The Van Dike, Exmouth Road, Devonport

It's funny how things suddenly come to mind. There I was just trolling the depths of the interweb when I came across this word; quintessence.

Quintessence: the fifth and highest element in ancient and medieval philosophy that permeates all nature and is the substance composing the celestial bodies; the essence of a thing in its purest and most concentrated form ...

But to me that will never be quintessence. For me Quintessence will always be a bunch of London based Aussies who took on Indian names and kaftans and played a curious blend of Indian classical music and prog rock. Actually, they were rather good, as I recall.

Quintessence were one of the first groups I saw at Plymouth's legendary Van Dike Club in the late '60s. And I do mean legendary ... if not in a literal way ...

The Van Dike was run by the musically based Van Dike family from the old Exmouth Road Chuch Hall in Devonport, originally a separate town from Plymouth.

I used to go frequently with mates from work or Martin, the only other Trot in the village, and thinking back, not only was the roster of emergent groups remarkable, so was the price of entry; three and fourpence to see Mott the Hoople, Deep Purple, Medicine Head (?) ... and six and eightpence to see a posh gig at the Guildhall ... Yes!, The Nice, Jethro Tull ... unbelievable.

And then Martin and I used to walk home from Devonport to Plymstock ... 6-7miles @ 2.00 in the morning ... those were the days ...

Amazingly, I found this repository of old Van Dike programmes here. It's a bit of a trip ... down Memory Lane nowadays, of course ...

Sadly, I had heard that Greg Van Dike had passed away a year or so ago, although I understand he was still involved in music to the end. His children seem to have picked up the banner - in a Lily Allen sort of way ... maybe.