The McManus brothers, who grew up on a farm near the village of Derrylin, Co. Fermanagh, started off their musical career as award winning traditional Irish musicians but were inspired by the legendary Irish celtic rock band, Horslips, as well as younger brother Tommys passion for the drums to form a rock band. In the late 70s the brothers had become big fans of Horslips and attended their gigs at every possible opportunity. They eventually got to know and became friends with the band members. It was around that time that they started their own band which was originally called Pulse before they changed it to Mamas Boys. Barry Devlin of Horslips heard about their band and went to see them rehearse at their home. He was suitably impressed and offered them a support slot for Horslips 1979 tour.
Although their heroes Horslips mixed traditional music with hard rock and the McManus brothers were top notch traditional musicians, Mama's Boys didn't really go for the celtic fusion sound, apart from the occasional fiddle solo by Pat, but went for a harder edged more heavy metal sound.
By 1980 Mamas Boys had a bootleg circulating and were touring extensively in Ireland. In 1981 they were invited to support Hawkwind on their UK tour. They recorded and self-financed their first album, a raw blast of rock power entitled Plug It In in 1982 and achieved a hit single in Ireland with the most pop-oriented song on the album, Needle In The Groove.
The second album Turn It Up was released in 1983. The same year they toured with Thin Lizzy on that bands farewell tour and played at the Reading Rock Festival and signed a worldwide record deal with Jive Records. The first album released on Jive was a self-titled compilation of Plug It In and Turn It Up with a few new songs added. One of the new songs, a cover of Slade's 'Mama Weer All Crazee Now' was released as a single and reached number 54 in the American charts. The video for the song got a lot of airplay on MTV and helped the band to become known in the US which they toured in 1984. Coincidentily the American heavy metal band Quiet Riot also released their cover version of the song at the same time as Mama's Boys but the Mama's Boys version is widely regarded as being superior.
1985s Power And Passion album broke into the Billboard top 100 in the US and the band toured in the US, Europe and Japan. During European leg of the tour Tommy had a relapse of leukemia which he had been treated for as a child and a replacement drummer was brought in to complete the tour. The recovering Tommy rejoined the tour in Ireland but had to be rushed back to hospital after another relapse.
In 1987 vocalist Keith Murrell was brought in after John started having trouble with his vocal chords and they recorded the album Growing Up The Hard Way. Jive Records chose Murrell with the idea of giving them a more polished commercial sound but it backfired as the unique raw sound of the band was replaced by a bland AOR type sound. The Jive contract, which ended that year, was not renewed and Keith Murrell was let go.
In 1989 with a new vocalist, Mike Wilson, and under new management they moved their base to the UK. The live album Live Tonite was released in 1991 and the band toured extensively in Europe. They released the album Relativity in 1992. While on tour in Italy in 1993, Tommy became ill again and the tour had to be canceled. The following year Tommy underwent a bone marrow transplant but tragically he did not survive. His brothers were devastated and Mamas Boys did not continue after this blow. On the first anniversary of Tommys death John composed a traditional lament on the low whistle for his brother and this led to himself and Pat revisiting their traditional Irish music roots and forming a celtic/new age group called Celtus.
In 2003, Pat McManus joined irish rock band 'Indian' and is currently enjoying continued success with them.
Click here to visit CELTUS on Myspace
Click here to visit INDIAN on Myspace
Click here to visit PAT MCMANUS on Myspace
Click here to visit JOHN MCMANUS on his website
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ABOUT THIS MYSPACE PAGE:
Maybe you're wondering who's behind this Myspace Mama's Boys page... :)
We wish to tell you a small story how we've met with the three McManus brothers...
One day in 1991 - we both were little school girls - there was an autograph session in our favourite record store with a strange rockgroup called MAMA'S BOYS... hmmmm... Mama's Boys...? "Never heard of it!" we thought, but maybe interesting to drop in! Can you imagine how it was for two girls of age 13 to meet 'real' musicians? Wow! Finally Tommy was the one who introduced us to the band and so it was the beginning of a wonderful and far-reached time. The Boys captured us immediately by their great music, their naturalness, happiness and charm!
Three weeks later we had the luck and possibility to enjoy our first Mama's Boys show and from then we became big fans and have followed the Boys through Switzerland during three years... and a special friendship was created at the same time. Sometimes it was more than half a year of waiting for new concerts... and tears of joy when we could hug the Boys again finally! We thought that it must always go on like this...
As Tommy left our world in 1994 we both were completely devastated. Only Pat & John were capable of taking the pain from us. Our grief has stayed for a very long time until we begun to live again with the memory of Tommy.
We're happy to know that Pat + John still are creating wonderful music - it would be a shame if the world would loose such great talents.
But the group Mama's Boys still deserves respect and support, that's why we decided to take over this page! :)
