Death of Phil May, leader of the rock band The Pretty Things

He was the leader of one of the freest, wildest and most original rock bands of the sixties. “They have an absolute understanding of chaos, don't care about the details, are unruly. They're probably the least professional group in the world, ” said their own manager to the Guardian . Phil May, leader of The Pretty Things, died Friday in Norfolk of a bicycle accident, his family said. He was 75 years old.

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The Pretty Things has inspired a number of punk, glam rock and alternative rock groups from the Stooges to the Libertines, including the Ramones, the Sex Pistols and Nirvana. The Clash had dedicated the song to them (White Man) in Hammersmith Palais while David Bowie had listed Phil May in his repertoire under the name "Dieu".

Despite this Dantesque heritage, rock history remembers The Pretty Things as the least known of the biggest groups, overshadowed by the aura of its rivals the Rolling Stones. According to legend, Mick Jagger himself tried to ban one of their television shows, lest their savagery make them forget that of the Stones.

First rock opera in history

However, it is around the Stones that everything begins. Dick Taylor, the very first bass player by Keith Richards and Mick Jagger, founded with Phil May The Pretty Things in 1963. The group had their first successes with the hits Rosalyn and Don't Bring Me Down , which were both taken by David Bowie on his Pin Ups record . Regarded as a pale copy of the Rolling Stones whose members wear “even longer” hair , the quintet is gradually moving away from the rhythm and blues sound of its beginnings after the commercial failure of the disc Get the Picture?

In 1968, The Pretty Things dropped the SF Sorrow bomb on the rock planet . A crazy, chaotic and pioneering record in which the group tries out the sitar or the organ. "We didn't stick to conventional instruments," said May. We made sound with everything that came our way. "

The concept album, released a year before Tommy des Who, is considered to be the first opera-rock in history. While the psychedelic rock bands of Summer Of Love praise hallucinogenic drugs on the other side of the Atlantic, SF Sorrow tackles the madness linked to their consumption. The madness in which sinks Syd Barret, leader of Pink Floyd, at the same time.

After Dick Taylor's departure, The Pretty Tings took a hard rock orientation with albums like Parachute and Freeway Madness . The rest of the story is made of chain separations and reformations and albums shunned by the public, until Phil May's retirement in 2018.