“Amid
endless forests family trees stand, their branches laden with so
many lifetimes; lifetimes which, like so many leaves, eventually
fall to the ground and vanish into the earth”
Frances Potemkin, Collected Essays 1958-62
It was whilst enjoying a rare break in the sleepy village he had
grown up in that William Holland, known better in some circles as
Quantic, happened upon a shipping crate. Left in a riverside warehouse
that had long since been abandoned the crate had refused to bow
to the advancing years and still held tight its spoils. As he prized
away the rotting lid and examined the contents within, William realised
that the fates had conspired over the decades and were now offering
him a glimpse into the long forgotten life of one of his distant
relatives, Edwin Windermere Holland. The crate held a number of
leather and canvas satchels stuffed with papers, letters, manuscripts,
photographs and yellowed newspaper cuttings, a large wicker suitcase
full of clothes, books and other such effects, a crudely fashioned
acoustic bass guitar which had been riddled with either mice or
bullets and a wooden box full of acetates and recording cylinders.
After many hours spent poring over these relics, William began to
piece together some of the incredible life his Great Great Uncle
had led.
Born at the turn of the last century Edwin Windermere Holland, or
Windy as was known, grew up in the then prosperous inland port of
Bewdley. He was poor student but a keen banjo player; from diary
entries it is clear that Windy obsessed about music, his insight
into rhythm and melody for an Edwardian teenager was incredible.
At the age of fifteen decided to leave behind him the tedium of
education and gainful employment, and headed downstream on a coal
boat to Bristol. Taking the first opportunity available, Windy stowed
away on a square-rigged sloop heading for Jamaica. He was soon discovered
and put his banjo to use by playing sea-shanties to earn his keep.
When finally they dropped anchor in Montego Bay Windy headed across
country looking for other musicians. He met a group of fugitive
plantation workers who had fled their evil captors to pursue a life
of musical enlightenment on in the forests surrounding Blue Mountain.
Together they began to compose music that was both sophisticated
and avant-garde; incredibly advanced compared to the mento and calypso
that could be heard around the island at the time, The Sophistications
(as they became known) blended Blues music with the rhythms and
harmonies inherited by the sons of African slaves. The slow Boogie
called “Feets And Hips” pre-dates the first Jamaican
sound systems by at least forty years, yet it predicts perfectly
the sound of all the Blues parties and lawn dances that were to
come.
After many years of island life Windy began to long for England;
a World War had passed, the British Empire had began to crumble
and he was anxious for the well- being of his parents. He decided
once again to cross the Atlantic, this time on a Merchant Navy vessel
headed for Southampton. The journey began in earnest as Windy worked
in the galley preparing the sailors meals, and weeks of diary entries
go by with little in the way of excitement. However, the entries
stop around the time the ship should have been making sails through
the Straight of Gibraltar, barely a week’s passage to the
English coast. What came next can, and probably will, be speculated
on endlessly: Six months after his last entry the ship was found
adrift in the Arabian Sea by the Pakistani Marine Guard, its cargo
intact but its crew slain in the bloodiest of manners. The solitary
survivor was Edwin Windermere Holland, who was described by onlookers
as “wild-eyed” and “demonic”. He charged
at the officials wielding a large cutlass, but was soon overcome.
Once sedated and secured he began to tell garbled tales of mutinies
and Somalian pirates, of pitched battles with dark forces and of
wicked omens. He charged with mass murder, certified and was then
swiftly imprisoned in a high security asylum in the port of Karachi
and there he lived out the rest of his documented days, arranging
and conducting the prison band. Amongst the many acetates the Karachi
Prison Band recorded “Put Some Grit In To It Parts I &
II” is an edgy, neurotic affair, frantic in pace and instrumentation.
Once again it seems that Windy pre-empted musical tastes by a whole
generation: the recording date on the cylinder marks it down to
1954, a clear ten years and hundreds and thousands miles away from
the deep funk explosion of North America in the mid 1960’s.
When the asylum was condemned and shut down in 1972 those inmates
thought to be to old to prove any threat to society were turned
out into the streets. What happened to Edwin Windermere Holland
will remain a mystery: the only clue is the receipt from the Mumbai
Shipping and Freight Company. Whatever his last movements, Holland
seemed keen to return his musical legacy to the United Kingdom.
Thirty years on, thanks to the endeavours of his Great Great nephew
and the Magnetic Fields imprint, the recordings of Edwin Windermere
Holland’s life of musical adventure have been lovingly restored.
The first two 7” instalments are now available for all to
enjoy.
Foreword by Russell Porter
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