A Message From Brian Godding

There have been some debates in the past as to whether or not Brian Godding ever played with Magma. There are some tapes from 1974 where the Magma community was not sure whether it was Olmos playing the guitar or whether it was Godding.

A few years ago, our good friend Olve Strelow got a message from Brian on this subject. I will reprint this letter here. (I have made some minor corrections in the punctuation and spelling.) Brian refers to the strange goings-on in reference to a question from Olve about the disastrous Spanish tour in the summer of 1974.


Hi Olve!

Nice to hear from you. I've been meaning (for years!) to clarify my contributions to Christian's Magma.

Basically, I played on the (Kontarcorz,,( sorry if this is spelt incorrectly!) album that was recorded on a mobile unit in the south of France. I was going to join the band after making the record, but unfortunately, I had to return to the UK for family and work commitments.

No, I never played with the band live, which is a great regret, as they were (are) one of my favorite live acts and Christian is a genius musician and he always plays with the most accomplished and exiting players ( Yanick Top! crazy boy !!).

I cant comment on any of their tour adventures but can implicitly say that when I was involved with the making of the album, there were absolutely no strange goings on at all!! Just work, work and more work!! Christian is a perfectionist and (what I consider to be) a 'true' artist with clear visions of what he wants to achieve, but having said that, a very humble and thoughtful human being striving to go somewhere new with the music and take it to another level.

I hope this puts to rest any misrepresentations about my (short but sweet !) involvement. There's a little of my history with the band on my own site, www.briangodding.co.uk in the 'music so far ' pages if you're interested.

Hope you are doing well with your projects and (most importantly!) enjoying it all !

All the very best

Brian Godding