LOFT 1993 by Alan Tomlinson Trio [Alan Tomlinson, Dave Tucker, Roger Turner]

Alan Tomlinson trombone
Dave Tucker guitar
Roger Turner drums

It was a night that has properly gone down in history; an extraordinary and alarming night.
Travelling by train from the previous concert in Berlin, the trio had lost Dave’s bag outside the station in Cologne, containing, totally inexplicably, all their money except for loose change, their flight tickets for the eventual return to London, their German rail tickets for the rest of the tour, their passports etc, as well as Dave’s guitar pedals and spare strings. Ostensibly, they had no means to go anywhere once they left the Loft.
Unfortunately, the story goes, they only realised all this once they had arrived at the venue and started setting up on stage. To make matters worse, they were late, with the audience already sitting waiting: the British Council representatives who had helped fund the tour, Tony Oxley, Alan Silva, Phil Minton, all the Köln musicians of note and everyone else, a full house, sitting patiently, waiting for the band to arrive.

Panic hit on stage. how could it not?
The trio was seen to jump around for 10 minutes, trying to come to terms with the situation, and then realising they had to knuckle down to playing some music, which they really did.
Just to add further tension, Alan and Roger got stuck in the lift in the interval between sets, having nipped out to buy a bag of chips, and it seems the whole situation finally hit the band in that second set (track 3); a kind of rage and horror of what to do, what was possible, after they left the Loft in an hour or so... it’s quite an extreme track.

The recording was made on cassette and remains a legendary document of an incredible trio at an amazing moment in time.
Roger Turner was given a cdR of the material at a concert he played in Munich in February 2024. It’s only taken 30 years... well, you can’t rush these things... if only Alan had been able to hear it.

Hans-Martin Mueller, the main flute in the WDR Symphony Orchestra, who ran the space and was unable to attend the gig, had told Roger later that he had heard a recording and thought it an amazing, indelible concert. Who knows if he knew this background stuff... it's difficult to pronounce on its relevance.

since 1994

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