SBB (band)

From 1971 until late 1973, SBB performed as Czesław Niemen's backing band, Grupa Niemen. During this time, performed at the Rock & Jazz Now! opening show for the Olympic Games in Munich, organized by Joachim-Ernst Berendt and featuring Charles Mingus, John McLaughlin & Mahavishnu Orchestra. They also toured accompanying Jack Bruce. SBB's cooperation with Niemen is presented on 5 albums. In Munich they recorded two LP's for CBS Records International, which started a long lasting friendship and cooperation with Reinhold Mack. Reinhold's son Julian Mack would later perform on 2005 SBB's album New Century.

In 1974, the newly formed SBB recorded a live album of their convert at Warsaw's Klub Stodoła on April 18-19, 1974.[1] When the album was eventually released, it became a wild commercial success, reaching a price on the black market four times higher than the retail price.[2]

The group regularly toured Czechoslovakia, East and West Germany, Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Hungary, Austria, Switzerland, the Netherlands and Belgium, where in 1978 SBB won the OIRT award - the Gouden Zeezwaluw (Golden Seaswallow).[3]

The band split up in 1980, exactly 13 months before the onset of the martial law in Poland. Józef Skrzek, Tomasz Szukalski and the band's technical crew continued as Józef Skrzek - Tomasz Szukalski Duo and Józef Skrzek Formation taking part in the prophetic movie The War of the Worlds: Next Century produced 11 months before the introduction of the martial law in Poland. After the onset of martial law Apostolis Anthimos joined the jazz trumpeter Tomasz Stańko and the Greek band of George Dalaras, Jerzy Piotrowski joined or supported various bands, e.g. Kombi, Young Power, Krzak, Martyna Jakubowicz and Stanisław Sojka and Józef Skrzek performed mainly organ music at sacral buildings.

SBB was briefly re-activated in 1991, 1993, 1998 and finally in 2000. After reactivation SBB also briefly toured the United States (1994, drummer Jerzy Piotrowski stayed in the USA) and Russia and in 2006 performed as a highlight at the Baja Prog festival in Mexicali, Mexico (with the drummer Paul Wertico). From 2016 Michał Urbaniak started to support the band.