Forty years on, Greenmantle's new gig is a first album and hopes for fans old and new

Published on Sunday 27 March 2011 15:31

A BAND who counted Billy Connolly among their fans has reunited after 40 years to release their first album today.

Greenmantle first toured Scotland in the early 1970s before going their separate ways in 1976, with Jack Law going on to become chief executive of Alcohol Focus Scotland and Billy Campbell working as a Clydebank hairdresser.

Now, decades on from touring every night and both in their 60s, the pair have recorded their first album, mastered at Abbey Road studios, and hope to find a new generation of fans.

Mr Law, 62, said: "It's very exciting. To me, at this stage in my life and to have loved music for so long, to be able to say: 'Look, this is what we did' is great.

"It brings you a new lease on life. Even if this is our only album - and I don't think it will be - there's a lot of venues around Scotland that are really nice and we would like to reconnect to the people who listened to us 40 years ago.

"It would be good for these songs to resonate with people again."

The pair grew up on the same street in Clydebank in the 1940s and 1950s, but only discovered each other as musicians in the late 1960s.

From there, Greenmantle toured every venue in Scotland, gigging almost every night and earning about 15 a week.

Encouragement to get back together came directly from Connolly and when Mr Law retired last year from Alcohol Focus Scotland the call back to music was too strong to resist. Mr Campbell, 64, said Connolly still remembered the band after 30 years during a chance meeting at Glasgow Airport in 2004.

He said: "I met Billy in the departure lounge, he had just returned from the Celtic European final in Seville, and was on his way to London to do a 'A Night with Billy Connolly' with an audience of his peers.

"He asked where we had got to for all these years, said he had missed us and that we shouldn't have stopped playing.

"He was reminiscing about the gigs we had done together, and the time we did a tour up north with him and he had his guitar and banjo stolen the night before.

"He used my guitar for that tour, and when we came home, he ordered the same one from the US, a Gibson Heritage.

"We hadn't seen each other for about 30 years, but it was good he still remembered. Maybe I'll send him an album for old times sake."

Greenmantle encountered Connolly at one of the most famed concerts in Glasgow heritage, the benefit gig for striking Upper Clyde Shipbuilders at Greens Playhouse, later the Glasgow Apollo, on 30 April 1972.

The band opened the show that was headlined by Donovan and supported by The JSD Band, Darryl Adams and Gallagher & Lyle, and compered by Connolly.

The band's first album, Two Hats, is produced by Hub Records.Mr Law said: "We are very proud of the album. It sounds retro but with a modern feel to it. It's indie rock rooted in blues, country and melodic melody. The songs come from yourself - they come from Glasgow."