northstandnorth
THE GOLDSTONE
ever see them live?
ever bought an album?
ever heard of them?
ever bought an album?
ever heard of them?
big country
- Thread starter northstandnorth
- Start date
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Tony Meolas Loan Spell
Slut Faced Whores
No
No
Yes
No
Yes
Trufflehound
Re-enfranchised
Yes - supporting David Bowie at Wembley Stadium, circa 1986(?)
Yes. The Crossing is still great. In a Big Country is in the top 20 tunes of all time. FACT.
No. Remind me who they were again...
Yes. The Crossing is still great. In a Big Country is in the top 20 tunes of all time. FACT.
No. Remind me who they were again...
Saw Stuart Adamson when he was with The Skids in 1979 just after 'Into the Valley' was released at the Top Rank. Richard Jobson came onto stage in enormous pantaloons and was covered in gob within 30 seconds.
Didn't Adamson drink himself to death?
Didn't Adamson drink himself to death?
Trufflehound
Re-enfranchised
El Presidente said:
Hanged himself in a hotel room about 5 years ago.
I saw Skids at the Lyceum on that tour - they were great.
northstandnorth
THE GOLDSTONE
- Thread starter
- #8
and for my longest post EVER
Stuart Adamson, rock singer, songwriter and guitarist
Born: 11 April, 1958, in Manchester Died: 16 December, 2001, in Hawaii, aged 43
STUART Adamson was the charismatic lead singer and guitarist in Big Country, the Scottish-based rock band that achieved considerable success in the Eighties with a combination of impassioned songs and anthemic guitar lines that evoked the sound of bagpipes.
Adamson, who had a history of problems with alcohol, had been reported missing from his home in Nashville after disappearing last month, and was found dead in a hotel in Hawaii. He had previously gone missing in November 1999, and had reportedly suffered a nervous breakdown in the early Eighties.
He was born in Manchester, but grew up in Crossgates, near Dunfermline in Fife. He co-founded his first successful band, The Skids, with singer Richard Jobson. The group formed at the height of the punk movement in 1978, and made a considerable impact with singles such as Into The Valley, Charade and Working for the Yankee Dollar.
Adamson and Jobson went their separate ways in 1981. Adamson formed Big Country, and assumed the role of lead singer denied him in The Skids. He recruited the Canadian-born guitarist Bruce Watson, an old friend from Dunfermline, and (after an initial short-lived line-up) brought in two Englishmen, bassist Tony Butler and drummer Mark Brzezicki.
Despite not having a single member born in Scotland, the band immediately created one of the most distinctively Scottish-sounding formations in rock music. They based themselves in Fife, and developed a distinctive twin-guitar sound with a dramatic, ringing, bagpipe-like quality which became their signature.
Adamson was a dynamic front man, and their anthemic songs made an immediate impact, stimulated by a high-profile supporting role on The Jam’s week of farewell concerts at Wembley in 1982. The release of the chart singles Harvest Home and Fields of Fire was followed by their debut album, The Crossing (1983), which sold in excess of three million copies, and earned the band two Grammy nominations.
Further chart success followed with their quintessential song, In a Big Country, and Wonderland, while the band’s trademark sound also proved popular in America. Their unrepentant focus on guitar (at a time when much pop music was dominated by synthesiser), Adamson’s passionate idealism reflected in his songs, and the bold Celtic feel of their music was like nothing else around at the time, and their second album, Steeltown, went straight into the UK album charts at No 1 in 1984.
The band’s strength, though, also proved to be their weakness. Their trademark sound quickly began to strike many listeners as repetitive, and the band were never really able to develop it in any significant new directions. Nonetheless, their next album, The Seer, produced their biggest-selling single, Look Away, in 1986.
The band took part in the Wembley Live Aid event and The Princes Trust 10th Birthday Party, and toured the Soviet Union in 1988 to celebrate the release of their next album, Peace in Our Time. In 1989, the established line-up suffered its first change when Brzezicki left, to be replaced firstly by drummer Pat Ahern, then Chris Bell in 1991, and Simon Phillips by 1993.
By then, the band’s major successes were behind them, although they continued to maintain a high profile on the festival and touring circuit, including supporting slots on tours with The Rolling Stones and the former Led Zeppelin duo, Robert Plant and Jimmy Page.
No Place like Home (1991) was their last album for Polygram. They signed to the Compulsion label, which issued The Buffalo Skinners (1993), an album which yielded two further modestly-placed chart singles, Alone and Ships.
Mark Brzezicki rejoined the band in time for Without the Aid of a Safety Net, a live album recorded at the Barrowlands in Glasgow at the end of 1993. Why the Long Face was issued in 1995, followed by an "unplugged" acoustic album entitled Eclectic (1995), recorded at Dingwalls in London with a handful of guests, including Steve Harley, Carol Laula and Kym Mazelle.
