unanimity

Peter Douglas Cameron Banks, was born on 9th September 1949. He attended Ryde School, on the Isle of Wight. His family later moved to Essex, where he attended Gaynes School, then Hornchurch Grammer School.

Banks was brought up in an already musical family, being exposed from an early age to classical music, and especially, the piano, which he learnt to play without any formal teaching. The purchase of a record player, introduced Banks to the sound of jazz. The young Banks felt behind in his musical exposure, but he caught up fast, absorbing the ever-changing music of the sixties. He was particularly impressed with a jazz track by Tony Crombie, called Drums, Drums, Drums, and then by The Shadows, with Hank Marvin's coolly melodic guitar. Then The Beatles arrived, and changed everything for Banks. At thirteen, he was given a guitar for Christmas, and a Bert Weedon Play In A Day book, from which he set about learning chords. Formed group Busy Bees within church youth group, who played respectable 150 or so gigs over a two year period.

In 1968, Banks began a degree at University of East Anglia, Norwich, reading Physics. During the Easter of 1969, while still at college, formed Unanimity, with Brian Ling, Tony Woods, and later Ruth Edwards, which lasted two years. The group was the musical core of a whole team of the same name, that gave presentations of the Christian gospel to the local youth. Typically, they would devote the first half of a concert to a group 'rave' with little chat between numbers. The group would use slides during the songs to illustrate the words, and connected them with poetry. The second half involved more information about the gospel being given between numbers, leading up to Everday's Auntie,

"where the choice they presented in earlier numbers was brought out in the form of free musical expression at the end of the song."

A short talk from Brian Ling, of the group, and Questions And Answers, the number they started the gig with, ends their set and the concert. Using this format, they put on two productions in Norwich during the year, namely Venture One and Venture Two. They had the use of a coffee bar called the Four Square, to which they could invite people after the concert for a chat.

Clementwood CC 127

During 1969, they record a single, Loner, a commercial blues number composed by Banks, which is released on the Clemantswood label. Neil Mathieson, writing in the January 1970 edition of Buzz magazine describes the song as

"... pretty well recorded and produced, with some nice guitar work, except the guitar sounds like it was recorded in a cardboard box at the time. The key is a bit too high for the singer, and the words not always too clear. But generally a fair job for a difficult style of blues."

The b-side was another Banks composition, All Right, which Matheison describes as a

"happy Herman's Hermits style pop song."

In December 1969, they returned to the studio to record Sunshine.

The most important material to emerge from Unanimity, however was The Suite, a sort of rock opera in three parts: 1. Life, 2. Death, 3. Life Again, some elements of which were retained, in altered form, in the future ATF repertoire, particularly a section from Life called OK, I.

Initially, when Unanimity began, Banks started out by playing guitar, but by their last gig in early 1971, he had switched to keyboards, and purchased a Hammond T organ (possibly a T102.). After two years, the band eventually split, and Banks formed another band - Bliss - to fulfil outstanding Unanimity bookings. In the summer of 1971, banks left university with a B.Sc. in Physics. and started teaching science at a secondary school.

Soon after leaving, Banks got involved with a gig at Lewisham Town Hall arranged by George Duffin, in which he did a short atmospheric piece with Out Of Darkness drummer, Tim Anderson, who was disguised so that he wouldn't be recognised. Out Of Darkness then played later in the evening, as did a new acoustic duo - Ishmael & Andy. Banks took the opportunity to speak with one of the duo - a young Andy Piercy at an idle moment, and the two got on well. Piercy liked the way Banks referred to the duo as Andy & Ishmael, and a friendship began.

By late 1971, with Unanimity now behind him, Banks was already contemplating another musical project ...

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