Anon was one of two bands made up of pupils from Charterhouse School in Surrey, members of which went on to form the progressive rock band Genesis with another band from the same school, called Garden Wall. The band formed in May 1965 and split up in December 1966. It originally consisted of Rivers Jobe (bass) (born 1950-died 1979), Richard MacPhail (vocals), Rob Tyrell (drums), and Anthony Phillips (lead guitar).[1] They were later joined by future Genesis guitarist/bassist Mike Rutherford on rhythm guitar. During a short period of time, Rutherford was forced to leave the band by his house master at Charterhouse and was replaced by Mike Colman (1951–2010).
The band was originally formed when Anthony Phillips met up with Rivers Jobe. The two had been friends in prep school and had been in a band called The Spiders whilst they had been at prep school. The Spiders had been a Beatles type band, and when Phillips entered Charterhouse in April 1965, he hooked up with his old friend and formed The Anon with Rob Tyrell and Richard MacPhail within a week. The band's name was short for "anonymous".[2]
Just after The Anon had formed, a young guitarist called Mike Rutherford, who had been at Charterhouse since November 1964, heard that there was a chance he would be let into the band as a rhythm guitarist. He met up with Phillips and MacPhail, and was given a place in the band.
Anon was dedicated to covering songs by The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and rhythm and blues music from that era, like John Mayall. The only recording the band ever made was the only original song that the band had during this period, a demo of a song called 'Pennsylvania Flickhouse' written by Anthony Phillips.
The members of Anon and Garden Wall were seen as the rebels of the school, as Charterhouse offered an extensive range of activities for pupils, but the members of the bands chose to play music. All music except for classical music was frowned upon by the teachers in the school. The members of The Anon used to have their hair longer than everyone else and go down to the local pubs as a sign of rebellion. As a result, the band suffered a lot of pressure from their parents and teachers, and this led to MacPhail leaving for a while because of his parents' attitude to him being in a rock band (leaving Rutherford to take over as singer), and Rutherford had his guitar confiscated by his house master (which led to himself temporarily leaving the group).
The band continued to go on with the five-piece lineup until July 1966, when Rivers Jobe and Richard MacPhail were scheduled to leave Charterhouse. MacPhail decided that his band should do a concert with Garden Wall both as top acts and with a third band opening, so The Anon set about getting together a concert that was staged within the school. The event marked the end of the five-piece lineup, and Jobe and MacPhail both quit the band. Jobe went on to join Savoy Brown, MacPhail went on to become a sound engineer for Genesis until 1973.
The band, now only Phillips, Rutherford, and Tyrell, carried on. Eventually Tyrell left, and the band finally broke up in December 1966. Phillips and Rutherford then went on to join with all three members of Garden Wall (Peter Gabriel, Tony Banks, and Chris Stewart), to form Genesis (with Mike buying his first bass), in January 1967.[3]