The Incredible String Band The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter and Wee Tam and the Big Huge: 1968 When was the album released? 1968 was the band's annus mirabilis with the release of their two most-celebrated albums, The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter and the double LP Wee Tam and the Big Huge ( How successful was The Hangmans' Beautiful Daughter? Hangman's reached the top 5 in the UK album charts soon after its release in March 1968 and was nominated for a Grammy in the US. Where there any famous singles from that album? The album featured a series of vividly dreamlike Williamson songs, such as "The Minotaur's Song
How successful was Wee Tam?
How successful was Wee Tam by The Incredible String Band?
1968 was the band's annus mirabilis with the release of their two most-celebrated albums, The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter and the double LP Wee Tam and the Big Huge (issued as two separate albums in the US). Hangman's reached the top 5 in the UK album charts soon after its release in March 1968 and was nominated for a Grammy in the US. Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin said his group found their way by playing Hangman's and following the instructions. A departure from the band's previous albums, the set relied heavily on a more layered production, with imaginative use of the then new multitrack recording techniques. The album featured a series of vividly dreamlike Williamson songs, such as "The Minotaur's Song", a surreal music-hall parody told from the point of view of the mythical beast, and its centrepiece was Heron's "A Very Cellular Song", a 13-minute reflection on life, love and amoebas, its complex structure incorporating a Bahamian spiritual ("I Bid You Goodnight"). Williamson and Heron in this album had added their girlfriends, Licorice McKechnie and Rose Simpson, to the band to contribute additional vocals and various instruments, including organ, guitar and percussion. Despite their initially rudimentary skills, Simpson swiftly became a proficient bass guitarist, and some of McKechnie's songs were recorded by the band.  By early 1968 the group were capable of filling major venues in the UK. They left behind their folk club origins and embarked on a nationwide tour incorporating a critically acclaimed appearance at the London Royal Festival Hall. Later in the year they performed at the Royal Albert Hall, at open-air festivals, and at prestigious rock venues, such as the Fillmore auditoriums in San Francisco and New York. After their appearance at the Fillmore East in New York they were introduced to the practice of Scientology by David Simons (aka "Rex Rakish" and "Bruno Wolfe", once of Jim Kweskin's Jug Band). Joe Boyd, in his book White Bicycles: Making Music in the 1960s and elsewhere, described how he was inadvertently responsible for their "conversion" when he introduced the band to Simons, who, having become a Scientologist, persuaded them to enrol in his absence. The band's support for Scientology over the next few years was controversial among some fans and seemed to coincide with what many saw as the beginning of a decline in the quality of their work. In an interview with Oz magazine in 1969 the band spoke enthusiastically of their involvement with it, although the question of its effect on their later albums has provoked much discussion ever since.  Their November 1968 album Wee Tam and the Big Huge, recorded before the US trip, was musically less experimental and lush than Hangman's but conceptually even more avant-garde, a full-on engagement with the themes of mythology, religion, awareness and identity. Williamson's otherworldly songs and vision dominate the album, though Heron's more grounded tracks are also among his very best, and the contrast between the two perspectives gives the record its uniquely dynamic interplay between a sensual experience of life and a quest for metaphysical meaning. The record was released as a double album and also simultaneously as two separate LPs, a strategy which lessened its impact on the charts. CANNOTANSWER
Their November 1968 album Wee Tam and the Big Huge, recorded before the US trip, was musically less experimental and lush than Hangman's
The Incredible String Band (sometimes abbreviated as ISB) were a British psychedelic folk band formed by Clive Palmer, Robin Williamson and Mike Heron in Edinburgh in 1966. The band built a considerable following, especially in the British counterculture, notably with their albums The 5000 Spirits or the Layers of the Onion, The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter, and Wee Tam and the Big Huge.  They became pioneers in psychedelic folk and, through integrating a wide variety of traditional music forms and instruments, in the development of world music.

Following Palmer's early departure, Williamson and Heron performed as a duo, later augmented by other musicians.  The band split up in 1974.  They reformed in 1999 and continued to perform with changing lineups until 2006.

