“…As he had done in Traffic, Winwood was playing bass lines on his organ but it was obvious that, to have complete freedom to play at his best, a bass player was required. Clapton had admired Rick Grech, bass player for Leicester art-rockers Family, since the days when that band was known as The Farinas: ‘I knew he was a good singer and could play great, and that was the guy we wanted.’ Winwood: ‘We didn’t even consider any other bass players. Once Rick was around, and he seemed like a nice guy, it was just very casually accepted that he was in the band.”
“… In fact, there was more than one time-bomb. Although Rick Grech was now a member of Blind Faith, he neglected to mention this fact to the other members of Family. Roger Chapman, Family’s vocalist, remembers: ‘The first inkling I got that Rick might be leaving was when I read an interview in a rock paper where Jimi Hendrix was asked why he thought bands changed. He said, “People have got to move on, these bands split, like Family.” Obviously, Rick had told him and hadn’t told us. The rumours are flying and these four berks at the back know nothing about it.’ Grech waited for an American tour to drop his bombshell. ‘He should have f*cking left before the tour started,’ says Chapman. ‘He and Gilbert [John Gilbert, Family’s manager] obviously knew before we got to America. They didn’t tell us until the day before we opened at the Fillmore East, where we died. Then we had all our equipment nicked in New York, and I lost my passport and it all sort of fizzled out.’ It was the beginning of the end for Family; it was also the beginning of the end for Grech’s new band.”