Eric Bell

The Eric Bell Band - Thin Lizzy Blues - 2007 - Music Avenue

Thin Lizzy's forgotten guitar hero returns in a bare-bones blues trio format, taped before an appreciative crowd. Curiously, the venue isn't listed, although the album's Swedish-only release in 1996 most likely points there. Angel Air's reissue sweetens the pot with three tracks not on the original release. Straight-ahead blues is the game here. The gig opens with a rampage through "The Stumble," whose 1966 recording featured Eric Clapton on guitar. Bell's style is scrappier, but no less spirited, as he demonstrates on brisk strides through standards like "Baby Please Don't Go," "Oh Pretty Woman," and "Things I Used to Do." Being an Irishman also enables Bell to explore his own roots, as evidenced by a show-stopping slow burn through Van Morrison's epic ballad, "Madame George." Naturally, Bell revisits his Thin Lizzy days with a fiery demolition of the late Phil Lynott's swaggering macho anthem "The Rocker." Bell makes room for Lizzy's rearrangement of the traditional "Whiskey in the Jar" — a song so radical it didn't include a bass part, yet still graced the U.K. Top Ten in 1973, and soars just as highly here. The real surprise is why Bell includes just three originals, including the lovelorn lament of "Two Ships" and "Just to Get By," a world-weary tally of life's ups and downs. That neither track made the original cut is amazing. But that's a minor point, especially since the music here is so crisp. Bell's guitar is succinct and to the point, while bassist Tony Wooton and drummer Romek Parol lend appropriately unobtrusive support. (The Bell-written anecdotes, "Just a Belfast Boy," are also delightful.) Pure blues fans and Lizzy devotees should find plenty to satisfy them here. © Ralph Heibutzki © 2010 Rovi Corporation. All Rights Reserved http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:fpfwxq80ldte

Eric Bell was a founder member of Thin Lizzy, one of the world's greatest rock bands. In 1969 he met Phil Lynott and drummer Brian Downey in Dublin, Ireland and they formed Thin Lizzy, one of the first Irish bands to be a huge success worldwide. Eric stayed with Thin Lizzy until 1973 and was part of the band's first three albums: "Thin Lizzy", "Shades of a Blue Orphanage", and "Vagabonds of the Western World". Some of Thin Lizzy's great songs were composed by Eric and Phil Lynott. The band’s first massive hit was "Whiskey in the Jar" which demonstrates Eric Bell's very distinctive guitar style. Before Thin Lizzy, Eric played in an Irish band called The Dreams. He also had his own band: Shades of Blue. Eric has worked with the best, including Van Morrison and Them, Noel Redding, Rory Gallagher, Bo Diddley, Henry McCullough, Dick Heckstall-Smith, Keith Tilman and Keef Hartley. Eric, Thin Lizzy's sometime's forgotten Irish guitar hero does what he does best on this great album, and plays the blues! For far too long he has been overshadowed by the big names around him. On this album he displays his great talent. Eric, like many bluesmen was never a great vocalist, but he more than compensates for this on the album with some terrific guitar work. It's always a pleasure to hear anything from Eric Bell, who plays the blues with a real understated Celtic touch. His small back up band also do a tremendous job on this recording which is HR by A.O.O.F.C. Eric Bell Band's "Irish Boy" album is located @ ERICBELL/IRBOY and Eric Bell Band's "A Blues Night In Dublin" can be found @ ERICBELL/ABNID Check out Thin Lizzy's "Vagabonds Of The Western World" album, on which Eric played an important part. It is also worth hearing Bo Diddley's "Bo's The Man" album on which Eric Bell plays some fine guitar

TRACKS / COMPOSERS

1 The Stumble [Live] - Freddie King/Sonny Thompson
2 Oh Pretty Woman [Live] - Bill Dees/Roy Orbison
3 Things I Used to Do [Live] - Guitar Slim
4 Baby Please Don't Go [Live] - McKinley Morganfield
5 Madame George [Live] - Van Morrison
6 Walk on Water [Live] - Andy Bell
7 Three O'Clock Blues [Live] - B.B. King/Jules Taub
8 Hold That Plane [Live] - Buddy Guy
9 Whiskey in the Jar [Live] - Trad.
10 The Rocker [Live] - Eric Bell/Brian Downey/Phil Lynott
11 Just to Get By [*] - Andy Bell
12 Two Ships [*] - Andy Bell
13 Gloria [*] - Van Morrison