History

Formation as a trio: 1965–66
In 1963, acoustic musicians Robin Williamson and Clive Palmer began performing together as a traditional folk duo in Edinburgh, particularly at a weekly club run by Archie Fisher in the Crown Bar which also regularly featured Bert Jansch. There they were seen in August 1965 by Joe Boyd, then working as a talent scout for the influential folk-based label Elektra Records. Later in the year, the duo decided to fill out their sound by adding a third member, initially to play rhythm guitar. After an audition, local rock musician Mike Heron won the slot. The trio took the name "the Incredible String Band". Early in 1966 Palmer began running an all-night folk club, Clive's Incredible Folk Club, on the fourth floor of a building in Sauchiehall Street in Glasgow, where they became the house band. When Boyd returned in his new role as head of Elektra's London office, he signed them up for an album, beating off a rival bid from Transatlantic Records.

They recorded their first album, entitled The Incredible String Band, at the Sound Techniques studio in London in May 1966. It was released in Britain and the United States and consisted mostly of self-penned material in solo, duo and trio formats, showcasing their playing on a variety of instruments. It won the title of "Folk Album of the Year" in Melody Maker'''s annual poll, and in a 1968 Sing Out! magazine interview Bob Dylan praised the album's "October Song" as one of his favourite songs of that period, stating it was "quite good".

The trio broke up after recording the album. Palmer left via the hippie trail for Afghanistan and India, and Williamson and his girlfriend Licorice McKechnie went to Morocco with no firm plans to return. Heron stayed in Edinburgh, playing with a band called Rock Bottom and the Deadbeats. However, when Williamson returned after running out of money, laden with Moroccan instruments (including a gimbri, which was much later eaten by rats), he and Heron reformed the band as a duo.

Development as a duo: 1966–67

In November 1966 Heron and Williamson embarked on a short UK tour, supporting Tom Paxton and Judy Collins. In early 1967, they performed regularly at London clubs, including Les Cousins. Joe Boyd became the group's manager as well as producer and secured a place for them at the Newport Folk Festival, on a bill with Joni Mitchell and Leonard Cohen.

The duo were always credited as separate writers, maintaining their individual creative identities, rather than working as a writing partnership. Boyd wrote, "Mike and Robin were Clive's friends rather than each other's. Without him as a buffer, they developed a robust dislike for one another. Fortunately, the quality and quantity of their songwriting was roughly equal. Neither would agree to the inclusion of a new song by the other unless he could impose himself on it by arranging the instruments and working out all the harmonies."

In July, they released their second album, The 5000 Spirits or the Layers of the Onion, accompanied by Pentangle's Danny Thompson on double bass and Licorice on vocals and percussion. The album demonstrated considerable musical development and a more unified ISB sound. It displayed their abilities as multi-instrumentalists and singer-songwriters, and gained them much wider acclaim. The album included Heron's "The Hedgehog's Song", Williamson's "First Girl I Loved" (later recorded by Judy Collins, Jackson Browne, Don Partridge and Wizz Jones) and his "Mad Hatter's Song", which, with its mixture of musical styles, paved the way for the band's more extended forays into psychedelia. Enthusiastic reviews in the music press were accompanied by appearances at venues such as London's UFO Club (co-owned by Boyd), the Speakeasy Club, and Queen Elizabeth Hall. Their exposure on John Peel's Perfumed Garden radio show on the pirate ship Radio London and later on BBC's Top Gear made them favourites with the emerging UK underground audience. The album went to Number One in the UK folk chart, and was named by Paul McCartney as one of his favourite records of that year.

The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter and Wee Tam and the Big Huge: 1968
1968 was the band's annus mirabilis with the release of their two most-celebrated albums, The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter and the double LP Wee Tam and the Big Huge (issued as two separate albums in the US). Hangman's reached the top 5 in the UK album charts soon after its release in March 1968 and was nominated for a Grammy in the US. Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin said his group found their way by playing Hangman's and following the instructions. A departure from the band's previous albums, the set relied heavily on a more layered production, with imaginative use of the then new multitrack recording techniques. The album featured a series of vividly dreamlike Williamson songs, such as "The Minotaur's Song", a surreal music-hall parody told from the point of view of the mythical beast, and its centrepiece was Heron's "A Very Cellular Song", a 13-minute reflection on life, love and amoebas, its complex structure incorporating a Bahamian spiritual ("I Bid You Goodnight"). Williamson and Heron in this album had added their girlfriends, Licorice McKechnie and Rose Simpson, to the band to contribute additional vocals and various instruments, including organ, guitar and percussion. Despite their initially rudimentary skills, Simpson swiftly became a proficient bass guitarist, and some of McKechnie's songs were recorded by the band.

