Biographies
Neil
MacGregor - Drums
"Most
smart people tend to feel queasy when the conversation turns to things like 'drunkenness' and the 'Metal Attakk-Fest' and the idea of a 'Funny
Heavy Metal Band'. But not me. I am comfortable with these themes...."
(Neil MacGregor 2002)
The story of our hero-drummer is one filled with themes such
as those described in the above quote, which he uttered after seeing the response to
the question; "Why don't we play at Blue Monday tonight?". It
was most definitely a loaded question-no rehearsal, no performances since the town
hall recording the previous month, a drummer who was only in town for a short break before alighting back down over the mountains. Could it work?
It might just.......................
Neil Macgregor first picked up music when his father picked
him up and danced around with him while listening to Radio Scotland's "Take the
Floor" programme. The year was probably 1982/3, the host of the program was and
is the Aberdeen DJ Robbie Shepherd, who even played a request to commemorate
the birth of this future visionary, after his birth in the foul year of our
Lord, Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-One. His father had his own Scottish
band that played in dances around Caithness and it was this that planted a seed
of interest in the much-abused art of melody and rhythm.
Spending his early years tormented by the music that
surrounded him, Neil would delight at the vision of watching his father's band. His ensemble
always included a drummer, be it Boysie Polson or Donnie Walloper, two men of Halkirk steel who are still playing to this day. These men, who still
insisted on the use of traditional grip would inspire the lad when it came time for him to provide the rhythm for his father's band of alcoholic
virtuosos.
Before that though, he had school to attend and it was during
his first encounter with the famous Thurso High teacher Stewart Watson, that Neil
would finally discover his path toward the glory of rock. "He handed
me a
bass and told me to play it", recalls Neil.
Neil got involved with various other musicians that were
attending Thurso High during that year of 1993. The music department had a particularly
fruitful alumni that year, including Ewan Barker, Stuart Maitland and
other assorted losers, such as Darren MacLeod, Neil's trusted comrade in arms-"Darren always knew what I was going to say, even before I said it.
The smart-arsed c*nt. I think he's working in insurance now, or
something."
Neil ploughed various furrows during his time in High School,
playing with various, hopelessly awful bands (including the 20,000 bands started by him
with future Metal Attakk man Cleft during Saturday jam-sessions). In fact it was his since-primary school friendship with Cleft that showed Neil just
what was possible in music. Neil and Cleft constantly listened to Guns N Roses, Iron Maiden and Metallica during their early high school years, even
going so far as to sneak looks at the Marlboro Man's bursting collection of first-edition
vinyls-"It was amazing. Cleft and the Marlboro Man ate,
slept and breathed rock music. So I did too. The best thing was that their
Mum didn't give a f*ck. If I'd been listening to some of that stuff in my house, my parents wouldn't have known what to do with me. They still don't
actually."
Around this time Neil also took up playing with his Dad's band, which brought untold financial rewards-"Theoretically of course, if the tax man is asking! I made over £600 in 1995 over a seven month period, just from playing gigs with my Dad. F*ck, I was only 13 and I was rich."
Neil also continued with his various high school combos, one of which continued after leaving school in '99. "We were a disgrace, we were so bad.
The
bass player was totally inept, which seems to be a habit of bands I play in, and the singer thought he was John Lennon. This was about the
time that I convinced myself that I was Lars Ulrich. There was a lot of bad
nonsense going on, the highlight of which was undoubtedly being told to leave the stage in the Waterfront having taken too much drink. I think
Kevin McGillivray was in charge of the place that night."
And so it was that one evening, having been in a Thurso pub somewhere, he bumped into a lanky, scraggly haired chap in Sandra's who noticed his "Ride The Lightning" t-shirt. "I thought he was some asshole who was going to give me grief", recalls Neil, "but that didn't happen till years later.....".
The lanky guy buying a pizza was Alasdair Manson.
At the insistence of local character Pi-knot, Neil met with
Ally again and they discussed starting a band. They shared a lot of similar tastes, such
as a love of Thin Lizzy and Iron Maiden. Ally also had his own radio show and a flat made out of
cd's-"Seriously, he had cd's coming out of his ears. He was into a wide range of stuff, a lot of it garbage, but he seemed
committed to getting something going."
The two started looking for musicians in Thurso, but none
seemed to be forthcoming. "Maybe it had something to do with the fact that we were
only interested in playing songs by Nailbomb", recalls Neil.
