Curved Air

One of the most dramatically accomplished of all the bands lumped into Britain's late-'60s prog explosion, Curved Air was formed in early 1970 by violinist Darryl Way, a graduate of the Royal College of Music, and two former members of Sisyphus, keyboard player Francis Monkman and drummer Florian Pilkington-Miksa. Adding bassist Robert Martin, the band named itself from avant-garde composer Terry Riley's A Rainbow in Curved Air, a touchstone that would inform much of their early work. The quartet originally came together to provide accompaniment for producer Galt McDermott's musical Who the Murderer Was; it was McDermott who suggested, once the stage show closed, that they add vocalist Sonja Kristina, with whom he had worked in the U.K. production of Hair. In this form, the band launched a well-received U.K. tour and, that summer, they signed with Warner Bros. -- the first British band on the company's roster. Curved Air's first album, Air Conditioning, was released in November 1970, a monumental recording that was flamboyantly issued as rock & roll's first-ever picture disc. Divided neatly between ambitious hard rockers and deeply classically influenced pieces, the album reached number eight in the U.K. chart and, while an accompanying single, "It Happened Today," did little, still Curved Air entered 1971 on the very edge of superstardom. With Ian Eyre replacing bassist Martin, the band crossed that precipice the following summer, when the incandescent "Back Street Love" rocketed to number four, ahead of the prosaically named Second Album. Disappointingly, the album emerged a somewhat lesser achievement than its predecessor, and climbed no higher than number 11, while a non-LP followup single, the lovely "Sarah's Concern," went by unnoticed. Curved Air bounced back in...