By early 1968 the group were capable of filling major venues in the UK. They left behind their folk club origins and embarked on a nationwide tour incorporating a critically acclaimed appearance at the London Royal Festival Hall.  Later in the year they performed at the Royal Albert Hall, at open-air festivals, and at prestigious rock venues, such as the Fillmore auditoriums in San Francisco and New York. After their appearance at the Fillmore East in New York they were introduced to the practice of Scientology by David Simons (aka "Rex Rakish" and "Bruno Wolfe", once of Jim Kweskin's Jug Band). Joe Boyd, in his book White Bicycles: Making Music in the 1960s and elsewhere, described how he was inadvertently responsible for their "conversion" when he introduced the band to Simons, who, having become a Scientologist, persuaded them to enrol in his absence. The band's support for Scientology over the next few years was controversial among some fans and seemed to coincide with what many saw as the beginning of a decline in the quality of their work. In an interview with Oz magazine in 1969 the band spoke enthusiastically of their involvement with it, although the question of its effect on their later albums has provoked much discussion ever since.

Their November 1968 album Wee Tam and the Big Huge, recorded before the US trip, was musically less experimental and lush than Hangman's but conceptually even more avant-garde, a full-on engagement with the themes of mythology, religion, awareness and identity. Williamson's otherworldly songs and vision dominate the album, though Heron's more grounded tracks are also among his very best, and the contrast between the two perspectives gives the record its uniquely dynamic interplay between a sensual experience of life and a quest for metaphysical meaning. The record was released as a double album and also simultaneously as two separate LPs, a strategy which lessened its impact on the charts.

Woodstock and multimedia: 1969–70
At this time most of the group lived communally at a farmhouse near Newport, in Pembrokeshire, Wales, where they developed ideas for mixed media experiments with Malcolm Le Maistre and other members of David Medalla's Exploding Galaxy troupe and the Leonard Halliwell Quartet. There, a film was made about the ISB, Be Glad For the Song Has No Ending. Originally planned for BBC TV's arts programme Omnibus, it featured documentary footage and a fantasy sequence, 'The Pirate and the Crystal Ball', illustrating their attempt at an idyllic communal lifestyle. It made little impact at the time, but reissues on video and DVD have contributed to the recent revival of interest in the band.

The band toured for much of 1969, in the US and the UK. In July they played at the Albert Hall on the fourth night of the "Pop Proms". They were introduced by John Peel and talked about their first brush with Scientology. Other acts in the week were Led Zeppelin and The Who. On 28 May 1969 the band received a phone call from Michael Lang, the producer of the momentous Woodstock Festival, asking the band to perform at the festival for a payment of $4,500. In August, they were slotted to play on Friday when all the folk-oriented and acoustic acts were expected to perform. However, the band refused to perform in the pouring rain, so stage manager John Morris rescheduled their performance for the following day. Their open slot was taken by Melanie, whose showing inspired her song, "Lay Down (Candles in the Rain)". The following day, 16 August 1969, at approximately 6:30 p.m., the band played in between the Keef Hartley Band and Canned Heat. The crowd was not anticipating the band's performance on a day that featured mainly hard rock acts. For that reason, the group was generally disfavoured and, perhaps more importantly, were not included in the filming of the festival. Over the Labor Day weekend in 1969, they appeared at the Texas International Pop Festival, in Lewisville, Texas. In November, they released the album Changing Horses, which was generally seen as a disappointment after their earlier work. By late 1969, they had established a communal base at Glen Row near Innerleithen. In April 1970 they released the album I Looked Up.

