Ten Years After MORE THAN 50 YEARS LATER

DRUMMER RIC LEE TALKS TO GOLDMINE ABOUT A TEN YEARS AFTER DELUXE EDITION OF THE A STING IN THE TALE ALBUM AND HIS RECENTLY RELEASED MEMOIR, FROM HEADSTOCKS TO WOODSTOCK.

- MIKE GREENBLATT

When Ten Years After plugged in at Wood-stock, the Sunday monsoon had come and gone. We were all wet, tired, hungry, freezing and had to go to the bathroom. Plus, we sorta wanted to go home. It had been four days. But from the first notes of Howlin’ Wolf ’s 1960 “Spoonful” to the final cadenza of guitarist Alvin Lee’s iconic “I’m Going Home,” there are those who say it was the best set of the weekend.

Original TYA drummer Ric Lee has a new book out, From Headstocks to Woodstock. Ten Years After — with two original members in Lee and keyboardist Chick Churchill — have put out a deluxe edition of 2017’s A Sting in the Tale, complete with live tracks.

Quick timeline: Alvin Lee died at 68 in 2013. He had left the band to go solo in ’73, rejoining in ’89 to ’03, when he was replaced by Joe Gooch, who lasted until ’14. Enter Marcus Bonfanti, who sings and stings that guitar as frontman to this day. Bassist Colin Hodgkinson replaced original bassist Leo Lyons in ’14 and still holds down the bottom.

GOLDMINE: I don’t think I’ve ever seen Ten Years After when I wasn’t tripping.

RIC LEE: Really?

GM: Be it at the Fillmore East or The Singer Bowl in Queens, New York, on the site of the ’64 World’s Fair or at Woodstock, yeah. RL: Amazing. Well, you were young then.