Big Tom McBride helped to change attitudes of many
Dear Sir,
I must, as always, be honest in my observations. If Big Tom or any of the plethora of Irish Country and Western Stars were playing in my back garden I would pull the curtains and turn the volume up to eleven on the TV. Noreen Ban and Gentle Mother and the like drive me to cigarettes. Declan, Nathan, Philomena Pluck and the Electric Shovels are not my cup of tea. My father’s idea of punishment was to make me listen to Jim Reeves, records, talk about cutting a stick to beat your own back, LPs my sisters and I would buy him as a Christmas present.
I liked my music loud, hard rock, a throbbing bass, wailing guitar and a drum smashing beat with a singer who could seduce a nun at a hundred yards.
Every generation rejects the music of the previous one. Later we learn to recognise the professionalism and quality of those we scorned and sneered. I can enjoy Joe Dolan but not Spit on me, Bobby Darin a yes, but a nay to Sinatra. Piaf, Holiday, Warwick and Joplin chanteuses of the first order. Give me the First ladies of American Country and a red hot needle in my ear for our Irish First Ladies.
Yet Big Tom and his fellow musicians in C&W bands helped created the Show-band scene which probably changed this country in ways which no Political Party or Government has or could. Back in the days dances were organised, for comely maidens, at crossroads by promoter Eamonn Dev. The Irish weather put paid to that and dances moved indoors to Parish Halls. Under the beady eye of the Parish Priest and the self appointed religious and moral police young people could dance to their hearts content.
The simple rule being that if you must dance dance an Irish dance. Immoral foreign dances such as the waltz were cleansed of any hint of naughtiness by becoming Old Time Waltzes danced to a good old fashioned Irish tune. Dancing close was a no no.
I remember as a teen in the 70s a local priest telling couples to leave space between them and and their dancing partner for the Holy Ghost. Why the Holy Ghost was at the dance and why he could not find his own partner I don’t know. We young lads wanted to get closer to the girls pointy bits which probably consisted of tissues and socks, hopefully clean.
In the late fifties and early sixties businessmen with an eye for a few bob saw the opportunity to get rich fast. Hay barn like buildings were built and dance floors installed and we had Ballrooms of Romance with exotic names Astoria, Fiesta, Dreamland, Emerald and Palais.
Dancers in Balbriggan would hire a minibus to Drogheda for the Abbey Ballroom, in Drogheda it was rehired to go to Skerries etc. Girls in those days were happy with a cross bar lift home.
Big Tom, Larry Cunningham and C&W bands would not have been as popular in sophisticated towns like Drogheda as the Royal, Miami and Capitol but in the Midlands, South and West they were big. Think Westlife, One Direction big. People working in Dublin from rural areas packed places like the National and Ierne Ballrooms during the week before catching ‘ The Lilac Bus’ home to dance the weekend away in their local hall. City met country and ideas changed as girls with Dublin fashions and attitudes influenced those who remained at home.
Snagging a chap with a bit of land became less important than an inside toilet and an electric cooker and TV set. Foreign dances such as jiving were initially frowned and sometimes banned in some areas but money at the box office was the guiding principle. Jiving and the hope of a quick peek of a stocking top was the most sex young men could hope for prior to marriage. Emigrants returning from England brought new ideas on social behaviour a more relaxed attitude to relationships and ‘Company Keeping.
Big Tom etc changed Ireland young people had jobs, money and mobility to get out from the watchful eye of their parents and the beady ever moral police and enjoy a new freedom denied to their parents who were reared on ‘ the clippings of tin’ While still conservative in their attitudes young people learned to express and accept new ideas. In their own way bands like Big Tom and the Mainliners were patriots who helped forge a new Ireland. The united people across the religious divide through their music.
You may sneer and I did, however age, usually, brings wisdom and at this remote I salute Big Tom McBride Social Revolutionary and builder of a modern Ireland. Gerry Floyd, Drogheda