Graham Day

Graham Day was one of the founding fathers of the British garage rock movement as the frontman with the band the Prisoners, and he continued to be a key figure on the scene, both as a sideman and bandleader. Day can play rough and ready rock & roll, and he's skilled enough to tackle more sophisticated pop- and jazz-influenced music without losing track of his energy and inspiration. Day has led a number of groups since the Prisoners bowed out, including the Prime Movers, the Solarflares, and the Senior Service; he stepped forward as a solo act with 2022's The Master of None, and he confirmed his continued mastery of the garage sound on Graham Day & the Gaolers' 2023 LP Reflections in the Glass. Born and raised in Chatham near the Medway Delta, Day formed his first band, the Numbers, when he was a teenager, but the group never took off. Day had considerably greater success with his next outfit; featuring Day on guitar and vocals, James Taylor on keyboards, Alan Crockford on bass, and Johnny Symons on drums, the Prisoners fused beat-era rock with R&B, American garage rock, and a dash of psychedelia. The Prisoners played their first show in 1980 and released their first LP, A Taste of Pink, on their own Own-Up Records label in 1982. Big Beat soon signed them, and a second album, TheWiserMiserDemelza, followed in 1983; a revised version was released by the Enigma-distributed Pink Dust label in America as Revenge of the Prisoners. Stiff Records picked up the band and released 1986's In from the Cold through its 54321 Countdown imprint, but the efforts to polish up the Prisoners' sound and market them to the mod revival crowd fell on deaf ears, and by 1988 the band was history. In 1989, Day formed a new combo, the Prime Movers, who recorded three albums before breaking up in 1993; another band, the Gift Horses, managed only one single in 1989, though bassist Martin Blunt and drummer Jon Brookes would go on to form the Charlatans and sing the praises of the Prisoners in the U.K. music press. In 1995, Day released one album of funk-infused psychedelic rock under the moniker Planet, and after a short-lived Prisoners reunion in 1996, he returned to familiar ground with a new band, the Solarflares, who released their debut, Psychedelic Tantrum, in 1999. Around the same time Day formed the Solarflares, another Chatham garage rock icon, Billy Childish, recruited Day to play bass in his band the Buff Medways. Childish and Day had worked together before -- Day briefly played drums in Thee Mighty Caesars, and Childish's label Hangman Records issued a collection of rare and unreleased Prisoners tracks shortly after the group broke up. In 2004, the Solarflares released their final album, and Day focused his energies on producing albums for other artists, including the Len Price 3, Les Terribles, and the Discords. In 2007, Day joined forces with two members of the American garage rock act the Woggles -- bassist Buzz Hagstrom and drummer Dan Elektro -- and formed Graham Day & the Gaolers, whose debut album, Soundtrack to the Daily Grind, appeared in the late fall of that year. Graham Day & the Gaolers delivered a second album, Triple Distilled, in 2008, with bassist Jonny Barker taking over from the departing Buzz Hagstrom. With two Gaolers in Britain and one in the United States, getting them together for another LP proved difficult, but Day had plenty of other projects to keep him occupied. He served as producer for 2010's Pictures, the third full-length from the Len Price 3. With bassist Allan Crockford and drummer Wolf Howard, he formed Graham Day & the Forefathers, bringing out Good Things in 2014. Day teamed again with Jonny Barker, this time playing keyboards, to form the instrumental combo the Senior Service, who made their debut with 2016's The Girl in the Glass Case, followed by 2018's King Cobra and 2022's A Little More Time, the latter recorded with guest vocalist Rachel Lowrie. Day guested on the 2018 LP from Groovy Uncle, Meanwhile Back in Medieval Britain …, and he was in the producer's chair for Jarvis Humby's 2020 project Straighten Your Mind With ... Day made his belated solo debut in 2022 with The Master of None. Recorded during the COVID-19 lockdown of 2021, The Master of None was a true solo recording, with Day playing all the instruments himself through multitracking. The songs for The Master of None were originally intended for a third Graham Day & the Gaolers album, and when drummer Dan Elektro was able to travel to the U.K. again, they reconvened and recorded the LP Reflections in the Glass, issued by Damaged Goods in May 2023. It arrived shortly after the Prisoners reunited for live work, playing four concerts in Medway in December 2022.
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