Whatever impact—real or embellished—that the 1969 Woodstock Festival had on music and culture, most of it came via the documentary/concert film that was released a year later rather than the actual “3 Days of Peace and Music” event.

Once viewers from around the world got a chance to see the performance footage, it automatically boosted the careers of bands including Santana, Sly & the Family Stone, and Joe Cocker.

And a blues rock outfit from the UK with the offbeat moniker of Ten Years After. Their incendiary version of “I’m Goin’ Home” meant that singer/guitarist Alvin Lee, bassist Leo Lyons, drummer Ric Lee (no relation) and keyboardist Chick Churchill would now be playing larger venues. Including one sizable upgrade in Houston.

“We had been playing 3,000 to 6,000 people a night and had some albums on the charts, so we had been doing pretty well. All I wanted to do was make a living as a musician,” the now 80-year-old Lyons says via Zoom from his home in the UK.
“But things really took off after the movie. The next time we played Houston, we didn’t go to our usual club—we played the Astrodome!" Lyons laughs. "Alvin didn’t like the pressure of the large places, though. If he was here now, he’d say that was the beginning of the end! But people still write to me and say they saw me in the Woodstock movie after their grandfather played it for them. Or great-grandfather!”

Another Houston memory involves the band getting picked up by a limo at the airport, where the driver tried to impress the musicians by noting some of the Houston homes they were passing were “more than 80 years old!” The bemused residents of Great Britain—which, um, has its share of structures of even greater vintage—could only suppress their smiles.
Leo Lyons was a founding member of Ten Years After, playing in the group from 1966 to their initial breakup in 1973 (their most recognizable hit was likely 1971's "I'd Love to Change the World"). They briefly reunited a decade later, and then permanently in 1988. Alvin Lee left in 2003, but the group continued with singer/guitarist Joe Gooch. He and Lyons both split in 2014 for one specific reason.

“Joe and I were somewhat restricted in the framework of Ten Years After. We decided to do the band the Hundred Seventy Split as a side project,” he recalls. “But the other guys didn’t like it and we were forced to leave…that’s the way it is with bands.”

That meant that Lyons and Gooch could really focus on Hundred Seventy Split and put out their 2010 debut, Special Edition. Their newest effort—billed as Leo Lyons Hundred Seventy Split—is Movin’ On (Flatiron Records). Taking the drum seat is Damon Sawyer.

Its 10 tracks run the gamut from traditional blues rock (“The Road Back Home,” “Walking in the Devil’s Shoes,” “Time to Kill”), arena rock (“Mad Bad and Dangerous,” “It’s So Easy to Slide”) and tunes with more of a swampy feel (“Black River,” “Deep Beneath the Muddy Water”). The songs were written by varying combinations of Lyons, Gooch, and songwriting friends/partners Fred Koller and Tony Crooks.

Hurricanes and tornadoes make appearances as well. Metaphorically in “The Heart of a Hurricane” and realistically in “Sounded Like a Train.” Lyons says he’s had some scary experiences with those twin towers of natural disasters, stemming from the 16 years he spent living in Nashville as an in-house company songwriter, beginning in 1999.

“My first week of moving to Nashville there was a big tornado that hit downtown. It actually hit my office, but thankfully I had left to look for an apartment!” he recalls. “Everyone went into the basement, and the air conditioning until came off the roof and blocked them all in! But you’re in Houston, Bob, so you kind of get used to it, right?”
Movin’ On has been a long time coming. The trio originally had studio time booked in the early months of 2020 to begin recording. Then, the pandemic hit. And instead of twiddling knobs in the studio, Lyons found himself twiddling thumbs at his home.

“It drove me nuts! I think it did everybody. And it really affected people’s businesses and mental states,” he says. “We’d just come hot off a tour, and I like to go straight into the studio because that’s when the band is gelling together really well. And then we had to sit out for two years!”
He was also missing Gooch and Sawyer, because of their inherent chemistry. It’s part of the reason he calls some of his releases “collaborations” rather than “solo records” (though the says his record company asked to put his name—somewhat more recognizable to Classic Rock aficionados than the band’s—prominent on the record cover and how the band is billed).

“I love to play with people I gel with, and I do with Joe and Dave. Joe is a great singer and a great guitar player—even though he says he doesn’t want to sing!” he says.

“I decided 20 years ago I didn’t want to play with people that I didn’t have empathy with, no matter how talented they were or how much money they offered me to do it. I spent a lot of years working with stressful people and didn’t want to do that [anymore]. And I’m not just talking about Ten Years After.”

Surprisingly, when a CD of Movin’ On is held up on the Zoom camera, Lyons is taken a bit aback.

“I don’t even have a copy!” he says. “I’ve got to get them to send me some for myself and the band!”

And while Hundred Seventy Split current have no gigs booked for 2024 now either in the UK or the US (where he says it’s “difficult” to coordinate visas and shipping carnets), he hopes that the album does well enough to pique interest, as he’s “itching” to play live again.

Finally, we ask about Leo Lyons’ distinctive mustache, its pointed and waxed ends reminiscent of an Old West Cowboy.

He’s had some variation of it going back to the early years of Ten Years After, and it’s also a kind of nod to his love of horses (Lyons rides Western Style) and Old West mythology. He even mentions having visited Texas’ famous King Ranch some years back.

Lyons says the moustache started many decades ago innocently enough when he had some time off and just didn’t bother to shave.

“I was 24 the last time I was clean shaven. I had an old photograph of my grandfather with this type of mustache, so I kept it!” he laughs. “But my family would disown me if I ever shaved it off! It’s my trademark!”

For more information on Leo Lyons and Hundred Seven Split, visit LeoLyons.org