Thin Lizzy Live

Thin Lizzy are currently on a UK tour, which began at Glasgow‘s Barrowlands on January 19 and runs until February 4, when the band headline London‘s HMV Hammersmith Apollo. Support on all dates will come from US metallers Clutch
A new line-up has formed to take Lizzy’s music to a whole new generation of music fans. Led by Scott Gorham, Brian Downey and Darren Wharton (all of whom played in Thin Lizzy with Phil Lynott) the stellar line-up is completed by Damon Johnson on guitar (Alice Cooper Band), Bassist Marco Mendoza (Whitesnake, Ted Nugent) and The Almighty’s Ricky Warwick on vocals and guitar.
 Here are some videos from their recent performance in Newastle:

In the begining

This is my first post and it’s been a bad week for Irish blues as we lose another brilliant guitarist, Gary Moore, who died last sunday in Spain at the age of 58. He’s gone to join that other great Irish blues legend, Rory Gallagher who died at the very young age of 47 in 1995. In a tribute to Gary “Sir” Bob Geldof said:

“”One of the greatest blues players of all time. Van Morrison, Rory Gallagher and Gary Moore – the glorious trinity of the Irish blues men.”

Van’s still around, and here’s hoping he stays for a long time to come, fellow Belfast man Gary left Belfast at the young age of 16 to go to Dublin where he first teamed up with Phil Lynott, in the band Skid Row. Of course Phil is better known as the lead singer and bassist of Thin Lizzy, who Gary joined in  1973 after the departure of lead guitarist, Eric Bell (also from Belfast). Although his original stint was quite short, he rejoined in 1977, when Lizzy were on top of the world creating influences for up and coming rock bands such as Guns ‘n Roses.

My personal memories include the Thin Lizzy Years, I was in my late teens when Lizzy were at their peak, but I was also really impressed by the haunting guitar work on Parisienne Walkways, which got into the top ten singles in the British charts in 1979.

Gary had a great solo career, probably more so in Europe than in the USA, but he collaborated with many greats including Bob Dylan, Peter Green (he even bought Green’s 1959 Gibson Les Paul to give it a good home) BB King and many more it’s well documented, Green was one of his early influences.

A few years ago he did a documentary on BBC Radio 2 in tribute to Rory Gallagher, and personally I thought it was great to hear Gary Moore singing Rory’s praises, lets hope Gary continues to recieve the recognition and credit he deserves for his contribution to world blues and not just Irish blues.