Skip Bifferty (album sleevenotes)


 * (Peel wrote the sleevenotes for Skip Bifferty's eponymoous debut LP, RCA, 1968. The album back cover can be viewed here).

It grows daily more obvious that, following the incredible forces generated by British musicians during the past four years, there is opening up a vast void where the new things should be. The main reason for this sudden, though predictable, and wholly destructive situation is the lack of opportunities for exposure on the mass media. The lack applies, of course, only to those who cannot accept that the trite and mundane should be forcefed into the vegetating public.

Anyone prepared to add fresh tedium to already worn and broken down musical concepts will be assured of instant financial success. Many prominent groups and individuals have been forced to take vast leaps back into the tired, grey past in order to ensure that their public will still have a chance to see and hear them. However, Bernie Andrews, producer of the BBC radio programme TOP GEAR, and myself believe that there is an outstanding amount of creativity and comment being bottled up by this "safety-first" policy. I am sure SKIP BIFFERTY don't expect to convince their listeners that they are infallible or omniscient - but just want people to know that there is an alternative to the "run of the mill" sounds, and to give them the opportunity to evaluate that alternative for themselves. "Top Gear" has only two hours a week, which is little enough time in which to present groups such as SKIP BIFFERTY, but it is better than nothing. Bernie and I do not always agree about what music we include in our programme but we do ensure that what we play is the best music available to us and that it has been recorded with both love and honesty. Skip Bifferty have been on "Top Gear" several times, and they certainly will be on again. Listen to this, their first LP, in the light of what I have just written and you will understand what I am talking about. With conditions as they are, Skip Bifferty may not survive but they have the creative talent necessary to win through, and when you've heard this record, you will be as anxious as Bernie and myself that they should.