In the very early seventies I was a musical snob; The Who were the best band in the world – end of, and no amount of pleading on behalf of Led Zeppelin or The Rolling Stones would shift me from this position.

I remember when I was in my first band, Bone, and Hawkwind’s eponymous debut album was released; hippies everywhere were softly intoning “far out, man” and other such clichés. I was quite excited to hear this ground-breaking weirdness and duly did so at a squat where we rehearsed. However, when it started, I heard clean electric guitar and barre chords being moved around with the occasional squeak and squiggle – at the time I considered that we, Bone, were a pretty far-out band and these guys were nowhere near us in the weirdness stakes! So I duly dismissed them; their big hit ‘Silver Machine’ (Status Quo with white noise!) only served to confirm my disparaging opinion of them and it wasn’t until I heard ‘Live ’79’, courtesy of my good buddy Andy Scott of Wasted Youth, that I realised I had done them a grave disservice and spent the next several months catching up on what I’d missed out on!

I did a similar thing with Man around ’69 – ’70; one of my mates enthusiastically invited me to “listen to this”, which I did, and announced myself to be singularly unimpressed; aimless jamming on one riff, again confirmed by a TV spot which failed to ignite my passion!

Fast-forward to 2014 and I bought the ‘Original Album Series five-pack, containing studio albums 3, 4, 5, 7 and 8, for a small amount of cash, thinking maybe I could give them a re-evaluation. It sat on my shelf for months until I heard Man perform ‘Ain’t Their Fight’ on one of those BBC4 compilations on a Friday evening; this lead me to think “maybe I should give that box set a listen”! From the first chords of ‘Romain’ I was interested, but not moved – as the album unfolded my interest was piqued and I moved on to ‘Do You Like It Here, Are You Settling In?’; I worked my way through all five albums whilst driving to and from work, and realised I’d done it again – Man were indeed a mighty force to reckon with!

From here I found out that all their stuff had been re-mastered and expanded by the Esoteric label, so I set about acquiring more Man – ‘Live at the Paget Rooms’ came first, and I began to realise just how mighty the Manband in full flow were; add to that the brilliant sleeve notes from Deke Leonard and I was well hooked! Their entire output up until the split in 1976 found its way through my door, then the Marquee reformation gig and ‘The Twang Dynasty’, all lovingly re-mastered, expanded and re-packaged by the nice people at Esoteric and the history filled in by the great Deke Leonard! I have experienced many moments of bliss courtesy of the Manband; the first time I heard the live version of ‘C’mon’ from ‘Back Into The Future’ being a particular highlight. I am now most definitely “along for the ride and the view”!

If only my judgemental and dismissive teenage self had been more patient I would doubtless have seen them live several times. Alas, with the passing of Micky Jones (RIP) in 2010 that will never happen.

Thank goodness their legacy has been so lovingly and carefully managed by the Esoteric label – and I wonder how many more great bands I am yet to discover!