Land of Cockayne is the final album by the band Soft Machine

Soft Machine

Soft Machine were an English rock band from Canterbury, named after the book The Soft Machine by William S. Burroughs. They were one of the central bands in the Canterbury scene, and helped pioneer the progressive rock genre...

, released in 1981. By this point, the band contained none of its original members. The title refers to the medieval land of plenty

Cockaigne

Cockaigne or Cockayne is a medieval mythical land of plenty, an imaginary place of extreme luxury and ease where physical comforts and pleasures are always immediately at hand and where the harshness of medieval peasant life does not exist...

.

The album came about as the result of a project based around top session musicians in which Jenkins and Marshall had been involved. The ad hoc band, Rollercoaster, had recently recorded the Stevie Wonder

Stevie Wonder

Stevland Hardaway Morris , better known by his stage name Stevie Wonder, is an American singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, record producer and activist...

 tribute album Wonderin'

Wonderin'

Wonderin’ is a tribute album featuring jazz-funk cover versions of Stevie Wonder songs. It was recorded by the ad hoc band Rollercoaster made up of leading UK session and jazz musicians based around British jazz-rock bands of the 60s and 70s such as Soft Machine, Blue Mink and Nucleus.It was...

and decided to record another album together. Many of the musicians included on the Cockayne album would make up Soft Machine's final live line-up which played a six-night residency at Ronnie Scott's in 1984.

Side one

1. "Over 'n' Above" – 7:24
2. "Lotus Groves" – 4:57
3. "Isle of the Blessed" – 1:56
4. "Panoramania" – 7:07
5. "Behind the Crystal Curtain" – 0:53

Side two

1. "Palace of Glass" – 3:22
2. "Hot-Biscuit Slim" – 7:27
3. "(Black) Velvet Mountain" – 5:10
4. "Sly Monkey" – 5:00
5. "A Lot of What You Fancy..." – 0:35

Personnel

• Karl Jenkins
  Karl Jenkins
  -Other works:*Adiemus: Live — live versions of Adiemus music*Palladio *Eloise *Imagined Oceans *The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace...
  
   – keyboards, synths
• John Marshall
  John Stanley Marshall
  John Stanley Marshall, better known as John Marshall, born 28 August 1941 in Isleworth, Middlesex, is an English drummer. He was a founding member of the jazz rock band Nucleus and has worked with various other jazz and rock bands and musicians, among them J.J...
  
   – drums, percussion

with

• Jack Bruce
  Jack Bruce
  John Symon Asher "Jack" Bruce is a Scottish musician and songwriter, respected as a founding member of the British psychedelic rock power trio, Cream, for a solo career that spans several decades, and for his participation in several well-known musical ensembles...
  
   – bass
• Allan Holdsworth
  Allan Holdsworth
  Allan Holdsworth is an English guitarist and composer. He has released twelve studio albums as a solo artist and played many different styles of music over a period of four decades, but first drew attention for his work in jazz fusion...
  
   – lead guitar
• John Taylor
  John Taylor (jazz)
  John Taylor is a British jazz pianist; he has occasionally performed on the organ and the synthesiser. He is one of Europe's most celebrated jazz pianists and composers.-Performing career:...
  
   – electric piano
• Ray Warleigh
  Ray Warleigh
  Raymond 'Ray' Kenneth Warleigh , is a leading UK-based alto saxophonist and flautist...
  
   – alto saxophone, bass flute
• Dick Morrissey
  Dick Morrissey
  Richard Edwin "Dick" Morrissey was a British jazz musician and composer. He played the tenor sax, soprano sax and flute.- Background :...
  
   – tenor saxophone
• Alan Parker
  Alan Parker (musician)
  Alan Parker is a British guitarist and composer. Parker was trained by Julian Bream at London’s Royal Academy of Music....
  
   – rhythm guitar
• Stu Calver
  Stu Calver
  Stu Calver was a British musician who died in October 2000 at the age of 54. He is best known for his work as a backing vocalist with the singer Cliff Richard. Stu Calver had an incredible vocal range, which was remarkable given that he was a cystic fibrosis sufferer....
  
   – backing vocals
• John Perry
  John Perry
  John Perry may refer to:*John Perry , English politician, MP for New Shoreham*John Perry , Irish engineer*John Perry , English musician, guitarist with The Only Ones...
  
   – backing vocals
• Tony Rivers
  Tony Rivers
  Tony Rivers is an English singer, best known for singing with the groups Tony Rivers and the Castaways and Harmony Grass. He also sang on albums by Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, Roger Daltrey, Shakin' Stevens and Cliff Richard.Rivers went to Raine's Foundation School in Bethnal Green...
  
  – backing vocals