Never ending story indeed...

Goose's post sounds like a Brock promo/vindication, which he may partly deserve. Nevertheless the HW camp have all too easily blamed Nik as the bad guy, the hypocrite he certainly is to a point. Playing the "all is free card" while getting paid himself - sounds like him. He's probably not even aware of his moral shortcomings. No wonder, him being a virgo, as Lemmy would point out. Nevertheless, a nice and easygoing man as long as you don't enter into business (or non-profit) relationships with him.

Just like thatBrock is a nice guy, but quite often has found reasons for harsh action and people to do the bad things for him. HW is a story of Brock domination over the others, as Calvert once pointed out - being ousted from the flagship himself - a year and a half after announcing a "Stalinist purge" in cooperation with Brock which left Turner stranded without a band in the late 70s. Sounds confusing? It certainly is...

I think the pattern is as follows: Brock is a tolerant person with a very open mind, ready to integrate people with new ideas into his band. This however led to points where artistic vision, musical and/or financial control threatened to slip or get out of focus to a major extend, thus forcing him to recover his central role as the band's founder and helmsman. On the other hand he probably feels - quite rightly so - he depends on other musicians to bring more life and stamina to his music. Don't get me wrong - he's an excellent rhythm guitarist and a great songwriter - but listen to his solo projects or some of his later tunes and you'll find they often sound a bit flat or lack a certain energy. So he brings in new guys again, who start do develop the idea they're a central part of the project until they suddenly find themselves sacked. And so on.

Nik was probably the first in a line of "front man"/"creative partner" - figures that suffered that fate, among them Calvert, Davey and lately Dibs.