TREASURE ISLAND

You know what it’s like when you need to find an item, you rummage in your cupboards and it’s not there. Or at least it’s not where you thought you’d left it. Photos, tapes, trinkets, leaflets, keepsakes… all seem to have a life of their own when it comes to evading the search for one’s memorabilia. Accruing ‘stuff’ seems to be one of the things that comes with getting older. As is forgetting where you put it – or whether you really had it in the first place.

So imagine what it’s like if you were once a member of Gentle Giant. The band broke up in 1980 after an amazing decade-long career that produced a clutch of albums with some of the most adventurous and distinctive rock music of the 70s, in a crowded and highly competitive field. It was Ian Crockett, the man behind the Madfish label’s recent spate of deluxe box sets by Steve Hillage, Wishbone Ash and Family, who.