National Health - Covent Gardens, London (1976, CD, England)

Tracklist:

1) Tenemos Roads (15:44)

2) Trident Asleep (16:10)
3) Agrippa (8:47)
4) The Lethargy Shuffle & The Mind-Your-Backs Tango (10:27)
5) Elephants (13:01)
6) The Lethargy Shuffle Part 2 (6:15)

Musicians:
Bass Guitar – Mont Campbell
Drums – Bill Bruford
Guitar – Phill Miller, Steve Hillage
Keyboards, Piano – Alan Gowen
Keyboards, Synthesizer – Dave Stewart

National Health - Maassluis (1979, Live, Netherlands)

National Health live at Toverbal Club, Maassluis (Netherlands) 29/3/1979

Tracklist:
1. TNTFX (2.47)
2. Silence (4.02)
3. Dreams Wide Awake (9.07)
4. Squarer For Maud (16.52)
5. Nowadays A Silhouette (15.57)
6. Rhubarb Jam (2.51)
7. The Rose Sob (1.32)
8. Play Time (11.50)
9. Seven Sisters (11.51)
10. TNTFX (3.15)

Musicians:

Phil Miller – guitar
Alan Gowen – keyboards
John Greaves – bass and vocals
Pip Pyle – drums

This is a very tight mic recording close to the stage in a fairly acoustically dead venue. Buzzing and occasionally drop-outs notwithstanding the balance is excellent.

The Alan Gowen line up of National Health was a somewhat looser affair than the Dave Stewart led version. Phil and Alan’s compositions still had enough twists and turns to keep all the musicians in a constant state of insomnia inducing, buttock-clenching anxiety (I’d have thought) but the blowing sections are noticeably more liquid and jazzier in feel.

National Health - Live in Breda (1979, Live, England)

National Health live in Breda, Netherlands 28.04.1979

Historic TV footage of very early Canterbury music

The following video comes from one of the discs we found among Phil’s collection and contains some wonderful old TV footage including Caravan, National Health and Kevin Ayers on The Old Grey Whistle Test and a very young Michael Parkinson interviewing Soft Machine.

The quality is far from great, and the footage seems to have been recorded by pointing a cine camera at a television. Nevertheless, I do think it is of real historical interest and although I have seen snippets of the footage on YouTube, I don’t think I’ve ever seen the whole compilation anywhere else. (search: Phil Miller Legacy)