Steve Fennell tells us the history of Forgotten
Heroes:
This is the history of the band as I remember it. I was working in Buile hill park as a gardener aged 17. I had just got a KORG MS-10 synth on the never never from A1 music down Cromwell road Pendleton and a SYNDRUM on a stand with 4 oscillators on it.
I had to justify to my Dad why I had gone £300 in debt. A chance encounter with some lads, they told me they had just formed a band, I told them of my Korg ms-10 and drum synth, that was enough for them I was in. What I didn't tell them was I had never played an instrument in my life I had no idea what the 30 dials or the patching system was
for, then the bomb shell, they said they had a gig in a few weeks time and I was the bass synth player and on synth drum
THE BAND
There was Colin Powell who had been in "Zion" a prog-rock band. He played all instruments and was our kind of leader, he worked at Hope Hospital. Then there was Dave Mcginley on bass guitar, he also worked at Hope. Then there was Andy Burke on guitar and the main singer, he was still at school and Paul Whittle Synth- drums-and vocals. I was the last to join.
THE FIRST GIG
Colin and Paul had written some good songs. We did covers of O.M.D.- Soft cell and Kraftwerk,
but our first gig, (at the dinning hall at hope hospital), went down like a lead balloon. We were supporting a jazz band called "Sidewinder" they were brilliant musicians. We all looked like Gary Numan (our hero). I was shaking so much I couldn't hit a right note, 200 people were watching this shambles, including my dad (who was shaking his head disappointingly). I wanted the ground to swallow me up.
I think the next gig was in St Luke's hall, Liverpool st. Salford, where we had band practice most weeks. We were all members of Saint Luke's Amateur Dramatic Society. It was a good learning ground. We did
musicals and had a free practice hall where we could pump up the volume.
The gig was a success, we were on cloud 9, We even had a small following. The Salford Advertiser did a page on us. The next O.M.D. they said. When my dad saw our picture in the paper I felt vindicated
of the £300 h.p. I was still paying.
Next was THE BATTLE OF THE BANDS competition at the Carlton Cinema, Cross lane.
That went well. I sang "The Model" by Kraftwerk, we got through to the next round.
But before we could do the next stage of the competition, we quarrelled on which song we were going to sing, we ended up not going.
Our next gig was THE GALLERY Manchester.
We went to check the place out a week before the gig, it was our first club gig, we were having a pint and watching this 3 piece band doing nursery-rhyme type songs. I was fascinated by their unusual style, they were called "JAMES" (oh sit-down, oh-sit down, sit down next to me) yes them. The other band that was on was a GLAM-PUNK band called
BELGIUM BITCH (later BELGIQUE ) they were watching our gig the week after and approached us to go on a compilation album. We had to fork out hundreds of pounds to them. They got us in a recording studio THE TWILIGHT SOUND RECORDING STUDIO. I think it was in Stockport. The song we did on a master tape was ALPHA BETA ROMEO written by Paul and Colin, it was our best song and when the master tape was played back by the producer-engineer we was on cloud 10 then we learnt our fist lesson of the music industry the distribution company of the compilation album went bust we were pissed-off to say the least. we dusted our self down hunted down the master tape and produced a c30 cassette I was an artist so I designed the covers all by hand and sent a copy to mike Sweeney on his radio show he gave us a plug for a forthcoming gig (nice one mike) then tragedy struck Andy Burke our main singer (who was in the Ian Curtis mould of personality) committed suicide Andy's death at the age of 17 was devastating to us all. We nearly folded the group that week but reluctantly reorganized our self and me and Paul took over most of the singing we were always versatile and all swapped instruments and singing on a regular basis. We did I think another gig at THE GALLERY the group on before us was SYNCOPATION DANCE I think there the SYNCOPATION on this band list they were very good. we got better even doing a gig in the
BRITANNIA HOTEL with a east German group it was very grand but the German party had never heard of synthesizers and the folk group that was playing before us went of to the bar for a drink while we bashed out a electronic cover of GIVE PEACE A CHANCE ha ha it was a strange and wonderful world we lived in then. I remember going to band practice one night I lived near the weaste hotel my friend peter had a sister who was going out with Bernard from NEW ORDER I think they had just got a flat together near Barton airport if memory serves me well. The band(new order) was having a few pints in the weaste hotel peter my friend was going in to see his sister so I went in to have a pint before band practice, I had my Korg ms-10 synth under one hand my syndrum on its stand in the other and a mic wrapped round my neck, I walked over to Bernard and hooky and announced
I'M IN A BAND they looked at me in silence for a few seconds you could have cut the air with a knife then Bernard said dryly id never have guessed
I walked away cursing my stupidity clattering my instruments whilst grabbing my pint trying to regain my dignity. the band FORGOTTEN HEROES lasted 3yrs all in all Paul Whittle went on to be in a few
other bands with Colin Powell and Dave McGinley and went on to write award winning Musicals JESUI
TUTANKHAMEN (at the Lowry) and is still doing music at St
Luke's am-dram where we all started out I left the band to go travelling I now live in
Swinton where I still have a midi keyboard to my computer electric guitars and I am better known today for my paintings of which in Jan this year 2007 ROLF HARRIS came to my house to see my paintings whilst filming a program on Lowry. As he was leaving with his film crew I saw him looking at my guitar's and keyboards, I thought afterwards when he'd gone would have loved to have jammed STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN with him.
Steve Fennell
17.12.09: Forgotten Heroes recently got back together to chat on
The Salford Music Hour and took the opportunity to recreate some
of their original photographs from 1982. Thanks to Steve Fennell
for sending them to us.
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