The band did a lot of good things, but I don’t miss it. turned a whiter shade of pale She said, There is no reason and the truth is plain to see.
Ending Procol Harum ”wasn’t difficult” for him, he says. Now 38 and living in London, Reid continues to write, with a particular interest in theater. Reid went on to manage British blues singer Frankie Miller, pub rocker Mickey Jupp and one-time Procol guitarist Robin Trower. Everyone’s heard ‘A Whiter Shade of Pale,’ so there’s something in common with everyone I meet.” Now 41, he and his wife live on a ”smallish” farm in southwest Surrey, where they own a local pub. Reflecting on the band, he says, ”Procol always seems to have been well thought of. (The two also own a music-publishing house called Bluebeard.)Ī pioneer in melding rock with classical music, Brooker has continued to perform with symphony orchestras: ”I’ve done concerts in Poland with orchestras and played quite a lot in Germany, including an annual televised night of rock and classics with the Bavarian Radio Orchestra.”
In addition, the song’s lyrics were written by Reid, with whom Brooker still collaborates occasionally. Yet the song defies a specific interpretation. Wilson, another Procol alumnus, on drums. The general consensus is that A Whiter Shade Of Pale is a snapshot of a drunken sexual escapade gone awry. One of the tracks, ”The Long Goodbye,” features Fisher on keyboards and B.J. A third album, Echoes in the Night, is due out in September. Procol Harum–the name, roughly translated from Latin, means ”beyond these things”–recorded 10 albums over the next decade, but founders Brooker and Reid were the only continuous members.Īfter the group finally broke up for good in 1977, Brooker took a year off and then undertook a solo career, playing on Eric Clapton’s Another Ticket and recording two LPs, No More Fear of Flying and Lead Me to the Water.