|
THE WANDERERS |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Michael Beal |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
After Sham finally split in 1980, the remaining members of Sham: Dave Treganna, Rick Goldstein and myself formed The Wanderers, recruiting (US) Cleveland punk singer Stiv Bators from the Dead Boys as our new front man. At that point we were working under the name The Allies. |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
We met Stiv in New York on Sham's first American tour. He was at one of our gigs and we invited him up for an encore to sing 'If The Kids Are United'. On our second visit to the States while hanging out with Kim Fowley and his all girl group The Orchids (I still keep in touch with Guitarist Che Zuro to this day) we ended up jamming at a session with Stiv in Hollywood. So a few years later when we called him he accepted the gig straight away. We recorded one album for Polydor "Only lovers left alive" and released two singles from it. We recorded it at Trident in London, the same studio Bowie used for Ziggy Stardust and other albums. Mick Glossop was the producer ( he also produced The Rutts, including Babylons Burning). |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
We played a handful of British dates and one American tour. After the tour I went back out to California to recover and hang out with a few friends, but on returning to England I was diagnosed as having hepatitis and was put into an isolation ward at Frimley park hospital for the next month. When I finally got out I found that Stiv and Dave had gone off with Brian James to form "Lords Of The New Church", Rick came down to see me at home and told me he'd been offered the part of Ringo in the "Bootleg Beatles", a part he played until very recently. |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
These shots were taken at the Pepermint lounge in New York by Stephan Sonic, the previous night we saw one of the best ever gigs by Johnny Thunders Heartbreakers, when they were bad they were terrible, but on form they were the best. |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
FRAMED |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Shortly after finding myself redundant, I got a call from our PA and sound man Steve Sutherland who told me that another act he worked for (Girlschool) had lost their bass player / singer and that she was looking for a guitarist to form a new band with. This was Enid Williams, and the birth of "Framed". |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
After a few weeks we had a new drummer who was a friend of our rhythm guitarist Barbara Spitz. They had played together previously in a band called "The Elgin Marbles". |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
As a band we played the London circuit, did a few radio interviews and recorded one single (a one sided single) called 'Wonderland', I wrote this track on the plane coming back from the Wanderers tour, it was about a place in New York where we used to go and score ( and probably the reason for my Hepatitis! ). We had a lot of fun in Framed but the time just wasn't right for us and we split up a few years later. Recently I re-wrote Wonderland for inclusion on my 2nd Solo album ‘Unstable’. |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
NEXT - |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||