National Health

Canterbury, again

National Health grew out of the Canterbury scene. In November 1973 Hatfield and the North and Gilgamesh played double-quartet gigs with arrangements by Alan Gowen, in some ways the prototype for the new band. By summer 1975 Dave Stewart and Gowen on keyboards, guitarists Phil Miller and Phil Lee, singer Amanda Parsons and bassist Mont Campbell had formed it, with Bill Bruford on drums a couple of months later and Pip Pyle deputizing until he replaced him in 1977. Stewart named it after his cheap National Health spectacles, a joke about musicians celebrating physical defects that also alluded to the NHS. Phil Miller was the only constant member.

The line-up shifted constantly: Lee left in December 1975, Campbell in June 1976, Bruford in December 1976, Parsons in February 1977 and Gowen in March 1977, frustrated with the changes, and Neil Murray in January 1978 to join Whitesnake. The debut album National Health was recorded in February and March 1977 at The Point in Victoria, London, produced by Mike Dunne, and released in February 1978 on Affinity. Of Queues and Cures (recorded July 1978 at Ridge Farm Studio, released December 1978) followed on Charly, with John Greaves on bass. Stewart left in late 1978 and Gowen returned; the final quartet of Miller, Gowen, Greaves and Pyle toured France and Spain, played a short US tour in November 1979 and a Scandinavian tour that winter, and split in March 1980.

Gowen died on May 17, 1981, aged 33. The surviving members reunited for a memorial concert in June 1981 and recorded D.S. Al Coda, an album of Gowen's compositions, in October and November 1981, released in 1982; two final concerts at the Edinburgh Festival followed in the summer of 1983. Miller died on October 18, 2017, aged 68. Piero Scaruffi called Of Queues and Cures the band's masterpiece. The Deftones sampled the intro of "Binoculars" on "Black Moon".