Adamson then relocated to Nashville, and moved Big Country to the back-burner while he explored the local country and bluegrass music scene. The group eventually returned to the studio to cut their final studio album, Driving to Damascus (1999), which featured Eddi Reader as a guest vocalist on the first single released from the album, Fragile Thing. A subsequent single, Somebody Else, was one of two songs on the album co-written by Adamson and Ray Davies, a friendship which had begun at the Glastonbury Festival in 1997, when the band joined Davies in an impromptu jam.
Big Country continued to play high-profile gigs, including the Scotland for Kosovo concert in Glasgow (and a subsequent concert in Kosovo itself) in 1999, and Aberdeen’s Millennium Street Party, but announced their intention to quit after what became a somewhat extended farewell tour in 2000. They eventually played their final gig at a festival in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in October.
The band had outlasted most of their contemporaries from the early Eighties, selling well over ten million albums in the process, and previously unreleased material continued to be issued through Track Records, the record company owned by Adamson’s manager, Ian Grant.
Adamson had a long standing interest in country music, and with the demise of Big Country, he formed a new Nashville-based band in 2000, The Raphaels. He was interested in exploring a fusion of Celtic, folk and country influences within the band, which featured country singer Marcus Hummon, John Mock on bass, and Mark Brzezicki on drums.
He went missing after watching the Republic of Ireland play Iran in a World Cup qualifying match on television in a bar on 15 November. Despite regular pleas to make contact from Ian Grant and his band members on their website, he was not heard from again until the discovery of his body in the hotel in Hawaii.
Stuart Adamson, rock singer, songwriter and guitarist
Born: 11 April, 1958, in Manchester Died: 16 December, 2001, in Hawaii, aged 43
STUART Adamson was the charismatic lead singer and guitarist in Big Country, the Scottish-based rock band that achieved considerable success in the Eighties with a combination of impassioned songs and anthemic guitar lines that evoked the sound of bagpipes.
Adamson, who had a history of problems with alcohol, had been reported missing from his home in Nashville after disappearing last month, and was found dead in a hotel in Hawaii. He had previously gone missing in November 1999, and had reportedly suffered a nervous breakdown in the early Eighties.
He was born in Manchester, but grew up in Crossgates, near Dunfermline in Fife. He co-founded his first successful band, The Skids, with singer Richard Jobson. The group formed at the height of the punk movement in 1978, and made a considerable impact with singles such as Into The Valley, Charade and Working for the Yankee Dollar.
Adamson and Jobson went their separate ways in 1981. Adamson formed Big Country, and assumed the role of lead singer denied him in The Skids. He recruited the Canadian-born guitarist Bruce Watson, an old friend from Dunfermline, and (after an initial short-lived line-up) brought in two Englishmen, bassist Tony Butler and drummer Mark Brzezicki.
Despite not having a single member born in Scotland, the band immediately created one of the most distinctively Scottish-sounding formations in rock music. They based themselves in Fife, and developed a distinctive twin-guitar sound with a dramatic, ringing, bagpipe-like quality which became their signature.
Adamson was a dynamic front man, and their anthemic songs made an immediate impact, stimulated by a high-profile supporting role on The Jam’s week of farewell concerts at Wembley in 1982. The release of the chart singles Harvest Home and Fields of Fire was followed by their debut album, The Crossing (1983), which sold in excess of three million copies, and earned the band two Grammy nominations.
Further chart success followed with their quintessential song, In a Big Country, and Wonderland, while the band’s trademark sound also proved popular in America. Their unrepentant focus on guitar (at a time when much pop music was dominated by synthesiser), Adamson’s passionate idealism reflected in his songs, and the bold Celtic feel of their music was like nothing else around at the time, and their second album, Steeltown, went straight into the UK album charts at No 1 in 1984.
The band’s strength, though, also proved to be their weakness. Their trademark sound quickly began to strike many listeners as repetitive, and the band were never really able to develop it in any significant new directions. Nonetheless, their next album, The Seer, produced their biggest-selling single, Look Away, in 1986.
The band took part in the Wembley Live Aid event and The Princes Trust 10th Birthday Party, and toured the Soviet Union in 1988 to celebrate the release of their next album, Peace in Our Time. In 1989, the established line-up suffered its first change when Brzezicki left, to be replaced firstly by drummer Pat Ahern, then Chris Bell in 1991, and Simon Phillips by 1993.
By then, the band’s major successes were behind them, although they continued to maintain a high profile on the festival and touring circuit, including supporting slots on tours with The Rolling Stones and the former Led Zeppelin duo, Robert Plant and Jimmy Page.
No Place like Home (1991) was their last album for Polygram. They signed to the Compulsion label, which issued The Buffalo Skinners (1993), an album which yielded two further modestly-placed chart singles, Alone and Ships.
Mark Brzezicki rejoined the band in time for Without the Aid of a Safety Net, a live album recorded at the Barrowlands in Glasgow at the end of 1993. Why the Long Face was issued in 1995, followed by an "unplugged" acoustic album entitled Eclectic (1995), recorded at Dingwalls in London with a handful of guests, including Steve Harley, Carol Laula and Kym Mazelle.
