“My first demo was recorded here in 1977. We were called Mitosis and we rattled of 8 songs in a session. Dave Gedge, Pete Solowka and Brian Scoffield were the other members of the band.”
“Henry (real name Pete Carroll) was from Chesterfield, but his production company Baby Cow was based in Manchester. He did loads of gigs as the Heavy Metal Death Goth Poet. He had long hair then. He would be seen in the audience at the Buzz Club and at the Witchwood in the 80's”
“The festival at Hopwood Hall was a Heineken sponsored gig, I think Carol Wright was the promoter who used to run the Hurricane Club in Oldham for a while and with Heineken put some gigs on at the Uni-Bar in Manchester.”
“The club has hugely successful, we regularly pulled in 120 plus on a monday evening. It started as a vehicle for The Screaming Beavers and quickly grew to being the best gig around for lots of Manchester bands. Mutley Maclad was posh, his real name is Tristan O'Neill and he had been Head Boy at the local private school called Kings, so he always got it in the neck from Fatty (Dave Kinsella).
Slimey Git (MaccLads manager) aka Sandy Gort supplied us with lots of comics including Steve Coogan who regularly turned up to try out a new routine and see how it went. John Thompson, Hattie Hayridge, Henry Normal, Caroline Ahearne, Dave Gorman, John Cooper-Clarke and Dave Spikey also appeared from time to time. Whilst it was primarily a live music club, we based the evening on John Marshall's early Buzz Club where there would be a Comic, a Poet and a live band.
We scrubbed the poet early on and had two bands, a comic and a set from the Beavers. The late license allowed us to cram a lot in. The landlord would feature a different menu every week.
At Christmas we would hire the local leisure centre and feature the favourite acts from that year as well as a set from the Beavers. It always sold out and the last one I was involved with was in the main sports hall, I think the best part of a 800 tickets were sold.
One of the Beavers signature pieces was 'No Sheep 'till Buxton' which I think the Macc Lads covered.”
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