Rock On! Wednesday, 10 December 2025 – Black Widow, Asterix, High Tide, Wishbone Ash & Nektar

Psychedelic, heavy, prog and more innovating sounds spanning the late 60s and the early 70s – Dan’s pick of the week: Black Widow, (Sacrifice), Asterix (Asterix), High Tide (High Tide), Wishbone Ash (Wishbone Ash) & Nektar (Live in New York).

Black Widow was een Britse rockband die in september 1969 werd geformeerd in Leicester (Engeland). De band stond vooral bekend om hun vroege gebruik van satanische en occulte beelden in hun muziek en toneelacts. Al vlug werd dat occulte verlaten, en werd de band een progressieve rockband.

Prog Archives review: “What you should expect is Jethro Tull-like prog rock, dominated by sax, flute, and Hammond organ. The music on this album, despite the heavily Satanic lyrics, are hardly sinister sounding, it’s actually pretty upbeat and cheery stuff, definately not what Black Sabbath done, and not even what Italian proggers Jacula (who later became Antonius Rex) had done.

The album starts off with “In Ancient Days”, I love that Hammond organ intro, which epitomizes what was great of prog in the early days. The acoustic guitar kicks, and you hear sax, and Mellotron-like strings, before the vocals come in. “Come to the Sabbat” was the “hit” on the album, what I am surprised was a hit with the repeated chanting of “Come, Come, Come to the Sabbat, Satan’s there”. “Seduction” is a rather pleasant ballad, and I love the cheesy-sounding middle part that sounds like something off a bad movie. Another favorite song of mine is “Attack of the Demon” with lyrics that go: “All my sins have damned my soul in Hell”. Then there’s the lengthy title track which contains a jazzy solo.

All this album is totally early ’70s. It’s also Black Widow’s only album with Satanic lyrics, it seems that certain fundamentalist Christian were outraged, and so the band dropped that image and all their following albums feature more typical lyrics. Still, if the thought of Satanic prog sounds interesting, then give this album a try.”

Wednesday, 12 November 2025 12:00 noon CET Brussels – 11 a.m. GMT London. Repeated: 16:00 & 20:00 hrs CET Brussels, 3 p.m. & 7 p.m. GMT London
Ends: 12 midnight CET Brussels, 11 p.m. GMT London.