Born at an early age in North Manchester, Gary showed no early signs of any musical talent or aptitude. Family history (mothers side) included at least two members of the Halle Orchestra (circa 1900) and a leading member of a 1930’s – 1950’s dance band, but all siblings and parents were ‘clueless’ not even knowing which end of a guitar to blow down.
Being a bright lad, and noting the way that music lessons took place inside at lunch hour in winter, he began his musical career as ‘lead triangle’ in the touring school brass band. This leading role – later extended to include other notable percussion instruments such as ‘tambourine’ and ‘sand blocks’ – instilled a desire to follow a career in music. This desire, and the realisation that the number of multi millionaire professional triangle players was not a high number, led to the acquisition of a classical guitar, later followed by a larger acoustic and an electric guitar.
At this point emergent talent on guitar was spotted by a number of friends who had been playing in a school band for some time. Eager to prevent any competition in the guitar playing field, they offered him the position of bass player, in the re-launch of the infamous ‘heavy metal’ cover band ‘Graf Spei’ (yes crap name but he didn’t pick it!). A long stream of school disco’s, youth club disco’s and any other occasion to play followed, never being paid and never caring. This four piece suffered from two problems – guitarist who couldn’t agree who should be loudest, and an inability to find anyone who could sing AND sing with a band called Graf Spei. We sank.
After a spell without any real direction, the members of Graf Spei decided to try and make it in the music business for real. This involved the purchase of some new (better) equipment, the hiring of a rehearsal room, the auditioning of a number of potential singers, and the tolerance of a lead guitarist who had some of his own material and wanted us to play it. After a number of abortive attempts to find a singer who was not a drug addict, not a criminal, not wanted by the military police (!), and able to drive, the band finally settled into a standard four piece format (drums, bass guitar, lead guitar and vocals). So was born Vera Cruz (still a crap name but better than Graf Spei).
Vera Cruz had a number of notable successes between the years 1982 to 1987, with a sound a bit like a cross between Bon Jovi and ZZ Top, with some Van Halen thrown in for good luck, and dress sense that made you reach for sun glasses even in darkened rooms. This included studio recording, followed by gigs in North Manchester, Oldham and Salford, first appearance at UMIST – Heavy Metal special leading to the first ‘tour’ around northern England, including various universities, polytechnics and festivals, and a number of pubs and social club nights. Some of these recorded / played by local radio. The following years saw repeat appearances at UMIST and various battle of the bands competitions, culminating in recording on a heavy metal compilation album. Leaving Vera Cruz in 1987, to concentrate on a real job plus session work, including work with Simply Red, Stone Roses, Lisa Stansfield and lots of other bands and ‘wanna-be ‘ musicians plus a few sessions for advertising jingles.
Most notable of the sessions was a short spell with a bunch of old school mates – at this point met a 15 year old Manny (Stone Roses fame) and taught him how to play a couple of songs on guitar. I apologise for any damage this may have caused in later years. A number of small sessions and jams with old friends continued for a time, but career and marriage took over, and the bass was boxed and forgotten in favour of a wide variety of acoustic instruments, including mandolin and banjo.
After a performing break of about fifteen years he was invited to play bass for Connection, and is now suffering from a severe case of ‘performance addiction’ – he hopes there is no cure! |
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