Shack, simply the best Liverpool band!

Before founding Shack, Michael and John Head were in the cult 1980s band The Pale Fountains, and released two albums, Pacific Street in March 1984 and ...From Across The Kitchen Table in March 1985. However, though critically acclaimed, the albums only reached Numbers 85 and 94 in the UK Albums Chart. That band folded in 1986 when bassist Chris "Biffa" McCaffrey died of a brain tumour.

The Head brothers soon re-emerged as Shack, signing to the Ghetto Recording Company, home of record producer Ian Broudie's solo project, The Lightning Seeds and British soul band Distant Cousins. Shack's first album Zilch was released in 1988, but was neither critically nor commercially successful. The follow-up, Waterpistol, was recorded in 1991 at London's Star Street Studio. Shortly after the recording of Waterpistol was complete, the studio burnt down and most of the tapes were destroyed. The only remaining DAT of the album was in the possession of producer Chris Allison. At the time, Allison was in Los Angeles, California and when he returned, it transpired that he had left the copy in his hire car. It was only found weeks later after a frenzied search. However, by this point, Ghetto had folded so the record was without a distributor. Shack split, with Wilkinson joining fellow Liverpudlian John Power (formerly of The La's) to form the successful Britpop band Cast. The Head brothers accompanied Love for a few touring dates. They then went on to form The Strands, which found them further critical acclaim.

Waterpistol was finally released in 1995 on the German independent record label, Marina (NME described Mick Head as "a lost genius and among the most gifted British songwriters of his generation"), but had negligible sales. Mick Head went on to suffer problems with heroin addiction.

The Head brothers, along with Iain Templeton (who drummed on The Magical World of the Strands) and bassist Ren Parry reformed Shack in 1998, releasing HMS Fable (1999). Perry was replaced by Guy Rigby on bass for ... Here's Tom With the Weather (2003). Wilkinson rejoined in 2005, replacing the departed Rigby.

The band are currently signed to Noel Gallagher's 'Sour Mash' record label. May 2006 saw the release of the album ...The Corner of Miles and Gil named after two of the Head brothers' heroes, Miles Davis and Gil Evans.

In October 2007 the band released their greatest hits compilation album, Time Machine, including two new tracks. They toured briefly in England in October and November with Martyn Campbell on bass, including a set at the Liverpool Academy on 26 October 2007, which was filmed and recorded for a possible live album and/or DVD.

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The Desert Wolves: What happened next...

It is said that hindsight is a great thing, I venture that may not to be true. That said I guess looking back the Desert Wolves would have been a lot more successful if they had slogged there way around the country building a legion of fans to go out and buy lots of records. They didn't, but that isn't to say they were not successful.

To the contrary, with the first single released, they were cutting quite a dash and garnering a great deal of support and adoration in the printed media. Locally the Manchester Evening local music writer Mick Middles was fulsome in his praise of the band

"It becomes obvious that The Desert Wolves are poised to become another important outpost in Manchester's flourishing left field pop scene"

and nationally Record Mirror gave "Love Scattered Lives" the honour of record of the week. No mean feat when you consider that also reviewed that week, and considered secondary, Aztec Camera and REM (yeah that REM)

Such things build careers and the important action now was for us to get another single out and into the shops. Here was band with songs and a repertoire and great personal charm to share with the record buying public.


"Speak to me Rochelle" was another deliciously light pop moment crafted by Marin King and his Platten brothers song writing partners. Again the highly stylised 60's pop tune was supplemented by a lavish full color sleeve art directed and design by one of Martin's friends. It was quite a production and the press continued to build

"Another Record of the Week in the Record Mirror. Wow!!!!
"The groove of Summer days - sounds so great you just have to chew it"

proclaimed Johnny Dee the famed music writer in his review of the week's releases, which must have deeply hurt those who weren't record of the week. I'm guessing Pet Shop Boys, Aha, Nina Simone, Everything but the Girl and ...... The Beatles could console themselves with extensive amounts of radio airplay to help get their records out and into the public consciousness and ultimately into the charts the following week.

And that sadly was it, in terms of The Desert Wolves and Ugly Man records. In an ideal world a third should have been released and then an LP. "Passion in the Afternoon" would have been that 3rd slice of the perfect pop cake, had my personal resources not started to evaporate. It was the best thing they ever did and stands the test of time listening to it today.

