English experimental/psychedelic quartet led by drummer/percussionist Glen Sweeney, noted for instrumental suites combining oboe, violin, cello and tablas and for blending raga, free-improvisation and folk textures.

Founder mentioned in reviews: Glen Sweeney. Early line-up cited in reviews: Paul Minns (oboe), Richard Coff (violin), Mel Davis (cello). Debut album Alchemy released 1969. The band composed at least one film soundtrack for Roman Polanski's Macbeth. Paul Minns is reported in a review to have died by suicide in 2000. Reviews note live appearances at the UFO Club alongside Soft Machine, the Move and Pink Floyd.

DeBaser reviews present Third Ear Band as an English experimental/psychedelic quartet that fused raga, free-jazz and folk instrumentation. Their early records (notably Alchemy and the self-titled Elements album) are praised for immersive, hypnotic instrumental suites. Reviewers highlight tabla, oboe, violin and cello as central to the band's distinctive sound.

For:Listeners of experimental, psychedelic, ambient and world-influenced music; fans of 1960s–1970s avant-garde instrumental groups.

 An original line-up, especially considering that this is their first release, dated 1969.

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 The pieces by Third Ear Band were not conventional, and although their expansive instrumental compositions were much more aligned with minimalism or certain raga diversions than with the mainstream of the Beatles or the Rolling Stones, it is curious and noteworthy that all their records entered the UK's top 50, perhaps due to their constant presence on the live festival circuit.

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 In the great and unrepeatable psychedelic season that exploded in the second half of the sixties, the English Third Ear Band constituted a unicum, both for the peculiar instrumentation used (mainly viola, violin, cello, oboe, and tabla) and for the attempt to compose pieces that harnessed within them the territorial peculiarities and the ancient energies of countries very distant from each other, both in time and space.

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