Dear Friends of The Blue Cats.This is the offical Blue Cats @ myspace site. I am Stef Edwards, original drummer with the Blue Cat Trio, The Blue Cats, G-Men, Beltane Fire and Flame Of The West.
Many contraversial versions of the split between Dave Phillips and The Blue Cat Trio have been written over the years. Well, this is the truth, the whole truth and noting but the official truth. Clive Osborne has the biography basically correct on his Blue Cats page except for the section about Dave Phillips being owed money. It all came to a head at the Lewes Road Inn, Brighton. After the gig that night, Dave demanded one third of the total fee before any expenses were deducted (petrol, Clive etc.). We, of course, said that was unfair and wanted to stick to the original arrangement. He was having none of it and stormed off in his car with his mate whose name escapes me. We now resume with Clive's version as Dave's Ford Anglia slams into the front of the van, narrowly missing Carlo, myself and the landlord. I never spoke to him again.Carlo and I went onto meet Clint and Mitch, had some very good times as The Blue Cats then formed G-Men, the 4 track EP reaching cult status of which I still have copies.We then called ourselves LA PLAZ, the meaning for the name was a personal joke between us. A 4 track demo recorded, one gig at Dingwalls, Camden. In all we lasted about one month so this is rare stuff. It was a transition period. We dropped out altogether and after rehearsing for a year, emerged as Beltane Fire.The Beltane Fire LP was released through CBS records on vinyl and cassette. CD wasn't around then but I did aquire some pressed from the original acetates. Sell out tours an LP that climbed to no. 43 in the charts, all of this down to management and gigging. Then CBS, in all its wisdom, decided not to push the LP. WHY? is the question I STILL ask myself. We had lost it. It was all downhill from there.Totally disillusioned with the music business, Flame Of The West evolved and after a lot of soul searching, Clint, Carlo and myself wanted to go to America. Mitch, however, elected not to join us. So we sold all of our posessions and moved to the US. We were a three piece. After rehearsing for a couple of months and with the help of Tim Polecat's first wife, we found ourselves in the head offices of Geffen Records, Manhattan, NY. Money changed hands for demos and 4 tracks were recorded. These are still in our posession. Gigs at the famous CBGB's on the Bowery and Yale University, then disaster. Carlo ruptured a disc in his back. In a nutshell, he had to return to England for surgery. Clint and I went on to join him. We were in the US for I year.Back home we played a few gigs as Flame Of The West but alas the public wasn't ready for us so we stepped back into The Blue Cats mode and went on to record The Tunnel CD.I have loads of photos, demos, studio outtakes and unreleased tracks from our various periods. Also new material is in the pipeline, its Carlo and myself these days. The official Blue Cats website is still under construction. Please drop me a line anytime.Watch this space...
All the best
Stef
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