exhaustion, and the theft of his Wurlitzer electric piano
Alan’s physical and mental condition had deteriorated to the point of a collapse. He told the local press: “Let’s get this clear: there was no bad feeling between me and the others. My doctor had diagnosed exhaustion. He’d warned me I’d have a breakdown if I didn’t slacken the pace. I simply can’t stand the pressures of the pop world anymore.” Despite reports to the contrary, Price insisted that he’d been trying to tell Mike Jeffrey of his intention to quit for several weeks, but had been ignored. On the morning before the group was to leave on a tour of Sweden, Alan walked out of his London apartment and boarded the train to Newcastle. Upon arriving back home at his mother’s house, he fell into bed and slept for 36 hours.
Although nervous exhaustion and his phobic dislike of flying were most certainly cause enough to leave the group, there were other, more deep-seated issues, as he told BBC Radio London’s Stuart Colman in a 1982 ‘Echoes’ interview: “The Animal’s were originally my band, the Alan Price Rhythm & Blues Combo. Then, when we decided to give it the big try and we came down to London, we made it a co-operative, a democracy, because everyone was taking an equal risk. I played a Wurlitzer electric piano, which was one of the very few in the country at the time. I’d only had it 10 days, when after a gig, the roadie left it on stage and it was stolen. Being that we were now a co-operative group, I asked the guys to chip in so we could get a new one. They refused. The moment I wrote out the check for the new Wurlitzer was the moment I realized I would leave The Animals.”
http://alanprice.absoluteelsewhere.net/biography2.html