N.B: Tracks 1-5 recorded at Ghothenburg, Sweden. Tracks 6-10 recorded at Helsingborg, Sweden. Tracks 1-10 originally released as "Live Tonite" in 1996 on BMA Records (Sweden). Album reissued as "Live Tonite...Plus!" in 2001 on Angel Air Records, and in 2007 as "Thin Lizzy Blues" on Music Avenue Records with the extra tracks, "Just to Get By", "Two Ships", and "Gloria"

BAND

Eric Bell - Lead Guitar, Lead & Backing Vocals
Tony Williams - Bass, Lead & Backing Vocals
Tony Woolton - Bass
Andy Golden, Romek Parol - Drums

BIO

Eric Bell may not have been present for Thin Lizzy's best known and most successful era (the mid to late '70s), but he was there for the group's formation, as a founding member. Born on September 3, 1947 in Belfast, Ireland, Bell played guitar throughout the '60s for several local bands (including Them, and John Farrell & the Dreams), but paid the bills by working as a 'street gas lamp lighter,' and in both pickle and shirt factories. One night in 1969, Bell caught a gig by another local Irish outfit, Orphanage, which featured bassist/singer Phil Lynott and drummer Brian Downey. Soonafter, Bell relocated to Dublin, where he joined up with the others to form Thin Lizzy. Bell's bluesy, Hendrix-esque leads were perfect for the hard rock direction that both Lynott and Downey sought for their new outfit, which led to a recording contract with the Deram label. Three albums followed in as many years - 1971's self-titled debut, 1972's Shades of a Blue Orphanage, and 1973's Vagabonds of the Western World - the latter of which contained a pair of early Lizzy classics, "Whiskey in the Jar" and "The Rocker." Bell, Lynott, and Downey also issued an additional recording in 1973 under the alias of Funky Junction, the self-explanatory A Tribute to Deep Purple. But Bell became unhappy with Lizzy's current, more streamlined musical direction (he longed for the early days of free-form jamming). After single-handedly sabotaging an important hometown Dublin gig with unpredictable and drunken behavior, the guitarist was sacked. The fast paced life of being in a rock band had paid its toll on Bell, who had to take a break from being in a band for several years. But a few years later (by which time Lizzy had become a worldwide hit with a pair of replacement guitarists, Brian Robertson and Scott Gorham), Bell was ready to play music again. When ex-Jimi Hendrix Experience bassist Noel Redding launched a solo career during the middle of the decade, Bell signed on as the project's guitarist, playing on such releases as 1975's Clonakilty Cowboys and 1976's Blowin', before moving on. For the remainder of the '70s, Bell appeared on such obscure releases as a self-titled release by Brush Shiels and a Phil Lynott-produced single for Ron McQuinn. With his differences between his former Lizzy bandmates long settled, Bell reunited with Lynott and Downey for a one-off 'flexi-single' for a Euro magazine, "Song for Jimi," and even joined Lizzy on stage for a night during the group's final tour in 1983 (documented on double disc set, Life). The early '80s also saw Bell attempt to launch his own group, the Eric Bell Band. But aside from a four-track EP in 1981, the group failed to get off the ground. Bell then joined up with blues-rockers Mainsqueeze (playing on their 1983 release, International Blues Rock Revue), who also briefly backed Bo Diddley during a European tour in 1984, and appeared on the subsequent live Diddley recording, Hey..Bo Diddley In Concert (aka Bo Diddley/Screamin' Jay Hawkins). Bell began performing again under the name of the Eric Bell Band during the late '90s, issuing such recordings as Irish Boy and Live Tonite...Plus! (a previously unreleased album Bell recorded with Noel Redding 20 years earlier, The Missing Album, was also issued around this time, as well). © Greg Prato, All Music Guide © 2010 Answers Corporation http://www.answers.com/topic/eric-bell

BIO (Wikipedia)

Eric Bell (born Eric Robin Bell, 3 September 1947, Belfast, Northern Ireland is a rock musician and guitarist. He was the lead guitarist for Thin Lizzy, and played on the band's first three albums Thin Lizzy, Shades of a Blue Orphanage and Vagabonds of the Western World. Although Thin Lizzy were gaining in popularity, the pressures of recording, touring and the excesses of the rock-star lifestyle, began to take its toll. He left the band after a New Year's Eve concert in 1973, after throwing his guitar into the air in the middle of the concert, pushing the amplifiers into the audience and storming off, as he said on the Gary Moore and Friends DVD interviews. There was a brief reunion for Thin Lizzy's 1983 tour, but for the most part, Bell concentrated on a solo career with his group, the Eric Bell Band. He has subsequently worked extensively with ex-Jimi Hendrix sideman, Noel Redding and toured with Bo Diddley.