After months of searching, they recruited a blank-faced
misfit named Davey 5-"A total lunatic. He never learned the songs, which
f*cked Ally
off, and kept playing Marilyn Manson w@nk, which f*cked me off." Davey 5 was
on the way out. It was the year 2000, Neil and Ally were desperate to find other
people to play music with but couldn't find a single rock-obsessed guitarist anywhere. So they took the route of least resistance-stoner rock.
"Ally had read something about a thing called a 'Cleveland Steamer'. It's a fancy name for 'turd'. We knew right then we had a name." Steamer recruited local handbag-wearer Barry Gordon.
Barry, who now writes for the People's Friend, was more than happy to step into Steamer and write all the songs.
"Ally
will protest this till his death" grins Neil, "but I think they had one writing session together in his house which resulted in Barry writing
all the songs, maybe excepting a couple. They were good though, I thought
they were hilarious. No-one would get it, so we naturally had to play a
gig as soon as possible."
Steamer played its only gig in the Viewfirth Barn on the 28th
of July, 2000. "It was great!", recalls Neil, wistfully. "A
sea of blank faces. Well, more of a puddle really, there were so few folk there. But it was
great fun, despite Joop's projector mishaps. He also got assaulted by a 14
year old or something that night."
The fun was not to last. Barry was going to Edinburgh
to take up his Beano staff-writer job and Neil had stupidly taken a job at BT. "I
needed the money, so I decided to dive into the biggest pit of filth I could
find.".
With it all seeming too much, Neil and Ally almost gave up
their struggle for rock stardom. "We couldn't be arsed with it any more as
we sucked and couldn't get anywhere. The only productive thing that came out
of our time together was 'The Idiots'."
The Idiots was a band dreamed up by Ally which would feature
the biggest idiots the guys knew. "I think the line-up was Ally on guitar and
vocals, Metal God on bass, Me on drums and Donald Cormack and Neil Moodie on vocals.
"
So Ally said anyway-just another hair brained scheme." The Idiots
stalled,
only to be revived as a due featuring Neil and Metal God over a year later.
With bands going nowhere and things coming to a standstill Neil and Ally entered their winter of doing
f*ck-all. "Even trying to jam with
Stevie Taylor went wrong. I can't remember why, but Stevie couldn't get to our
jam session-apparently Ally is still not speaking to him over that."
And so now our story has brought us to mid-2001. Ally contacted Neil with the promise of a new band-"I'd heard it all before from him, and so had he from me. But he told me that he'd spoken to one Dave Morris and that he would play guitar. Ally knew him from years ago. I was to play drums and Ally was back on bass and vocals."
Ally
had propositioned Morris with the chance to reform, in part, their old band, Discrapency.
"I didn't give a
f*ck about Discrepancy or what they'd done" quipped Neil, "but Ally
assured me that this guy Morris was on the ball, so I said 'sure'."
However, Ally had a plan to recruit another guitarist to beef up the sound - enter The Gunslinger.
Despite being in his late 50's and suffering from arthritis and paranoid delusions, former Pathetic Shark and diabetic Kevin agreed to join up. It seemed an ideal set-up to all involved and it probably was - experienced musicians getting it on. Neil did have ulterior motives though, when agreeing to have Kevin in the band-"Ally told me years ago that he'd been in this band in the early '90's called 'Discrepancy'. He said that the reason the band finished was because one guy, Kevin McGillivray had wanted to call the band Metal Attack. I couldn't believe it-a genuine fruitcake! So when the chance came to have him in our band, I told Ally 'absolutely'."
Alas, things went south for our heroes again-Dave Morris
announced, before that band had even met, that he wouldn't be playing. "He was
apparently into reggae or something", mutters Neil. So the band needed a new
guitarist before they'd played a note-Neil had still only met The Gunslinger once;
when he'd guested on Ally's Friday Night Fiasco.
However, a solution appeared as if from nowhere......
"I can't believe we hadn't thought of Paul sooner."
says Neil. "I knew Paul was a drunk, a chain smoker and a fan of proper rock
'n' roll music. I jumped at the chance of him joining." Things seemed set to go,
especially following the announcement that Kenny Manson from Febus would be joining to sing.
"What did I think of Kenny joining?" says Neil, "I was glad Ally wasn't
gonna get to sing."
