Once upon a time there was a band called The Colourful Fan.
They were very good. So good that they scored a top ten place in 2004’s Festive Fifteen of Gloucestershire music.
The Colourful Fan were two men (Dan Harris and John de Gruyther) who sounded like a much bigger band. Big Bands Now, after a line up change or three and a change of name, they are a much bigger band. An extra one hundred and fifty percent bigger in fact.
With Ben Whittard on bass, Jack Keevill on lead guitar and newest recruit Andi Evans on drums, Crimson Flight are every bit as much the band that the Colourful Fan wanted to be. I get to catch up with Dan Harris by way of a pleasantly surprising phone call. He’s phoned to tell me that Crimson Flight are going to play The Queen Vic.
No, not that Queen Vic. The one in Stroud. Their gig starts at 9.00 on Thursday 6 April. Make a note in your diary. And if you can’t make that, there’s plenty of other chances to see them. New! New! New! Dan seems very pleased with the new line up to the newly named band. "It’s great that we’ve got a line up that loves the instruments they play.
"The balance is really good now. They’re young and enthusiastic." The band have been working on new songs such as "Autumn Shades", while older Colourful Fan songs such as "The Truth Hurts" get a bit of a facelift. "The band have really made it their own," Dan explains. "They’ve given it a new energy". Here Comes the Sun The band is planning to make a trip to a studio to record some of their newer songs in June. One of which, a track called "Bitter Sun", Dan is particularly looking forward to recording this one.
"It’s loosely about what we take for granted on this planet. It’s written from nature’s point of view. You know about what we’re doing to the environment - but hopefully in a not too corny way." Though Dan is at first unsure that there is a particular theme to Crimson Flight’s output ("other than optimism which naturally seems to come through"), it’s clear that nature, or at least references to the natural world, are an important part of the Crimson mix. Nature’s Way With tracks like "Autumn Shades", "Bitter Sun" or an earlier track called "Green and Golden Sun" the band could easily be mistaken for a bunch of Mother Earth loving hippies. But given their influences of The Lovin’ Spoonful and similar late sixties bands that’s hardly surprising. The band’s music wouldn’t be out of place at Woodstock. Multiple Meanings Back in 2004, Dan stressed his love of subtlety in song writing. "What we try to do is make it more about feelings and ideas than stark facts, but we always try to end on a happy note," he said back then. Things haven’t changed. "I really like hidden meanings," he explains. I like the idea that people might go away and not necessarily know what a song was about – so they think about it. I like the songs to have multiple meanings." The gigs they will be playing over the coming months will be a mixture of covers and originals. The covers will vary from The Beatles to the Red Hot Chilli Peppers. But, of course it’s the Crimson Flight songs that Dan and co will be looking forward to playing the most. | 