The ISB's performances were more theatrical than those of most of their contemporaries. In addition to the spectacle of their exotic instruments and colourful stage costumes, their concerts sometimes featured poems, surreal sketches and dancers, all in the homegrown, non-showbiz style characteristic of the hippie era. In 1970, Robin Williamson (with little input from Heron) attempted to fuse the music with his theatrical fantasies in a quixotic multimedia spectacular at London's Roundhouse called "U", which he envisaged as "a surreal parable in dance and song". It combined the band's music with dancing by the Stone Monkey troupe (which had evolved out of Exploding Galaxy), the letter U representing a transition from a high level of spiritual awareness to a low, then returning to a final peak of awareness and communication. Although the performance was ambitious, critical response was mixed, with some harsh reviews from critics who had in some cases acclaimed their earlier work. It fared little better in New York, and a planned US tour of "U" had to be cancelled after a few performances at the Fillmore East. Joe Boyd described the show as "a disaster".

Diminishing returns: 1971–74
After that the group lasted another four years, although there was a gradual decline in their status and commercial success after 1970. Joe Boyd, whose skillful handling of the band had contributed much to their international success, stopped managing them and returned to the US. The group left Elektra Records and signed with Island, for whom they recorded five albums. The first was a soundtrack to the "Be Glad..." film, and this was followed by the eclectic Liquid Acrobat as Regards the Air, regarded as their best album for some time.

The band continued to tour and record. Rose Simpson left in 1971 and was replaced by Malcolm Le Maistre, formerly of the Stone Monkey troupe. Mike Heron took time out to record a well-received solo album, Smiling Men with Bad Reputations, which, in contrast to the ISB's self-contained productions, featured a host of session guests, among them Pete Townshend, Ronnie Lane, Keith Moon, John Cale and Richard Thompson. The following year, Licorice left, and was replaced by Gerard Dott, an Edinburgh jazz musician and friend of both Heron and Williamson who had contributed to Smiling Men. Williamson also recorded a solo album, Myrrh, which featured some of his most extraordinary vocal performances.

The group's changing lineup, adding Stan Schnier (aka "Stan Lee") on bass, Jack Ingram on drums, and Graham Forbes on electric guitar, reflected moves toward a more conventional amplified rock group. Their final albums for Island were received disappointingly, and the label dropped them in 1974. By then, disagreements between Williamson and Heron about musical policy had become irreconcilable, and they split up in October 1974.

Solo careers: 1974–2014

Williamson soon formed Robin Williamson and His Merry Band, which toured and released three albums of eclectic music with a Celtic emphasis. Within a few years, he went on to a solo career, moving between traditional Celtic styles and more avant-garde material.  He also produced several recordings of humorous stories. In all, Williamson released over forty albums post-ISB. Notable in this output are the Grammy-nominated Wheel of Fortune (1995, with John Renbourn) and four records on the  jazz/classical/avant-garde ECM label: The Seed-at-Zero (2000), Skirting the River Road (2002), The Iron Stone (2006), and Trusting in the Rising Light (2014). Heron formed a rock group with Malcolm Le Maistre, called first Mike Heron's Reputation, then just Heron, and later released occasional solo albums. Malcolm Le Maistre continued teaching in schools and performing theatre and music, and he released two albums.

Reunion and final separation: 1999–2006
In 1997, Williamson and Heron got back together for two concerts, which were warmly received. This was followed by a full reunion of the original three members plus Williamson's wife, Bina, and Lawson Dando in 1999. However, they did not recapture the high reputation of the original ISB, playing mostly small venues to mixed critical and audience responses. In March 2003 it was announced that Robin and Bina Williamson had "temporarily" left to pursue other projects and their solo careers. Rumours circulated of an acrimonious split. A long-standing agreement between Williamson and Heron that neither would use the name 'Incredible String Band' without the other's involvement was bypassed by a temporary re-branding as 'incrediblestringband2003'. Heron, Palmer and Dando, and new member Clare "Fluff" Smith, continued to tour regularly around the United Kingdom and internationally. Heron, Dando and Palmer toured the US in 2004. Another live album was released in 2005. Their last concert together was at the Moseley Folk Festival, Birmingham, UK, in September 2006.

Barbican: 2009
In 2009, Heron and Palmer announced a concert entitled "Very Cellular Songs: The Music of the Incredible String Band" at The Barbican, featuring Richard Thompson, Danny Thompson, Robyn Hitchcock, Alasdair Roberts, Trembling Bells, Green Gartside, Dr Strangely Strange.

