Scrapbook
1975

Taken from "Bravo" issue 46/1975

This is the rock-sound of the SAILORs!

Finally some new sounds in the rock-scene! A 40-year-old music-monster named Nickelodeon which you can see above plays a very important role. The band SAILOR has updated its engineering for their live shows. Here you can read the whole SAILOR-story...

A bit of nostalgia blows across the stage when SAILOR appear. Their costumes look like the uniforms of English sailors from the last century. The most important instrument of the band is a Nickelodeon, a piano that used to be the precursor of the music box. And the music the four guys have to offer also seems to come from the last century more than from the rock-music of the 20th century.
In "Traffic Jam" they describe the traffic of the 18th century with harmonic vocal-arrangements, strings and a rhythm that seems to resemble the sound of horses in the streets. "Blue Desert" reminds us of shanties, the old sailor-songs.
And in spite of this the English fans are convinced that this band belongs to the future. Since the Beatles there was no other band that composed such simple and lovely melodies and presented their music in this way. SAILOR mix folklore with rock, the surf-sound of the Beach Boys and classical sounds. Some songs sound like a soft roaring of the sea on a warm summer evening, others are so heavy that even Led Zeppelin could be proud of them.
The story started in 1970. Drummer Grant Serpell (29), bass-player Phil Pickett (29), Nickelodeon-player Henry Marsh (26) and guitarist Georg Johan Tjegodiev Sakonski Kajanus (29) studied at the Sorbonne in Paris. They became friends and decided to earn some money by playing music. They found jobs at the café "Le Matelot". "We did very well and were allowed to play there every day", explains Georg Kajanus. He is the composer, lyricist and producer of the band and also the musical leader. "We didn't have a name for the group at first, so we simply called ourselves like the café "SAILOR". (Le matelot means sailor, "Seemann" in German).
In 1971 it was all over. The café burnt down. "We had finished our studies anyway, so it wasn't that bad for us. We separated and each one of us went another way. Grant's father moved to London as a professor, Philip is English although he was born in Münster (Germany), Henry went back to his hometown Bath in the English county Sommerset, and I didn't want to go back to Norway again - where I was born in Trondheim", says Georg.
The four of them didn't see each other for three years. "From time to time we wrote to each other, but that was all." In 1974 Philip Pickett got to know the music publisher Steve Morris- Steve offered him a record deal. "The only thing I wanted to do was to get my old friends back together again. I was sure that the four of us would have more luck than just myself all alone."
Philip was right. In 1974 the first SAILOR LP was released in England. "We didn't reach the charts, but we got many offers for tours and the success proves that we were on the right way."
In Germany SAILOR already presented themselves in the "Musikladen" in Bremen and "Pop '75". "In 1976 we will surely appear in the charts again - if not something must be terribly wrong."

The text under the pictures says:
Henry Marsh discovered the Nickelodeon in Paris. It was built in 1936.
Guitarist Georg Kajanus comes from Norway. He is the leader of the band.
Bass-player Philip Pickett was born in Münster (Germany). He is the second man at the Nickelodeon.
Drummer Grant Serpell comes from Paris. He formed SAILOR five years ago.

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