Jun 28 2009
Disrespecting Rory
Because that’s what it is when you name your band “Taste” and try to cash in on the Rory legacy! John Wilson and Charlie McCracken, former band mates of Rory’s from the Taste days have been trying to resuscitate their musical careers off and on for the past few years by trading on the name of Ireland’s greatest band ever. That’s right U2, the greatest band to come out of Ireland was Taste, and despite what the lawyers, snake oil salesmen, and apparently old band mates, will have you believe, Taste was and always will be about Rory Gallagher. It was Rory Gallagher who led that band to stardom and international stature.
You see, it was never 3 guys jamming in the basement of their parents flat and deciding together to form a band. It was Rory Gallagher who corralled a couple of mates from the Fontana Showband, Johnny Campbell and Oliver Tobin, and played in the all night clubs of Hamburg. It was Rory Gallagher who formed “Taste” with local Cork boys Eric Kitteringham and Norman Damery and made their way to Fame if not Fortune at Belfast’s Maritime Hotel. And it was Rory Gallagher who reformed “Taste” with new band mates, John Wilson and Charlie McCracken and took the London Marquee Club by storm. Like the audience chants at his shows, it was “Rory, Rory, Rory!” From Hamburg to Belfast to London it was always Rory.
This did not sit well with band members Wilson and McCracken. They thought themselves equal to Rory, particularly John Wilson, and grew irritated at Rory’s fame. This is what John Wilson had to say about the split:
..quite frankly the music I’ve been following, and wanting to do for the last year is nothing like what we were doing. I mean it just became comparable to a circus. They came along to see us, ‘perform.’ I think we could have stood on our heads, and people would still have gone mad. I tried to introduce a little more intricacy into Taste numbers that just never called for this style of drumming. I put them in – but realized that it didn’t make any difference – I’m sure the audience never noticed.
That obviously upset me somewhat. My way of thinking, and I’m sure it is the right way of thinking is that a three-piece has to share equal pressures when playing – therefore we wanted to be recognized as equals with Rory. But instead it was Rory this, and Rory that. — Melody Maker, October 17, 1970
After the acrimonious breakup, Wilson and McCrackin formed a new band called Stud, added guitarist Jim Cregan and despite intitial encouragement from audiences in Germany faded from the limelight by the Summer of ’72. Rory, on the other hand, found himself a new rhythm section, even adding a keyboard player for a time, and rocketed back to the top beating out Eric Clapton in 1972 as world’s best guitarist in Melody Maker’s annual poll, proving to the world that, “No, Mr. Wilson, not all things are created equal.” Rory would never play another original Taste song again, despite their being his songs. (Neither Wilson or McCracken wrote a single Taste tune.) The hurt Rory felt over the breakup wouldn’t allow him to play his old songs. Frankly, if I thought Wilson and McCracken would get any royalties out of it I wouldn’t wanted him to play them either. Rory just got better and better while Wilson and McCracken faded into the musical mist.
While Rory Gallagher has even improved with his music his two ex-colleagues seem to be badly off without him. Their new guitarist is good, but he’s nothing more than that. However, McCracken and Wilson are both very skilled musicians from who I had expected more, actually.– Musik Express
The point is, the media had welcomed “Stud” with open arms, hoping that they would be the second coming of “Taste”, but that didn’t happen, not by a long shot. It was the Rory Gallagher Band that merited that title. Rory Gallagher had been the heart and soul of “Taste,” and his new band just continued where Taste had left off. If possible, Rory’s guitar work, his song writing, and his voice got even better. People lamented the split up of “Taste” for no reason. Taste was still there live and kicking, just under a new name, “The Rory Gallagher Band.” “Stud”, on the other hand, lasted 2 short years, and then Wilson and McCracken fled into obscurity, until a few years ago when Rory’s music staged a rebirth of sorts. In the past couple of years, several books, DVD’s, and records have been released and have done remarkably well. The annual Rory Gallagher tribute festival in Ballyshannon has grown and grown and now tops over 10,000 visitors to the 4-day event. It appears that Wilson and McCracken seek to capitalize on this renewed interest in Rory with a new version of “Taste”, or perhaps it should be called “Taste-Lite”.
In an article from CNI, Culture Northern Ireland, we learn that this new, Wilson-led “Taste” plan on releasing 2 albums in the near future: one, a tribute to the late great Rory Gallagher, and the other a collection of new songs penned by Wilson and new lead guitarist, Sam Davidson. All this in honor of the 40th Anniversary of the band. Okay, Rory formed “Taste” in ’66, that would make it the 43rd Anniversary, they must mean the second incarnation of “Taste” in ’68 and they’re just a tad late getting the CD out.
But wait a minute, surely we can bury the hatchet and just applaud another tribute CD to the Irish master? I don’t think so! If they had called themselves by any other name, then sure, no hard feelings, have at it, but no, in their arrogance they named themselves “Taste”, presumably because some lawyer told them they could. Let’s be clear about this, “Taste” was no “Fleetwood Mac” that blues behemoth that traded in their lead guitarists and vocalists at the drop of the hat. No, “Taste” was Rory Gallagher and a rhythm section, and the split up was so bitter that anyone masquerading as “Taste” demonstrates their total lack there of.
There will be those who remember the days of “Taste” and think about going to see this new “Taste”, or maybe buy there commemorative CD just to listen to the old songs. Don’t! In honor of Rory, just say No!
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