Musical style
Stylistically the ISB were centred around the idioms of conventional folk and pop, but their notable experimentation with musical form, instrumentation and styles (e.g. Indian and Moroccan) led them to innovative, often eclectic, compositions. In 1967–68 they were described as part of pop music's "underground". Williamson claimed that, as both the Beatles and the Rolling Stones saw them play before Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and Their Satanic Majesties Request were recorded, the ISB were an influence on those albums. Chris Cutler commented that "They were one of the most important bands of that era ... Instead of AABABA etc., their developments would go linearly, A-B-C-D-E-F-G-H-I-J-K-L-M and beyond; no one else thought that way ever ..." [emphasis in original] One of Bob Dylan's favourite songs was 'October Song' from ISB's debut album.  Robert Plant claimed that Led Zeppelin found their way by playing 'The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter' (see above). Following in the footsteps of ISB, Led Zeppelin later successfully incorporated Moroccan rhythms (e.g. on 'Dancing Days').

Both Mike Heron and Robin Williamson would insert seemingly unrelated sections in their songs in a way that has been described as "always surprising, laughably inventive, lyrically prodigious". Music critic Robert Christgau wrote of the band in Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies (1981): "Way back in the 1960s I tried to figure out whether these acoustic Scots were magic or bullshit and concluded that they were both."

Legacy
In 1994 Rose Simpson, a former member of the band, became Mayoress of Aberystwyth. In 2003 the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, who had previously chosen "The Hedgehog's Song" when he appeared on Desert Island Discs, wrote a foreword for a full-length book about the band, describing them as "holy". Licorice McKechnie was last seen in 1987, and may be deceased.

Personnel

Members

Mike Heron (1965-1974, 1999-2006)
Robin Williamson (1965-1974, 1999-2003)
Clive Palmer (1965-1966, 1999-2006; died 2014)
Christina "Licorice" McKechnie (1968-1972)
Rose Simpson (1968-1971)
Malcolm Le Maistre (1971-1974)
Stan Schnier (1972-1974)

Jack Ingram (1972-1974)
Gerard Dott (1972-1973)
Graham Forbes (1973-1974)
John Gilston (1974)
Lawson Dando (1999-2006)
Bina Williamson (1999-2003)
Claire "Fluff" Smith (2003-2006)

Lineups

Discography

Albums

Studio albums

Live albumsBBC Radio 1 Live on Air (October 1991)BBC Radio 1 Live in Concert (November 1992)First Girl I Loved: Live in Canada 1972 (Trojan Records, 2001)Nebulous Nearnesses (2004)Across The Airwaves: BBC Radio Recordings 1969-74 (2007)Tricks of the Senses - Rare and Unreleased Recordings 1966 - 1972 (Hux Records 2008)

CompilationsThe Chelsea Sessions 1967 Unreleased Demos (Pigs Whisker Music, October 2005)Relics of The Incredible String Band  (Elektra compilation, March 1971)Seasons They Change (Island compilation, November 1976)For solo releases, see under Robin Williamson, Mike Heron, Clive Palmer and Malcolm Le Maistre.Singles (UK only)
"Way Back in the 1960s" / "Chinese White" (Elektra EKSN 45013, promotional release only, 1967)
"Painting Box" / "No Sleep Blues" (Elektra EKSN 45028, March 1968)
"Big Ted" / "All Writ Down" (Elektra EKSN 45074, October 1969)
"This Moment" / "Black Jack Davy" (Elektra 2101 003, April 1970)
"Black Jack David" / "Moon Hang Low" (Island WIP 6145, November 1972)
"At The Lighthouse Dance" / "Jigs" (Island WIP 6158, February 1973)

