The Encyclopedia of Dead Rock Stars (207 page)

(Bristol, England, 1959)

The Experimental Pop Band

The Brilliant Corners

Starting out as The Hybrids, Bristol’s Brilliant Corners became one of the leading guitar bands in Britain’s post-’C86’ scene. Bassplayer Chris Galvin started the band with his friend guitarist Davey Woodward, and The Brilliant Corners carved a small niche for themselves, particularly with sparkling single ‘Brian Rix’ (1987) and third album
Somebody up There Likes Me
(1988) on their own SS20 label. Attracting no real attention – save one appearance on Radio One’s John Peel Show – Woodward and Galvin folded the project after no fewer than seven studio albums. The pair went on to create ‘skewed boho-pop’ (according to the
NME
) with The Experimental Pop Band in 1995, issuing an acclaimed debut album,
Discgrotesque
(1997). It was to be Galvin’s only contribution. Terminally ill with cancer, he passed away at the end of the following year. Davey Woodward pays tribute by continuing with the band to the present day.

Friday 25

Bryan MacLean

(Los Angeles, California, 25 September 1946)

Love

(The Bryan MacLean Band)

The first rock band signed by the influential Elektra label, Love were the brainchild of charismatic singer Arthur Lee – though there are many who still believe the real magic was in the playing of guitarist Bryan MacLean. A fan of folk and rock, MacLean had escaped his privileged upbringing to befriend fellow guitarist and Byrds-founder David Crosby, the latter inviting him to join the fledgling band as a roadie. Also emerging were The Grass Roots, Lee’s precursor to Love, whom MacLean was to join by the end of 1965. Initially, the latter found it hard to force his writing on to Lee, who had a very distinct vision of where Love were headed. After a great self-titled first album (1966), Love returned even more impressively with the wondrous
Da Capo
and
Forever Changes
(both 1967) – the second of these featured some of MacLean’s compositions, most notably the classic ‘Alone Again Or’. Strangely, the sessions for this last album had witnessed extreme band disharmony, and MacLean decided to make his own way after its release. It proved a bad move: MacLean’s substance abuse snowballed and the errant guitarist found himself falling increasingly foul of the law. By 1970 he had all but jacked in music.

A Christian convert, Bryan MacLean reemerged with a more religious strain of pop music until launching his own side project, The Bryan MacLean Band, in the early eighties. This group contained an up-and-coming singer/guitarist in the shape of his half-sister, Maria McKee, who would go on to record MacLean’s ‘Don’t Toss Us Away’ as leader of the excellent Lone Justice. Bryan MacLean – who had released his final solo album,
Ifyoubelievein,
just a year before – was enjoying a Christmas lunch with his friend Love biographer Kevin Delaney when he collapsed and died from a heart attack.

See also
George Suranovich (
February 1990); Ken Forssi (
January 1998); Arthur Lee (
August 2006). Original Love drummer Don Conka died in 2004 and sometime bassist Robert Rozelle in 2011.

Wednesday 30

Johnny Moore

(Selma, Alabama, 15 December 1934)

The Drifters

(The Three Hornets)

Enduring vocalist Johnny Moore learned his trade as tenor with The Hornets, a doo-wop group from Cleveland, Ohio, whose popularity stretched little further than their home state. The Drifters, on the other hand, formed a year earlier, were at the point of huge stardom by the time manager George Treadwell hired Moore at the end of 1954. The singer’s recruitment was an effort to bring wayward lead singer Little David Baughan into line: Moore, who had been given just B-sides to sing at this stage, was actually briefly dismissed three months later when this odd plan appeared to be working. He was installed as an official singer soon after, when Baughan reverted to his earlier ways. Moore spent most of his time on the road with The Drifters for the next few years, the group on a strict wage with record sales barely affecting their personal wealth.

In 1957, the singer was drafted, but on his return to civilian life tried his hand as a soloist under the name Johnny Darrow (to avoid confusion with singer Johnny Moore of The Blazers) before returning to The Drifters’ fold (via The Drapers, an offshoot) in 1963. Moore was thus a veritable senior by the time he was installed as lead in 1964. Previous lead Ben E King had left the line-up, and The Drifters – by now regular hitmakers – had struggled to find a suitable replacement; Moore was only offered the ‘permanent’ role after the shocking death of then-current lead Rudy Lewis (
Pre-1965).
The day after Lewis’s passing, Moore sang vocals to ‘Under the Boardwalk’, the first major hit to showcase him. With sales beginning to dip, The Drifters exploited their European popularity, nurtured during the mid sixties, eventually relocating to England, where Moore fronted their hugely successful seventies incarnation. Although Drifters aficionados tend to see this version of the group as slighter than the early R & B line-ups (some songs were now written by the British partnership of Roger Cook and Roger Greenaway), there is little arguing with the parade of UK hits they accumulated, such as the 350,000-selling ‘Kissin’ in the Back Row’ (1974) and ‘There Goes My First Love’ (1975). In 1978, Moore again attempted a solo career, but still found success easier to come by as a Drifter. After some wrangles over ownership of the name, the singer teamed with Ben E King for the first time ever during the eighties, and The Drifters brand became a staple of the oldies circuit. Johnny Moore appeared on British television with The Drifters just days before his death from respiratory failure.

Johnny Moore is one of numerous dead Drifters (
Pre-1965/Dead Interesting!)