Monsters of rock
Last updated 09:12, Saturday, 03 May 2008
Simon Hardy-Graham who has a television production company and now lives in London and Bruges played in the band, but he told me he’d never heard of anyone called Robbo (as Timeline mentioned). He was, however, able to supply us with plenty of information on the group’s history.
“The original band came from Kilmarnock” he said. “And came down to play at a holiday camp in Silloth.
“For some strange reason, they decided to stay in Carlisle and I joined them in 1976.
“We were the resident band at The Enterprise, in Stanwix, when Albert (Bert) Clayton Robinson was on drums. However when we went on the road the line-up was Alistair Burnett (drums), Jim Murray (guitar and vocals), who I think both still live in Carlisle, Colin Matheson who is a Professor of English at Edinburgh University and Ian Smith now living in Ireland.
“We played all over Scotland and the north of England and in 1978, after our last tour of Norway, Ian left and was replaced by Pete Bar (who now lives in Spain).
“In Carlisle we played at all Tom Foster’s clubs, The Twisted Wheel, The Pagoda, Flopps and The Triple C (I played in a backing band for Bo Didley in that club, with Brian Ward, and would love it if someone had any photos).
“Young farmers dances were all the rage every summer and we played in tents and aircraft hangers all over the county.
In 1980 we also went to play and live in Holland for about a year. We lived on a bus in a hotel car park!
“Nessie ended up as Pete Bar and myself playing as a duo for a while until we parted to concentrate on other aspects of our lives.”
