In 1967, Paul McCartney asked the classic question:
“Will you still need me,
Will you still feed me,
When I’m sixty-four?”
Time has answered that question. A couple of years later, a slightly lesser known band than The Beatles was formed in the West Country, lesser known but in their own way hugely influential. More than any other, Wishbone Ash pioneered the twin lead guitar sound; the original line up was bass player Martin Turner, drummer Steve Upton, lead guitarist Andy Powell, and lead guitarist Ted Turner. The two Turners are not related; Ted hails from Birmingham and was actually born David Turner. He left the band in 1974 to be replaced by Laurie Wisefield, but was to return later. Although he was not a founder member, Laurie Wisefield is as good as; these five men constitute the classic Ash, even though they have never all played together.
I first got into Wishbone Ash just before or shortly after I left school. I remember in my 6th form room there was a poster on the wall captioned Wishbone Ash’s Ted Turner. The first of their albums I bought was Wishbone 4, on vinyl. Remember vinyl? Though I remained a fan, I didn’t get round to seeing the band in concert until the 1990s when I saw them * two years in succession at Lewisham Town Hall, Catford.
Wishbone Ash are still performing today, in fact there are two bands with that name: Wishbone Ash and Martin Turner’s Wishbone Ash. It is best to say here only that Andy Powell owns the name Wishbone Ash, and the two bands have no connection nor do they communicate with each other. Ted has remained on good terms with Martin Turner and Laurie Wisefield, and in August 2012 he joined Martin Turner’s Garden Party. You can currently find some background information on over forty Wishbone Ash songs at SongFacts, the world’s leading dedicated song database. You can also find a lot of information about the band on the Wishbone Ash and Martin Turner websites, both of which are superb.
Like many English musicians from the golden age of rock, Ted Turner relocated to the US, and is based in Arizona. Today is his 64th birthday, which makes him 6 years older than me to the very day. Although his website hasn’t been updated for a while, it is worth checking out. Voted one of Rolling Stone’s Top Twenty Rock Guitarists of all time, he may no longer be part of a twin lead guitar sound, but he is still making great music in his golden years.
[The above article was originally published August 2, 2014. * Memory is a strange thing, I have seen Wishbone Ash only the once, and here is the proof. The article was originally linked to a video (by the site) and a small photograph was captioned “Ted Turner provides the local vocal and shares the lead guitar with Andy Powell on Keeper Of The Light from the 1989 Here To Hear album”. That photograph has been replaced with a screengrab from a video on YouTube; the band is performing Keeper Of The Light.]
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