Post Ugly Man The Wolves shed bassist Richard Jones, who had always appeared on the periphery of the group and it's essential core. He had become increasing interested in developing a career as a working musician and initially worked as a session trumpeter with Black, and The Pasedenas, appearing on Pebble Mill at One, at one point. He had always shown an interest in the business side of things and how the whole process worked. More of Richard later.

Having seconded a friend Stuart Bowman, in on Bass the group became more tight knit but sadly nobody showed interest in continuing their recording career. As with most student bands the end of studies heralded the end of the band. A legend died but a legacy lingered.


As the internet was born, so was the ability for people who live all over the world to share common passions for obscure musical forms. The call them "communities" in the world of commerce and just such a community existed and was called Tweenet. Driven by Peter Hahndorf a guy from Hamburg who was building the internet, it became the central point for a world of people consumed by the guitar scene of the late 80's and all that it inspired.

In the late 90's Peter was based and working in London and I met up with him. As a result he introduced me to some of his fellow Desert Wolves fans, who ran a wonderful record label and were based in Berlin - Firestation Tower records. A plot was hatched there and then to release an LP of all the available tracks that the Desert Wolves had ever recorded. The band were delighted to be able to chronicle the past and Pontification was born and released in 2000. The CD is now every bit a valued and sought after as the vinyl that spawned it, as people snapped up the limited edition release.

The joy now is that people from all over the world - east and west of Stretford - listen to those songs each day and get the same joy they engendered in 1987 and 1988 and inspire another generation of songwriters.

http://uglymanlittlebird.blogspot.com/2008/02/desert-wolves-what-happened-next.html

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Yeah Jazz, Six Lane Ends Here...

From the band's myspace page:

Before they phased out, two musical albums were published. The first album was named "Six Lane Ends" published only in LP and tape forms (There was a CD released in Japan only - see Pictures for details), the second album was called "Short Stories" initially on cassette only later rereleased under the new band name of "Big Red Kite". A single (EP) was lifted from the album entitled "April" in CD format containing 5 tracks including "Distant Trains". The "April" EP came out on Tubecroft Records in 1992 and also included "Rainbows" and live favourite "Lorraine & Duane".

The line up of the band at this point was Kev Hand (Gtr/Vocals), Chats (Gtr), Stu (Bass), Dave Blant (Accordion / keyboards) and Fred Hopwood (Drums). The song titles of "Six Lane Ends" are: .. Sharon .. Stones .. Lee Marvin .. All of My Days .. Freeland .. Step into the Light .. Heaven .. The Girl the Years Were Kind to .. Dirty Windows .. Make a Fist .. Stranger Than Fiction .. All the Stars .. This is Not Love (bonus track in some editions) Of these, "Sharon" was released as a single. Also on Cherry Red came "Morning O'Grady", "She Said" and "This Is Not Love". The "She said" single managed an impressive No34 in the independent charts and remained active within it for 4 weeks. Cherry Red provides on-line download services for "Six Lane Ends" in MP3 format. Customers can download single by single or the whole album at different prices.


Based around the affecting songwriting of Kevin Hand, Uttoxeter's best ever pop group released a single - Julie and the Sea Lions - on their own label, then recorded for Upright and Cherry Red. Peel and Long favourites for a while, especially with the classic This Is Not Love, it never translated to commercial success. The band returned to live action and recording in the early 1990s, releasing a 5 track CD EP on the Tubecroft label.

The band then changed their name in 1996 to 'big red kite' and released an album called "Short Stories" on the German record label Scout. The band played at the 1994 Heineken Music Festival. The band split up in 1999 although singer Kevin Hand still writes. Releases: Julie and the Sealions (7") 1984 on Distinctive records - Julie and the Sealions - American Planes She said (12") 1986 on Upright records This Is Not Love (12") 1986 on Upright Records Sharon (7"+12") 1987 on Cherry Red Records - CHERRY 100 - Sharon - The Girl The Years Were Kind To Six Lane Ends (LP) 23.May 1988 on Cherry Red Records - BRED 82 - Sharon - Stones - Lee Marvin - All My Days - Freeland - Step Into The Light - Heaven - The Girl The Years Were Kind Too - Dirty Windows - Make A Fist - Stranger Than Fiction - All The Stars Morning O'Grady (12") 1988 on Cherry Red Records - CHERRY 101 On compilations: Imminent 5 (LP) 1987 on Food Ltd - Bite 5 - Probably This Winter

http://www.myspace.com/yeahjazz

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