Recorded between July and September 1973 at Air Studios, London, and released the following February, 'The Man In The Bowler Hat' was Stackridge's third long-player. It was, by common consent, their finest achievement, both up to that point and in their entire seven-year career.
For James Warren, Stackridge had 'three ingredients going for it: eccentricity, Englishness and an incredible stylistic diversity. We were flying in the faces of the Frees, Zeppelins and Sabbaths, undoubtedly; but none of us were out and out rockers at heart, so we just stuck to ploughing our own idiosyncratic furrow.'
But the magic ingredient 'Bowler Hat' boasted was the involvement of an iconic musical figure: GEORGE MARTIN, producer of the Beatles until their split three years previously.
Track listing: 1. Fundamentally Yours 2. Pinafore days 3. The Last Plimsoll 4. To The Sun And The Moon
5. The Road To Venezuela 6. The Galloping Gaucho 7. Humiliation
8. Dangerous Bacon 9. The Indifferent Hedgehog 10. God Speed the Plough
