Procol Harum's first year in the NME

Enthusiastic acclaim: 3 February 1968

These excerpts from New Musical Express, kindly selected for 'Beyond the Pale' by Yan Friis, show very little Procol news, but an acknowledgement of Dylan's huge influence on the period.

Front page:
Half page advertisement for Marty Wilde’s By The Time I Get To Phoenix (Philips)
Half page advertisement for Status Quo’s Pictures Of Matchstick Men (Pye)

 Main feature headlines:

 HERD-A-WEEK

’If I lived with anyone I’d probably drive them round the bend’, says … GARY TAYLOR
by Nick Logan

JOHN FRED writes personally about his PLAYBOY SOUND!

NMExclusive

 Tipped for charts by Derek Johnson:

Long John Baldry, Hold Back The Daybreak
Petula Clark, Kiss Me Goodbye 

(A small review for Genesis, The Silent Sun (Decca) ‘ … a bit too complex for the average fan’)

 NME Top 5

1 (1) Everlasting Love, Love Affair
2 (3) Am I That Easy To Forget, Engelbert Humperdinck
3 (6) Judy In Disguise, John Fred & his Playboy Band
4 (2) The Ballad Of Bonnie And Clyde, Georgie Fame
5 (11) Mighty Quinn, Manfred Mann

NME in Midem, report by Andy Gray

 (excerpt)

 … Tom’s (Jones) triumph (last Saturday) made up for the rather pathetic British Gala shambles four nights before in the elegant Cannes Festival Hall. In this the only truly ‘back Britain’ artists were the Moody Blues, Roger (very professional) Whittaker and the Procol Harum. They all won themselves enthusiastic acclaim …

 Bob Dylan’s John Wesley Harding reviewed by Nick Logan

(‘Dylan once more is a moving force in a world that owes so much to his influence.’)

Read more from the first year of Procol press