BURNIN’ RED IVANHOE: signed by John Peel and produced by Tony Reeves: a look back.

Danish prog pioneers BURNING RED IVANHOE was formed in 1967 in the Copenhagen area with a musical recipe that included jazz, rock and blues. Early signs suggested a strong COLOSSEUM and CHICAGO TRANIST AUTHORITY influence, and it was no coincidence that their BURNIN’ RED IVANHOE albums (see below) was recorded in London and produced by Tony Reeves. Legendary DJ John Peel was in the crowd when the band was performing at a concert in Copenhagen and, in 1970, and signed them for his own Dandelion label (distributed by Warner Brothers). He and Reeves co-produced

Following a promising debut double album M144 (1969); the lengthy ‘Ksilioy’, with its somewhat wayward vocal, and repetitive guitar pattern that brings to mind Can is featured on the excellent Esoteric double CD box “Living on the Hill: A Danish Underground Trip 1967-1974”. The aforementioned BURNIN’ RED IVANHOE (1970), with a line-up of Ole Fick (guitar, vocals), Kim Menzer (tenor sax, trombone, mouth harp, flute, percussion), Karsten Vogel (alto sax, soprano sax, organ, piano), Jess Stæhr (bass, acoustic guitar) and Bo Thrige Andersen (drums, percussion), was a well-judged mixture of blues-rock and psych-jazz, with some great interplay between the musicians, bordering on free jazz-rock on the impressive concluding track, ‘Secret Oyster Service’

With the same line-up, Burnin’ Red Ivanhoe’s fourth album (or third if you count a collaboration with a Danish folk singer in the same year), WWW.BURNIN’ RED IVANHOE (1971) is a mixture of songs and instrumentals; in a jazz-psych-rock style with some great solos and rhythm. There is a song about a hotel stay during a gig at Fairfield Halls (‘Second Floor, Croydon’) and a humorous, theatrical side to ‘Oblong Serenade’ with its nice trombone motif. Then there’s the ghostly, experimental title track. Hard to pigeonhole exactly, Burnin’ Red Ivanhoe are often mentioned in the same breath as CARAVAN or SOFT MACHINE in these early days.

Their RIGHT ON (1974) LP is championed by some, and BRI (2013), their first album of new material for 15 years. also attracted some favourable reviews. In between, from a progressive point of view, SHORTS (1980) and LACK OF LIGHT (1998) are best avoided. There was also a live album MILEY SMILEY/ STAGE RECALL (1972) after which Vogel left to form Secret Oyster, a highly regarded jazz-rock-fusion group that released four albums between 1974 and 1976 including commissioned music for a Danish ballet. To bring the story right up to date an archival recording from 1969 with John Tchical on alto sax was released in 2020.