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Vincent Crane, real name Vincent Cheesman, was born in Reading, Berkshire on 21st May 1943 and grew up in Battersea, South London. He attended Westminster City Grammar School, and at the age of fifteen, taught himself to play the piano. At eighteen he attended the Trinity College of Music in London where he graduated in 1964, and while studying classical music there he also played blues and jazz at the Marquee and the 100 Club in his spare time. After graduating from Trinity he decided to drop the classics and formed the first of several short-lived bands.
In 1965 Vincent lived in a shared house in Fulham where he met Arthur Brown, three months later The Crazy World of Arthur Brown were formed and originally started out with just improvisation, and after a year of touring Britain, they played their first of many gigs at the U.F.O. Club in London where most psychedelic bands of the 60s started their careers. Two years later they were signed to Track Records, the same label which signed Jimi Hendrix the year before, and that same year The Crazy World of Arthur Brown's first album went straight to No. 1 in Britain and many other countries, as did their single "Fire" which, amongst other songs, Vincent co-wrote.
During their tour of the U.S. the band had a number of management and contractual problems and they split half way through the tour, and it was also during this time that Vincent's latent psychiatric problems first became a problem in the form of bizarre manic escapades, followed by long periods of depression in hospital. On returning to Britain Vincent Crane and Carl Palmer decided to form a new band, with the name Atomic Rooster.
Atomic Rooster MkI consisted of: Vincent Crane - Hammond organ and piano, Carl Palmer - drums, and Nick Graham - bass and vocals. They recorded their first album, titled Atomic Roo-o-ster, for B&C Records during late 1969, and was released in February 1970, reaching No.49 in the charts. A track from this album was released as a single - "Friday 13th" but failed to make the charts.
Just before the release of the first album, John (Du) Cann, previously the guitarist and vocalist with 1960's cult psychedelic bands Andromeda, The Attack, and The Five Day Week Straw People, had replaced Nick Graham, and it was decided that John should also replace the guitar and vocals on the US release of Atomic Roo-o-ster. By the autumn of that year, Carl Palmer was persuaded to leave the band to become part of Emerson, Lake and Palmer, but John managed to recruite drummer Paul Hammond as Carl's replacement. With this line-up, Atomic Rooster recorded their best-known album "Death Walks Behind You". The album was a big success, and it also provided them with their first top twenty single, "Tomorrow Night" - reaching No. 11 in the U.K. charts.
In 1971 the band released their biggest ever hit - "Devil's Answer", written by John Cann, reaching No.2 in the UK, and also charting worldwide. Soon afterwards, the band had moved over to Pegasus Records (B&Cs "progressive" label) and recruited Pete French on vocals. With this line-up, they recorded Rooster's third album "In Hearing Of" reaching No. 18 in the UK charts of July that year.
Vincent was once again unhappy with the direction the band was taking, wanting to move away from the dark, almost satanic image portrayed by their second album, towards a lighter, funk/soul sound. Uncomfortable with this new direction, John Cann and Paul Hammond left to form Bullet (later renamed Hard Stuff) and were immediately signed to Deep Purple's own record label, Purple Records, on which they released two albums and a string of singles. With Hard Stuff, John continued developing the dark, hard rock that he had brought to Rooster, and as a result took with him Rooster's disaffected fans.
Vincent reassembled a completely new line-up of Atomic Rooster, this time with Chris Farlowe on vocals, Steve Bolton on guitar, Bill Smith on bass (for one track only!), and drummer Rick Parnell who had previously joined the band for a short while when Carl Palmer left. This time Rooster signed to Dawn Records and released their first album for the label in 1972 titled "Made In England". With this new funk/soul direction, Rooster lost the vast majority of their hard-earned fans. Neither the album or the singles taken from the album charted. Soon afterwards, Vincent replaced Steve Bolton with guitarist Johnny Mandala and the following year released the album "Nice and Greasy" which again failed to make any sort of impact. Not suprisingly, Vincent disbanded Atomic Rooster.
After Hard Stuff, John DuCann joined Thin Lizzy, replacing Gary Moore who was about to leave to join Colosseum, and completed an extensive European tour to promote their last single for Decca, titled Little Darlin' , before leaving to concentrate on writing more of his own material. John signed a song-writing deal with a major publishing company, through which he was offered a deal with Arista to release his first solo single, titled "Throw Him In Jail" (single of the week in NME). An album, titled The World's Not Big Enough, was to be released, but due to changes in the A&R department at Arista the LP was shelved (now available on Angel Air). For the next two years John was writing successful TV advertising jingles, which lead him to his next top-twenty hit single "Don't Be A Dummy", originally a theme for the punky Lee Cooper jeans TV advertisement.
In late 1979, John decided not to follow up with his Don't Be A Dummy hit as he began to receive calls from several record
companies (Virgin and EMI amongst them) offering deals to reform Rooster. As the so-called NWOBHM (or New Wave of British Heavy Metal) had started to take hold, John thought it was a good enough reason to contact Vincent with his proposal to reform the band.
The band signed to EMI Records and a self-titled album was recorded with session drummer Preston Heyman. The single "Do You Know Who's Looking For You?" was released, but neither the album or single made the national UK charts, although for several weeks it had topped the heavy metal charts of Sounds, NME and Record Mirror. Despite this, and a heavy touring schedual, EMI dropped the band.
John immediately negotiated a deal with Polydor Records, and after a very short and unhappy spell with Ginger Baker, re-recruited original drummer Paul Hammond.
With the classic line-up restored, they recorded two singles, "Play It Again" and "End Of The Day" and toured the UK extensively. Once again, this time due to industrial disputes at the record pressing plants, they failed to make the UK Top 40 despite repeatedly topping the heavy metal charts with both their earlier and new material, and once again they were dropped by their record label. The strain took its toll, and John decided to leave the band, but Vincent continued, and in 1983 was signed by a small independent label, Towerbell Records.
Vincent decided once again to change the sound of Rooster - gone were the heavy Hammond organ-dominated riffs, and in its place were piano and synthesiser compositions, with the organ non-existent or far back in the mix. Vincent reworked several compositions he had had for a number of years, and put together a new album, titled Headline News.
Vincent was unable to persuade John DuCann to play on the album, but John suggested Bernie Torme as a replacement., and Tom Newman, who produced the album was a close friend of Pink Floyd's Dave Gilmour and managed to arrange for him to play on some of the compositions.
With this brave (and poorly recorded) attempt, and despite Dave Gilmour's trademark guitar, neither the album or the single taken from the album managed to reach the national, independent, or even the rock/metal charts that the band had dominated during 1980-82, partly due to the record company going bankrupt immediately after the release, but mainly because of the army of new fans that Rooster had won over were once again alienated from the band. The album was perceived by fans as more of a Vincent Crane solo album, rather than something equal to that of the DuCann/Crane/Hammond line-up.
This seemed to be the last straw for Vincent Crane and he once again gave up with Atomic Rooster, and in February 1984 Vincent accepted an offer to join Dexy's Midnight Runners for their album "Don't Stand Me Down" and subsequent tour. In late 1988 it was rumoured that Vincent and John were once again going to reform Atomic Rooster, but on February 14th 1989 Vincent committed suicide at his home in Maida Vale, London.
Today, John Du Cann continues to write and record music, and has been busy remastering his entire back catalogue of material, and to date has re-released The Attack, Andromeda, Five Day Week Straw People, most of his Atomic Rooster material and his 1977 solo album, The World's Not Big Enough on Angel Air Records.
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