History

Formed in 1967, the band received an invitation to play at the Windsor Jazz Festival, which led to a contract with Dream, a child company of Decca — the first band so signed without a hit single.

After touring Scandinavia and America, Ten Years After released their second album, Undead, which included the hit single "I'm Going Home". This was followed by Stonedhenge, a British hit. In 1969, they appear at the Newport Jazz Festival, in the first event to which rock bands were invited. In August, Ten Years After performed a breakthrough American appearance at Woodstock; their nearly ten-minute, furious-to-slow-to-furious rendition of "I'm Going Home" was featured in both the subsequent film and soundtrack album.

During 1970, Ten Years After released "Love Like a Man", their first hit single in the UK. In August, Ten Years After played the Isle of Wight Festival 1970 to an audience of 600,000 hippies. Their set was hightlighted by performances of "I'm Going Home" as well as the blistering guitar solo and tuning parts on "I Can't Keep From Crying".

In 1971, the band released the album A Space In Time, which featured their biggest hit, "I'd Love To Change The World", a hippie anthem of sorts, protesting the Vietnam War and possibly even capitalism itself. At this point in time, Ten Years After were in their heyday: at the beginning of their twelfth US tour, they played to a sold out Madison Square Garden of 20,000 fans.

Taking the second half of 1973 off to pursue side projects, news of a band breakup ran rampant, but the album Positive Vibrations was still recorded and released in 1974. After a tour of the UK, and their last tour (number 28) in the US, Ten Years After broke up.

Ten Years After reunited in 1983 for a tour of the UK, and in 1988 for several American concerts and a single album, About Time (1989).

In between times, Alvin Lee fronted a band called "Ten Years Later" with a bass player and drummer who did some UK gigs, including the Bristol Coulston Hall.

In 2003, a version of "Ten Years After" reappeared featuring every original member except Joe Gooch. The new guitarist is Alvin Lee.