References

Sources
Boyd, Joe: White Bicycles - Making Music in the 1960s. London: Serpent's Tail. 2006
Green, Jonathon: Days In The Life: Voices from the English Underground, 1961–71. London 1988 (ISB-related contributions from Joe Boyd and Steve Sparkes)
Harper, Colin: Dazzling Stranger: Bert Jansch and The British Folk and Blues Revival. London:  Bloomsbury 2006 (plenty on the Edinburgh folk scene of the early 1960s, from which both Jansch and the ISB emerged)
Heron, Mike, and Andrew Greig. You Know What You Could Be: Tuning into the 1960s. London: riverrun, 2017.
Moon, Tim. The Incredible String Band: Every Album, Every Song. Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire: Sonicbond Publishing, 2021. 
Norbury, Paul. Smiling Men with Bad Reputations: The Story of the Incredible String Band, Robin Williamson and Mike Heron and a Consumer’s Guide to Their Music. Tolworth, Surrey: Grosvenor House, 2017.
Shindig Magazine. Witches Hats & Painted Chariots: The Incredible String Band and the 5,000 Layers of Psychedelic Folk Music. Cambridge: Volcano Publishing, 2013.
Simpson, Rose. Muse, Odalisque, Handmaiden: A Girl’s Life in the Incredible String Band. London: Strange Attractor Press, 2020.
Unterberger, Richie: Eight Miles High: Folk-Rock's Flight from Haight-Ashbury to Woodstock. San Francisco/London, 2003 (especially the interviews with Williamson and Boyd. Also has informative chapters on the British folk scene)
Wade, Chris. The Music of the Incredible String Band. Wisdom Twins Books, 2013.
Whittaker, Adrian, ed. beGLAD: An Incredible String Band Compendium.'' London: Helter Skelter, 2004; revised, expanded edition, 2013.

External links

Large site with copious discography, ephemera, etc.
Be Glad for the Song Has no Ending
Review of The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter on outsideleft.com)
The 1969 Oz interview.
The story of U and its place in the ISB's career.
Mike Heron's official website
 Stan Schnier's official website
[ AMG overview]

Psychedelic folk groups
Scottish folk music groups
Scottish rock music groups
Elektra Records artists
Island Records artists
Musical groups from Edinburgh
Musical groups established in 1966
Musical groups disestablished in 1974
Wee Tam and the Big Huge is the fourth album by the Scottish psychedelic folk group, the Incredible String Band, released in Europe as both a double LP and separate single LPs in November 1968 by Elektra Records. In the US, however, the two discs were released separately as Wee Tam and The Big Huge.

Consisting of a varied selection of songs by Robin Williamson and Mike Heron, with intriguing and poetic lyrics, the album is rich with eclectic and adept instrumentation and arrangements. Around 15 instruments are featured, played mainly by the two band members Williamson and Heron but also, in supporting roles, on a few tracks by Rose Simpson and Licorice McKechnie. Williamson explained the title as follows: "I saw a man with a huge big dog, [and] we knew somebody called Wee Tam, in Edinburgh.  It seemed like it was a good idea in terms of one person looking up at the stars; Wee Tam and the Big Huge. Just like the vastness of the universe".

Background 
The Incredible String Band were fairly busy in the latter half of 1968.  With their popularity and reputation growing on both sides of the Atlantic, they began selling out large venues like the Fillmore and the Royal Albert Hall. As Heron explains, "...we were touring maybe six months of the year and by that time we all lived together, in eight cottages joined together in this place called Glen Row. When we were not on the road we were either in the studio or playing each other songs we'd written. So it came out of the experience of just being in each other's company all the time". With their recent exposure to the musical style of the U.S., the band returned to England hoping to incorporate both their English and American influences. The internal politics of the band also changed as Heron and Williamson each desired to have a say on one another's arrangements. More important was the emergence of Simpson balancing out the role of McKechnie, which further developed into a positive effect on the band. With the incorporation of the two new personnel, live performances could more closely resemble album pieces, which was in the band's mind as Wee Tam and the Big Huge was simpler in comparison to its predecessor.

Recording took place between April and August 1968 on an intermittent basis at Sound Techniques Studios in Chelsea, London. The tracks were more conventional in concept, but the band still continued to use eastern instrumentals in the album's development. Wee Tam and the Big Huge, like on past albums, exudes a specific message of serenity, harmony, and overall well-being. The album had an optimistic outlook on life, nature, and the universe while retaining a sense of eclecticism.  Heron and Williamson's interaction on each other's compositions also played a large role, noticeable on the instrumental development of the tracks. The whole process was completed with less overdubbing than on past albums, due to the more standard arrangements and lengthier recording period.