The band finally made it to rehearsal in late 2001 and
worked through some covers. Some worked, some didn't, but the guys definitely found it
enjoyable after so long in the doldrums.
Guess what? A spanner in the works looked to throw the whole thing into disarray before it could even get off the ground - Kenny was leaving to take up an accountancy job in Guernsey. Things looked fucked, but Neil had a brainwave.
"Boots"....
He had to be the singer because no one else wanted to do it, and more importantly, no one else wanted Ally to do it."
Thus, Metal Attakk Mk3 was born. Boots was now 'The Metal God' and set about learning to sing and learning the songs.
"I
was delighted that Boots was in the band", says Neil. "The thing about him is, as long as he's alive somewhere
in the world, I know that there's someone willing to take the mayhem further than I
am.......................".
It was around this time that the band settled upon it's eventual moniker. 'Metal Attakk' was no accident of birth. Neil often brought up the story of Kevin and his desire to call a band Metal Attack and decided to suggest this as a proper name for the band. "We'd been f*cking around for months trying to think of a name", said Neil. "Ally kept on coming in with these really gay '80's euro-metal names like 'StormBringer'. How f*cking stupid is that? But for him, I think 'Blacktooth' was the final straw".
With the band's first gig rapidly approaching, the name Blacktooth was chosen by Neil and Boots and settled upon. However, the course of events proved too much for Ally-"His workmates started calling us 'Blackpoof'" guffaws Neil. "He simply couldn't handle it, the abuse from his colleagues. He demanded that we change the name, although Metal God, Marlboro Man and I LOVED the name 'Blackpoof'!".
Ally grudgingly went along with name Metal Attakk, although to this day he has never thrown the cross-handed Metal Attakk sign.
The resolution of the band-name issue seemed to open a floodgate within Neil, who rapidly named each member of the group-"Metal God, well Boots
just is Rob Halford. It was simple. The Marlboro Man, simple, the
Marlboro Man was the character on Marlboro ads who smoked constantly. It seemed to fit
Paul. And the real Marlboro Man didn't even die of cancer-he died of AIDS!
Proof that smoking is safe.
Where was I? Yeah, The Gunslinger...
I
always liked seeing Kevin get into playing a song. When he did he would
put on this stance, half Hetfield, half Adrian Smith. I remember reading Hetfield
describe his stance as 'The Gunslinger' so it worked. 'Cleft', just because. It's close to Cliff I suppose.
'Fabien'-well, what other
name could someone so irritating have? Hilda Ogden maybe? And Pert?
The reason for that is described on Kevin's biography." Interestingly, it's the
Marlboro Man character who is dressed as a gunslinger in the Marlboro ads!
Rejoining our story, it was the problem with the name of the band that first indicated that Ally wasn't one of the group. His alienation from the
humour and enjoyment of the rest of the band seemed to distance him. After
the triumphant Wick gig, Ally made his own way home while the rest alighted
o Metal HQ for a viewing of Bad News 2.
"He had to go", says Neil. "He was ruining it for us.
We were having a great time, but he just couldn't let himself be part of it. And his bass
sounded like a marble in a tumble dryer."
The story of Fabien's departure is told elsewhere and will not be dredged up here. Suffice to say that his replacement, Cleft Burton was able to fill the vacant shoes.
Metal Attakk's final 100 yard dash was characterised by
drunkenness, disastrous farewell gigs and missing drummers. The Metal Attakk-fest
should have been the band's final hour, instead it was a fiasco of
hangover's, a missing guitarist and a deep sense of forboding about going to Perth the next day. Things seemed to have imploded on a terrible low note.
All was not lost though. The band reconvened a few months later and proved that they could still do it easily, first recording a live album in
Thurso Town Hall and then an off-the-cuff show at the place where it all
started, The Redwood-"By far the best of the young bands."
Hopefully this wont be the last that's heard from these morons. With everyone still in Thurso except Neil, it hopefully wont be long before
another reunion is held. Neil is confident that next summer, "MetalAttakk-Fest 2: The Gunslinger's Return" will be more than just a pipe
dream.
To close off this tale, it is fitting to mention another quote from our hero-drummer. It was oft quoted by him in times of crisis within the band
and it helped to lift the spirits of the main protagonists. Until they
return, we can only read this quote and keep our fingers, and our toes, crossed.......
"IT'S KEVIN'S BAND!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"-Neil MacGregor-2002