Gentle Giant were a British progressive rock band active between 1970 and 1980. They were known for the complexity and sophistication of their music and for the varied musical skills of the members. All of the band members were multi-instrumentalists. Although not commercially successful, the band did achieve a cult following. The band stated that their aim was to “expand the frontiers of contemporary popular music at the risk of becoming very unpopular”, although this stance was to alter significantly with time.
Gentle Giant was formed in 1970 when the Shulman brothers teamed up with two other multi-instrumentalists, Gary Green (guitar, mandolin, recorder etc.) and Kerry Minnear (keyboards, vibraphone, cello, etc.), plus drummer Martin Smith, who had previously drummed for Simon Dupree and the Big Sound. The classically trained Minnear had recently graduated from the Royal College of Music with a degree in composition, and had played with the band Rust. Green was essentially a blues player and had never worked with a band above the semi-professional level, but adapted readily to the demanding music of the new band. The Shulman brothers, meanwhile, settled into typically multi-instrumental roles of their own — Derek on saxophone and recorder; Ray on bass and violin; and Phil on saxophone, trumpet, and clarinet (with all three brothers playing other instruments as and when required).
Gentle Giant’s music was considered complex even by progressive rock standards, drawing on a broad swathe of music including folk, soul, jazz, and classical music. Unlike many of their progressive rock contemporaries, their “classical” influences ranged beyond the Romantic and incorporated medieval, baroque, and modernist chamber music elements. The band also had a taste for broad themes for their lyrics, drawing inspiration not only from personal experiences but from philosophy and the works of François Rabelais and R. D. Laing. In 2015 they were recognised with the lifetime achievement award at the Progressive Music Awards.
The band’s first album was the self-titled Gentle Giant in 1970, produced by Tony Visconti. Combining the collective band members’ influences of rock, blues, classical, and 1960s British soul, it was an immediately challenging effort, although it has sometimes been criticised for having a slightly disappointing recording quality. Gentle Giant was followed in 1971 by Acquiring the Taste. This second album showcased a band who were developing rapidly. Far more experimental and dissonant than its predecessor, Acquiring the Taste was shaped primarily by Kerry Minnear’s broad classical and contemporary classical music training. It also showed the band expanding their instrumental palette. Gentle Giant’s next recording was Three Friends (1972). This was the band’s first concept album, and was based around the theme of three boys who are “inevitably separated by chance, skill, and fate” as they become men.
The release of Octopus is generally considered to herald the start of Gentle Giant’s peak period. In 2004, Ray Shulman commented “[Octopus] was probably our best album, with the exception perhaps of Acquiring the Taste. We started with the idea of writing a song about each member of the band. Having a concept in mind was a good starting point for writing. I don’t know why, but despite the impact of the Who’s Tommy and Quadrophenia, almost overnight concept albums were suddenly perceived as rather naff and pretentious”.” Dissatisfied with their deal with WWA, Gentle Giant signed a new deal with Chrysalis Records, with whom they would stay for the rest of their career. Although the band were still writing and performing some of the most complex rock music of the period, it was at this point that they began to polish and slightly simplify their songs for accessibility, in order to reach a wider audience (in particular an American one). Their efforts seemed successful enough to get 1975’s Free Hand into the Top 50 of the album chart in the USA.