Adamson then relocated to Nashville, and moved Big Country to the back-burner while he explored the local country and bluegrass music scene. The group eventually returned to the studio to cut their final studio album, Driving to Damascus (1999), which featured Eddi Reader as a guest vocalist on the first single released from the album, Fragile Thing. A subsequent single, Somebody Else, was one of two songs on the album co-written by Adamson and Ray Davies, a friendship which had begun at the Glastonbury Festival in 1997, when the band joined Davies in an impromptu jam.
Big Country continued to play high-profile gigs, including the Scotland for Kosovo concert in Glasgow (and a subsequent concert in Kosovo itself) in 1999, and Aberdeen’s Millennium Street Party, but announced their intention to quit after what became a somewhat extended farewell tour in 2000. They eventually played their final gig at a festival in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in October.
The band had outlasted most of their contemporaries from the early Eighties, selling well over ten million albums in the process, and previously unreleased material continued to be issued through Track Records, the record company owned by Adamson’s manager, Ian Grant.
Adamson had a long standing interest in country music, and with the demise of Big Country, he formed a new Nashville-based band in 2000, The Raphaels. He was interested in exploring a fusion of Celtic, folk and country influences within the band, which featured country singer Marcus Hummon, John Mock on bass, and Mark Brzezicki on drums.
He went missing after watching the Republic of Ireland play Iran in a World Cup qualifying match on television in a bar on 15 November. Despite regular pleas to make contact from Ian Grant and his band members on their website, he was not heard from again until the discovery of his body in the hotel in Hawaii.
pasty
A different kind of pasty
Saw them at Knebworth in 1986 supporting Queen. Pretty damned good if I remember correctly.
Shame that was what turned out to be Queens last ever live gig.
Shame that was what turned out to be Queens last ever live gig.
Statto
007
No
No
And No
No
And No
Juan Albion
Chicken Sniffer 3rd Class
Yes
Yes
Yes
I was a roadie at a Skids gig in Manchester once. They were great live (Albert Tatlock! Albert Tatlock!).
Saw Big Country a few times, thought they were very good.
Yes
Yes
I was a roadie at a Skids gig in Manchester once. They were great live (Albert Tatlock! Albert Tatlock!).
Saw Big Country a few times, thought they were very good.
Stinky Kat
Tripping
Yes
Yes
Yes
Skids did a song about Albert Tatlock - class
Yes
Yes
Skids did a song about Albert Tatlock - class
pasty said:Saw them at Knebworth in 1986 supporting Queen. Pretty damned good if I remember correctly.
Shame that was what turned out to be Queens last ever live gig.
I was at that Gig as well!
I saw Big Country loads of times in the early to late 80s, a great live band. Songs like Lost Patrol ,Porrohman, Fields of Fire and The Storm were fantastic live!
Have to say I havent listen to them for ages as its all on vinyl. Got all them signed when they played at the Brighton Centre. Stuart Adamson signed all of them with his catchphrase "Stay Alive"!!!
First time I saw them at the Hammersmith Odean they played various songs twice as only so much material to play! Went down hill from "The Seer" album, didnt see them so much after that release. The Crossing and Steeltown are both great albums
Superphil
Dismember
Yes
No
Yes.
I saw them at Bowie gig also, they were almost as poor as Bowie that day.
Having said that, it was an improvement to the first time I saw them, as The STUART Adamson Band, they were supporting Alice Cooper at the Centre. They were awfull. So much so that after a couple of songs the drummer tossed his sticks up in the air, missed them when thay came down, everyone was laughing so he threw them out into the crowd, who promptly threw them back at him. After I stopped laughing so much I went to the bar and waited for Alice to come on.
No
Yes.
I saw them at Bowie gig also, they were almost as poor as Bowie that day.
Having said that, it was an improvement to the first time I saw them, as The STUART Adamson Band, they were supporting Alice Cooper at the Centre. They were awfull. So much so that after a couple of songs the drummer tossed his sticks up in the air, missed them when thay came down, everyone was laughing so he threw them out into the crowd, who promptly threw them back at him. After I stopped laughing so much I went to the bar and waited for Alice to come on.
Trufflehound
Re-enfranchised
Superphil said:
'Tis true, but their rendition of In a Big Country and Bowie doing Time were good enough to forgive them both. Just. The rest was quite forgettable. In fact, I've forgotten what else they played.
Trufflehound
Re-enfranchised
Mr Blobby said:
Sadly ironic really...
northstandnorth
THE GOLDSTONE
- Thread starter
- #18
last time i saw them live was at the crawley liesure centre.a great time was had by too few.supporting act was a new irish band called CRY BEFORE DAWN,they should have been bigger too
no
yes
yes
yes
yes
227 BHA
Well-known member
Trufflehound said:
I was there as well, The Glass Spider Tour - Big Country were on in the afternoon and Bowie later in the evening.
Top, top day - both were fantastic. Can't remember who else lined up that day I just remember that as a BC fan what a bonus it was to have them supporting Bowie.
And yes, had the album as well - absolute quality.
****......heads off to loft in search of vinyl***