Rest in Peace Brian
5 October 1945 - 9 February 1997
Sweet Memories
Brian Connolly - the face and hair that a generation craved - and that went for the blokes and the chicks! The hours I must have spent on stuff from boots to try and get my hair like Brian's.... I could probably afford a wig by now. No matter how much lightener I put on it, it just wouldn't go blonde, and I was too chicken to get out the peroxide. In the end I stuck on some Raven Black and went in the opposite direction and tried for the Mick "look". It wasn't bad really, but I missed a bit at the back and had a brown streak - but it didn't matter. The strange thing was that my hair was naturally like Steve Priests at the time, but I suppose that was far too obvious a look to go for.Anyway - Brian is no longer with us and I'm just glad that I was able to see him a few times before he left us. In the reception of the Albany Hotel in Brum he signed the regulation autograph, and at the Hammersmith Odeon he performed to camera flashes and punters alike with me in row 1 (I'd started in row 2, but as soon as the guys came onstage it was everyfan for him/herself!). At the Night Out he was vocally Sweet, but missing the lads, and again in Brum the BC crew were more than a match for Mud. Les Gray didn't know what was going on. The fans weren't anti-Mud, but they wanted SWEET....They wanted SWEET. And then a few weeks before his death in Colchester I saw him with Jean in the Albert before the gig down the road. He wasn't well, but an hour later he was giving it his all. It's difficult for anyone who wasn't sixteen when the Sixteens came out to realise the profound effect the Sweet had on us, and Brian was, and always will be (sorry Mal) the Sweet.
Brian 1976