The Idle Race

The Idle Race were a British cult rock group from Birmingham in the late 1960s and early 1970s. In addition to being the springboard for Jeff Lynne, the band holds a place of significance in British Midlands' rock history as a link between Electric Light Orchestra, The Move, the Steve Gibbons Band and Mike Sheridan and The Nightriders. The core of the group, rhythm guitarist Dave Pritchard, bass guitarist Greg Masters and drummer Roger Spencer, w... more

The Idle Race were a British cult rock group from Birmingham in the late 1960s and early 1970s. In addition to being the springboard for Jeff Lynne, the band holds a place of significance in British Midlands' rock history as a link between Electric Light Orchestra, The Move, the Steve Gibbons Band and Mike Sheridan and The Nightriders. The core of the group, rhythm guitarist Dave Pritchard, bass guitarist Greg Masters and drummer Roger Spencer, was relatively unchanged from 1959 until February 1972. The band went through several incarnations, lead guitarists and lead singers: first Billy King and later, more successfully, with Mike Sheridan, with whom they first rose to prominence and, in 1964, to a record deal with EMI. While Mike Sheridan and The Nightriders failed to crack the charts, the band's lineup during this period included a young lead guitarist and composer named Roy Wood, whose first commercial song "Make Them Understand," appeared on one of the band's B-sides in 1965.... less