FORCEFIELD & MINUTE BY MINUTE
 

The Minute By Minute project saw Ray team up again with old mate Polle Eduard When Ray was planning the second Forcefield album in 1988 the name of Jan Akkerman as guitarist immediately came to mind and Jan subsequently contributed to the third album. Ray has long been an admirer of Jan’s guitar style and whilst with the Spencer Davis Group he supported Focus on a tour of the States in 1974.

"I remember seeing Focus at the Marquee and they were so good. And I remember when we toured with Focus in '74 Jan was using banks of these Leslie cabinets. It was incredible!"

The Forcefield project spawned four albums. It was basically a musical collective with Ray and Cozy Powell as the two mainstays and a number of diifferent vocalists and guitarists. The music was mainstream hard rock with a definite American AOR feel. The albums were particularly successful in Japan."I had a lot of offers from people to tour and manage it  but it never really got off the ground. The problem with those kind of things is that everybody is always doing something else and it's a nightmare trying to organise it."

The Jan Akkerman link was renewed in 1989 when Jan guested on two tracks for Ray’s "Minute By Minute" project. This was originally released on a small label in Holland, with rather uninspiring artwork, and only available in limited quantities. The CD has now been remastered, and there’s a new cover with more information.
 

How did the "Minute By Minute" project come about? "Robbie "Polle" Eduard was the bass player in The Tee Set (Dutch band) when I first joined, he was also the bassist in After Tea a Dutch band who have since become something of a cult in Holland. I'd been working with Polle for many years so I said why don't we get together and start to write some songs.

We got a guy called Ruud De Graaf who was managing Polle to book studio time and we put it out on Telstar. This was a mistake as the guy there only had experience of traditional Dutch acts. Anyway the licensing deal expired and we were free to take it elsewhere."

How did you get Candy Dulfer on the album? "At the time she was only 19 and she was a friend of someone working in the studio. I said I wanted a sax player and he suggested Candy Dulfer. When I heard this young kid play I thought it was fantastic and she also looked like a movie star!!"

As a professional guitar player, why does Ray find Jan Akkerman's style so appealing? "I admire his fluidity, his great musical knowledge, his interest in Hungarian folk music comes into his playing. He's a fusion player. He incorporates so many different styles. If you listen to Larry Carlton he is very reminiscent of Jan's playing.

And Jan's got a feel for blues like Robben Ford. He's at home with jazz and classical music. I remember when we were in America Jan was heavily into funk music. He was always hanging out with black musicians. I love the early-'80s stuff like "The Complete Guitarist". Some of those tracks are quite minimalist but effective. He also writes beautiful melodies."

Was there anything left over from the Forcefield sessions with Jan? "No, that's the one thing that really upset me, that we didn't do more. The problem was timescale - we always had only the allotted studio time. Jan would come over for a few days, Cozy was only available for a week and so on. It wasn't always easy coordinating these musicians."

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