Family performing on the BBC’s OldGreyWhistleTest, London, 1971.
Image: Michael Putland/Getty Images
“Maybe I shouldn’t say this, but a lot of musicians who talk about Family say, ‘Oh, you were a proper band. You weren’t like a bunch of posers.’”
We weren’t trying to sound diffrent we just were different,” vocalist Roger Chapman says about his former group, Family. And while never a vehicle for double concept albums or displays of flashy virtuosity, Family were one of the first and among the most open-minded of the late-60s/early-70s progressive rock groups, mixing songcraft with a multitude of styles, from jazz to soul, to heavier rock forms, to folk, classical and Eastern influences. They were also a dynamic live act, with Chapman a particularly intense frontman. In a time when musically different was embraced by the record-buying public, all this contributed to a series of UK Top 40 albums and singles before Family’s dissolution in 1973.