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The Animals
 Alan Price started out as a northern British bluesman, playing with a
combo of Hilton Valentine, Chas Chandler and John Steel on the Newcastle
club circuit. Price played a mean set of keyboards and had a soul-tinged
voice that was sexy but lacked the ferocity to cover the grubbier end of
rock.
However, in 1962 they recruited a suitably mean lead singer to fill
out the sound and beef up the image. Eric Burdon had one of the grimiest
voices in the business and would throw himself into the songs, whip the
band into overdrive and slaughter the audience. The original name of the
group, The Alan Price Combo, had to go and The Animals came into being.
Supporting older, black musical legends like John
Lee Hooker and Sonny Boy Williamson
as they toured the UK, the band grew into a professional unit, with Eric
perfecting his skills as a rabble-rouser.
The only dark cloud on the
horizon was the rivalry between Alan and new front man Eric, and the
first signs of resentment soon began to show.
In 1964 they moved to
London, where they teamed up with producer Mickie
Most, and signed to Columbia. They blasted their way through Price's
arrangement of the traditional House Of The Rising Sun, which
went to Number 1 in the UK, the USA and around the world.
 For the rest of the 60s, The Animals hit the charts regularly, most
famously with Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood and We Gotta Get
Out Of This Place. However, it wasn't long before ego problems
resurfaced, and only two LPs, The Animals (1964) and Animal
Tracks (1965), were recorded before Price left to pursue a more
mainstream solo career.
He was quickly replaced by Newcastle's Dave Rowberry. Steel had also
left the band by the release of its third album, Animalism
(1966), the new drummer being Barry Jenkins (ex-Nashville
Teens). In the limbo of these personnel changes, Burdon recorded a
solo single and an LP (Eric Is Here) and moved his base to
California. There he formed a second incarnation of the band, Eric
Burdon & The Animals, comprising Burdon, Jenkins, guitarist Vic
Briggs, John Wieder (guitar/violin) and Danny McCulloch (bass). This
line-up produced two LPs with a different style from the R&B
stompers they'd kicked around in the clubs of London and the north of
England.
1967's Wind Of Change featured tracks with titles such as Poem
By The Sea, It's All Meat, and Yes, I Am Experienced,
Burdon's reply to the title of Jimi Hendrix's
just-released debut album. The new, 'psychedelic' Animals did fairly
well, with chart successes at home and in the USA (including Monterey
and San Franciscan Nights), but not well enough to avoid
McCulloch and Briggs being replaced by bassist Zoot Money and guitarist
Andy Summers.
This final line-up was packed full of skilled musicians, each of whom
had his own musical statement to make. Expecting them to function as a
unit was demanding too much and after two minor LP releases, The Animals
folded.
Alan Price was by now an 'all-round entertainer' having done TV,
novelty songs, and worked briefly with fellow British bluesman Georgie
Fame in a kind of R&B supergroup.
Chas Chandler had hung up his bass to reinvent himself as a producer,
working with Hendrix and British glam-popsters
Slade. Wieder went on to become part of Family,
Zoot Money went solo, and Andy Summers worked with Kevin Ayers and Kevin
Coyne, before joining The Police. Eric Burdon
kept on rocking, digging back down into the dirt for his next venture, War.
War's urban, Latin-tinged funk had to be put
briefly on hold while the original Animals re-formed in early 1976 ,
releasing an album, Before We Were So Rudely Interrupted, which
generated some interest on the nostalgia circuit. However, Price left
almost immediately to continue his solo career and nothing more was
heard from The Animals until they briefly re-formed again in 1983,
recording a studio LP, Ark and issuing Rip It To Shreds, a
live hits compilation. They then, once again, returned to solo projects.
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Eric Burdon
Vocals
Alan Price
Keyboards & vocals
Chas Chandler
Bass
John Steel
Drums
Hilton Valentine
Guitar
Dave Rowberry
Keyboards
Barry Jenkins
Drums
Vic Briggs
Guitar
John Wieder
Guitar & violin
Danny McCulloch
Bass
Zoot Money
Bass
Andy Summers
Guitar
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