Land of Cockayne is the tenth studio album by the jazz rock band Soft Machine, released in 1981. The title refers to the medieval land of plenty. It would be the last album released under the Soft Machine moniker until Hidden Details in 2018.
In 1979, Karl Jenkins, who had been a member of Soft Machine from May 1972 to the band's split in December 1978, was among a number of top UK session and jazz musicians put together as an ad hoc band called Rollercoaster to record a tribute album called Wonderin' (1980) featuring jazz-funk cover versions of Stevie Wonder songs. After the completion of that album, a number of the Rollercoaster musicians decided to record another album together, this time under the Soft Machine name. Some of the musicians involved in the project would later be part of Soft Machine's next live line-up which played a six-night residency at Ronnie Scott's in 1984.
All compositions by Karl Jenkins.
Soft Machine
Additional personnel