He was born in Glasgow in 1945 to a teenage waitress Francis Connolly (Father unknown) and was fostered by Jim and Helen McManus and grew up known as Brian Francis McManus. One popular story is that he was step brother to the late star of Taggert fame Mark McManus. Actually this is inaccurate he was actually a step cousin as Jim was Marks fatehers brother (hope that makes sense).Anyway when he started to perform around the local Pub scene he reverted to his mothers name Connolly. In 1965 he joined a group called "Wainwrights People" whose drummer was Mick Tucker, Connolly actually replaced Ian Gillan who later became well known for his roles with Deep Purple & Black Sabbath.
In 1968 Connolly & Tucker (who was a brilliant Drummer) formed a group called "The Sweetshop" later to be shortened to "The Sweet". Sadly neither Connolly or Tucker are with us today so is a short video tribute to both :-
One or two mucisians were tried before The Sweet got their well known line up of Connolly, Tucker, Steve Priest & Andy Scott and success was found.
The group only had one Number one single the superb "Blockbuster" in 1973 but had a unbelievable five songs reach the number 2 spot. They had many other great hits in the glam glory years between 71 & 76.
The group had World wide success and had a string of chart its including many Number ones in many countries around the World including USA, Germany, Norway, Denmark, Australia, etc.
Ask most Glam fans what is the best Glam song of all time, I reckon the majority would go for the classic "Ballroom Blitz" it just doesn't get any better than this :-Back to Connolly he left The Sweet in 1979 to pursue a solo career but didn't have the same success, in 1981 he suffered multiple heart attacks which left suffering health wise.
Connolly eventually passed away in 1997 at the age of 51 due to liver failure, years of alcohol abuse in his earlier life had taken its revenge. He is survived by three Children, two daughters Nicole & Michelle plus a son Brian James.
Finally just got to play one more Sweet classic so here it is "Little Willy" :-
RIP Brian a true Glam King
6 comments:
They were very big here (as you mentioned) and a great band.Ballroom Blitz was huge, who can forget "All right fellas, lets gooooooo!!!
Well...I hang my head in shame as I've never heard (until now) of Brian Connelly. My apologies.
Great band The Sweet. I never knew that Brian Connelly was a Scot!
I don't know if its true, but there's an old story about how some of The Sweet started wearing so much make-up, apparently they were in the make-up room at 'Top of the Pops' (A BBC pop show for anyone who doesn't know)and Pans People (A very glamorous group of girl dancers) came in to do their make-up, and so the band could keep chatting them up, more and more make-up was applied! :)
Celtic,
Amazing group from a time when I think the musicians always looked happy.
Rach,
You don't have to apologise we were all brought up with different styles I'm sure you could lose me with facts about your favorites.
Airlie,
Pans People now you are talking, and I've heard that story.
They came to New Zealand years ago and the little town of New Plymouth where I lived Were lucky enough to have them play an outdoor concert.
Well The Sweet rocked the place, we had never seen anything like it.The crowd went wild, it was the best concert that I've been to and I've been to many since.
We went to an after party that was held for the band, suffice to say some of it is still a blank, and there were big hangovers the next day.
thanks for your blog, it's brought up some happy memories.
Cheers
I think underrated because of the glam stamp so good musicians and tight well in league with Deep purple
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