Release

In November 1968, Wee Tam and the Big Huge was released by Elektra Records as EKL 4036. In the UK, the album was released as a double LP, but in the U.S. the album was released individually as Wee Tam and The Big Huge. This affected sales and chart position in the U.S., but, more importantly, it diluted the single thematic continuum the band had expected the album would express. The front and back covers were featured as both covers and lyric sheets as the design simply showed the lyrics of all the tracks. For the individual albums, there are images of Williamson and Heron posing in a garden. The inside of the gatefold sleeve presents a poem by Williamson along with accompanying pictures on each fold. Upon release, the album, again, earned the band success in the UK, but after the decision by Elektra's American office to split the album, the sales fared less successfully. Still, Wee Tam managed to reach number 174 on the Billboard 200, and The Big Huge also charted at number 180.

Track listing

Disc one (Wee Tam)

Disc two (The Big Huge)

Personnel
Robin Williamson – lead vocals , guitar , bass guitar , guimbri , percussion , sarangi , violin , harpsichord , piano , Hammond organ , flute , kazoo , whistle , harmonica , Irish harp , drums , backing vocals
Mike Heron – lead vocals , guitar , sitar , bass guitar , organ , harpsichord , washboard , percussion , harmonica , backing vocals
Rose Simpson – violin , percussion , backing vocals    
Licorice McKechnie – percussion , Irish harp , backing vocals

Chart positions

References

1968 albums
The Incredible String Band albums
Elektra Records albums
Albums produced by Joe Boyd
Warner Music Group albums Tim Tam (April 19, 1955 – July 30, 1982) was a champion American Thoroughbred racehorse who won the 1958 Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes and was inducted into the Hall of Fame.

Background
TimTam was a dark bay horse sired by Tom Fool and out of Two Lea (both sire and dam listed on the Top 100 U.S. Racehorses of the 20th Century; Tom Fool at #11 and Two Lea at #77), the dark bay colt was owned and bred by Calumet Farm. Tim Tam was trained by Jimmy Jones.

Racing career
Racing at age two, Tim Tam finished unplaced in his only start of 1957, earning just $275.00.

As a three-year-old, Tim Tam won the Everglades Stakes, the Flamingo Stakes, the Fountain of Youth Stakes, the Florida Derby, the Forerunner Stakes and the Derby Trial en route to winning the 1958 Kentucky Derby.

After winning the Preakness Stakes, Tim Tam was considered to have a strong chance to capture the American Triple Crown. However, in the Belmont Stakes, coming down the home stretch toward the lead that seemed to assure victory, Tim Tam fractured a sesamoid bone and hobbled the last yards across the finish line in second place. His injury ended his career but he went on to be a successful sire.

Stud record
At stud Tim Tam sired 14 stakes race winners, among them the Hall of Fame filly Tosmah. His legacy would become even more important as the damsire of three outstanding runners:

Mac Diarmida (1975) : The American Champion Male Turf Horse of 1978 whose wins included the prestigious Canadian International Championship and Washington, D.C. International Stakes;

Davona Dale (1976) : In 1979 she won the American Triple Tiara of Thoroughbred Racing and was voted American Champion Three-Year-Old Filly. In 1985 she was inducted into the U. S. Racing Hall of Fame;

Before Dawn (1979) : The 1981 American Champion Two-Year-Old Filly.

In 1980 Tim Tam was retired from stud duty. On Monday, July 25, 1982 he suffered a heart attack and on Friday July 30 was euthanized. He was buried in the Calumet Farm equine cemetery.

Honors
Although his racing season was cut short, Tim Tam still was elected American Champion Three-Year-Old Male Horse.

In 1985, Tim Tam was inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame.

The Tim Tam chocolate biscuit manufactured by Arnott's in Australia was named after the horse.

Breeding

 Tim Tam was inbred 3 × 3 to Bull Dog, meaning that this stallion appears twice in the third generation of his pedigree.

References

1955 racehorse births
1982 racehorse deaths
Racehorses bred in Kentucky
Kentucky Derby winners
Preakness Stakes winners
United States Thoroughbred Racing Hall of Fame inductees
Eclipse Award winners
Thoroughbred family 23-b