the mid- 1990s was known.

In 2000, the Swedish actor Peter Stormare did Frost's widow Dorothy through newspaper advertisements in the East Anglian Daily Times identified. Stormares interest and demand from fans eventually led to the re-release of the two Ramases albums. The demo recording of a planned third LP Skylark are lost.

Discography

Singles

• Ramases & Selket: Crazy One / Mind 's Eye (CBS 3717) 1968
• Ram & Sel: Screw You / Gold is the ring (MM 14553 AT) with PS 1970
• Ramases & Seleka: Love You on / Gold Is The Ring (MM 704) 1970
• Ramases: Balloon / Muddy Water (Philips 6113 001 ) 1971
• Ramases: Jesus Come Back / Hello Mister (Philips 6113 003 ) 1971

Albums

• Space Hymns ( Vertigo 6360 046 ) 1971
• Glass Top Coffin ( Phillips 6360 115) 1975