Quatermass was a British

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 progressive rock

Progressive rock

Progressive rock is a subgenre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s as part of a "mostly British attempt to elevate rock music to new levels of artistic credibility." John Covach, in Contemporary Music Review, says that many thought it would not just "succeed the pop of...

 band formed in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 in September 1969. Lauded as a band of the future on the release of their debut album

Album

An album is a collection of recordings, released as a single package on gramophone record, cassette, compact disc, or via digital distribution. The word derives from the Latin word for list .Vinyl LP records have two sides, each comprising one half of the album...

 and supplementing single

Single (music)

In music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...

, "Black Sheep of the Family", major commercial success eluded the band throughout its brief duration.

Career

The trio consisted of bass player

Bass guitar

The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....

 and vocalist

Singing

Singing is the act of producing musical sounds with the voice, and augments regular speech by the use of both tonality and rhythm. One who sings is called a singer or vocalist. Singers perform music known as songs that can be sung either with or without accompaniment by musical instruments...

 John Gustafson

John Gustafson (musician)

John "Gus" Gustafson also known as Johnny Gustafson is an influential bass player who has had a thirty eight year recording and live performance career...

, keyboardist

Keyboard instrument

A keyboard instrument is a musical instrument which is played using a musical keyboard. The most common of these is the piano. Other widely used keyboard instruments include organs of various types as well as other mechanical, electromechanical and electronic instruments...

  Peter Robinson (born John Peter Robinson, 16 September 1945, Fulmer

Fulmer

Fulmer is a village and civil parish in South Buckinghamshire district in Buckinghamshire, England. The village is now contiguous with Gerrards Cross but remains administratively separate....

, Buckinghamshire

Buckinghamshire

Buckinghamshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan home county in South East England. The county town is Aylesbury, the largest town in the ceremonial county is Milton Keynes and largest town in the non-metropolitan county is High Wycombe....

) and Mick Underwood

Mick Underwood

Mick Underwood is a British drummer best known for his work with Episode Six, Quatermass and Gillan. First playing drums at the age of 14, he was a professional musician by the time he left school...

 on drums

Drum kit

A drum kit is a collection of drums, cymbals and often other percussion instruments, such as cowbells, wood blocks, triangles, chimes, or tambourines, arranged for convenient playing by a single person ....

, all well-established and previously distinguished musicians who had met while playing in Episode Six

Episode Six

Episode Six was a British vocal pop-rock group during the mid 1960s. The band was not well known, but foreshadowed the arrival of Deep Purple in late 1960s...

. As Quatermass, these musicians strove for a distinguished organ-tinged

Hammond organ

The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond in 1934 and manufactured by the Hammond Organ Company. While the Hammond organ was originally sold to churches as a lower-cost alternative to the wind-driven pipe organ, in the 1960s and 1970s it became a standard keyboard...

 sound, with swinging rock coupled with striking ballads. Their first and only album sold itself through "...compactness, wealth of ideas, forceful lead vocals and complicated arrangements, enriched by pianist Robinson's tasteful use of classical strings which are on display along with spacious keyboard passages at their height in the mold of The Nice

The Nice

The Nice were an English progressive rock band from the 1960s, known for their blend of rock, jazz and classical music. Their debut album, The Thoughts of Emerlist Davjack was released in 1967 to immediate acclaim. It is often considered the first progressive rock album...

."

In 1994, Underwood, and Nick Simper

Nick Simper

Nicholas John Simper is a bass guitarist, best known as a founding member of Deep Purple.-Biography:...

 joined in a project titled Quatermass II. Gustafson contributed two songs on their eventual album, Long Road (1997), which also involved Gary Davis and Bart Foley on guitar, with Don Airey

Don Airey

Donald Airey has been the keyboardist in the rock band Deep Purple since 2002, succeeding Jon Lord...

 on keyboards.

The band took its name from Professor Bernard Quatermass

Bernard Quatermass

Professor Bernard Quatermass is a fictional scientist, originally created by the writer Nigel Kneale for BBC Television. An intelligent and highly moral British scientist, Quatermass is a pioneer of the British space programme, heading up the British Experimental Rocket Group...

, a fictional scientist who had been the hero of three science fiction

Science fiction

Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...

 serials produced by BBC Television

BBC Television

BBC Television is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation. The corporation, which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927, has produced television programmes from its own studios since 1932, although the start of its regular service of television...

in the 1950s.

Singles

• "Black Sheep of the Family" / "Good Lord Knows" (1970)
• "One Blind Mice" / "Punting" (1971)
• "Gemini" / "Black Sheep of the Family" (1971)