Skin Alley – Sun Music – The Complete Recordings 1969-1973 (2025)
Sun Music – The Complete Recordings 1969–1973 offers the first comprehensive overview of Skin Alley’s work across four albums, rare singles, and a previously unreleased soundtrack. This 4CD clamshell box collects the British band’s complete output for CBS and Transatlantic Records, newly remastered from the original master tapes.
The four Skin Alley albums show how the band evolved from an early mix of rhythm and blues, jazz and psychedelic rock to a fascinating combination of jazz and progressive rock. Their pieces contained a mix of structured songs and improvised passages with fine keyboard, guitar, and flute work plus curiosities like the use of accordion which was rare in rock and jazz-rock bands.
Rather than the high voltage fusion of Return to Forever and Weather Report, Skin Alley was closer to Blood Sweat and Tears and early Chicago. That is, they contributed more rhythm and blues than other jazz-rock bands. By their fourth and final album, the band had lost its mojo and delivered a set of radio friendly, pop-leaning songs.
Skin Alley was formed in London in 1968. They belonged to the Clearwater management roster alongside Hawkwind, High Tide, Trees, and Cochise. The group became a fixture on the UK’s underground concert and festival circuit. Their self-titled debut appeared on CBS in 1969, produced by ex-Pretty Things guitarist Dick Taylor. A second album, To Pagham and Beyond, followed in 1970, along with the now-resurrected Stop Verushka!, a shelved soundtrack to an abandoned film about German model Veruschka.
The group’s 1971 appearance at the Glastonbury Fayre solidified their cult status. A live version of their track “Sun Music” was included on the influential triple-LP documenting the event, alongside contributions from the Grateful Dead, David Bowie, Marc Bolan, Gong, and Hawkwind. Two final studio albums, Two Quid Deal? (1972) and Skintight (1973), marked the end of their recording career after a move to Transatlantic Records.
Musicians: Thomas Crimble on bass, vocals, keyboards, harmonica; Robert ‘Bob’ James on saxophone, flute, guitar, vocals; Krzysztof Henryk Juszkiewicz on organ, piano, accordion, harpsichord, mellotron, vocals, trumpet; Giles ‘Alvin’ Pope on drums, percussion; Nick Graham on vocals, keyboards, bass, flute; and Tony Knight on drums, vocals.
Track Listing
Disc One
Skin Alley Remastered
1 Living in Sin
2 Tell Me
3 Mother, Please Help Your Child
4 Marsha
5 Country Aire
6 All Alone
7 Night Time
8 Concerto Grosso (Take Heed)
9 (Going Down the) Highway
Bonus tracks
10 Better Be Blind (B-side of single)
11 Tell Me (single version)
12 Shower Music (from Stop Verushka)
13 Sofa, Taxi and Sand Themes (from Stop Verushka)
14 Cemetery Scene (from Stop Verushka)
15 First Drug Scene (from Stop Verushka)
Disc Two
To Pagham & Beyond Remastered
1 Big Brother is Watching You
2 Take Me to Your Leader’s Daughter
3 Walking in the Park
4 The Queen of Bad Intentions
5 Sweaty Betty
6 Easy to Lie
Bonus tracks
7 Russian Boogaloo (from Stop Verushka)
8 Skin Valley Serenade (from Stop Verushka)
9 Sun Music (from Stop Verushka)
10 Bird Music (from Stop Verushka)
11 Snow Music (from Stop Verushka)
Disc Three
Two Quid Deal Remastered
1 Nick’s Seven
2 So Many People
3 Bad Words and Evil People
4 Graveyard Shuffle
5 So Glad
6 A Final Coat
7 Skin Valley Serenade
8 The Demagogue
9 Sun Music
Bonus tracks
10 You Got Me Danglin’ (A-side of single)
11 Sun Music (‘Glastonbury Fayre’ version)
Disc Four
Skintight Remastered
1 If I Only Had Time
2 At a Quarter to One
3 How Long?
4 Surprise Awakening
5 Broken Eggs
6 Maverick Woman Blues
7 The Heap Turns Human
8 What Good Does It Do?
9 Mr. Heavy
10 Instermental
Bonus tracks
11 In the Midnight Hour (A-side of single)
12 Broken Eggs (single version)