Fact #42129

HOW THIN LIZZY'S 1976 TOUR OF THE USA GOT CANCELLED

by Johnny Black

Tuesday, November 23, 1976, was the night before Thin Lizzy were due to fly to America to begin the tour that could transform them from homeland heroes into global megastars. The bags were packed, the plane tickets were booked, the road crew was already in New York City preparing for their arrival.

Unfortunately, it was also the night that their hard-drinking axemeister Brian 'Robbo' Robertson decided to nip down to London's most notorious rockstar watering hole, The Speakeasy, where hot r'n'b/funk combo Gonzalez were laying down hot'n'sweaty grooves for the rock elite. What happened next involved champagne, whiskey, onstage lacerations, buckets of blood and the last-minute cancellation of the entire tour.
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Chris O'Donnell (co-manager, Thin Lizzy) : If you look back on it, what was wearing out Philip and the band was that Brian was desperate to be accepted by his peers. That meant he had to emulate everything Phil did. He had to have the same rock'n'roll swagger, had to drink as much, smoke as much and fight as much as Phil. The odd thing was that Phil wasn't really like that.

Frank Murray (tour manager, Thin Lizzy) : That tour was really important to the band. We were trying to capitalise on the success of Jailbreak, and The Boys Are Back In Town, which had done well, so the idea had been to go to America and follow up on that.

Brian Robertson : I shouldn't have been in The Speakeasy in the first place. It was the night before I was supposed to fly to America, I had already packed my suitcase, but I was sitting in my flat, there was nothing to eat, so I went out to The Speakeasy to have a meal.

Ray Minhinnett (guitarist, Frankie Miller's Full House) : Robbo was always in The Speak, every night, with his stuffed dog under his arm. It was like a little beagle that he used to carry everywhere. Frankie and I both remember him being very out of it. I know he says he wasn't.

Frank and I had been doing a radio show that evening, somewhere, down at the Paris Theatre or one those places. We'd gone out to eat, then we'd gone down to The Speak.

Brian Robertson : I went down, I didn't know Frank (Frankie Miller) was going to be there, I didn't even know what band was playing. I just went down there to have a nice pepper steak and some champagne and that was it but, as things turned out, well, down there in those days you would always get up and jam. I was called up to jam with Gonzalez.

Brian Robertson : Contrary to the stories that have been put out about that evening, for once, I was not drunk. Frank was the one that was leggo. After my meal, Gonzalez asked me up to play, so I did … I think I probably had about two whiskies that night. I was stone cold sober, as opposed to young Frank who was seven sheets to the wind.

I was invited to get up first but Frank was in one of his moods, and when Frankie wants to do something, he does it. So he kinda like barrelled onto the stage after me. He wasn't invited.

I was just taking my guitar off, getting ready to into the dressing room at the back of the stage.

Ray Minhinnett : The dressing room was at the left hand side of the back of the stage and it had a curtain instead of a door.

I was standing behind Frankie and Robbo. Brian was more into the dressing room than Frankie was. I was kind of between them and behind them, on the stage.

It just blew up out of nowhere. They (Gonzalez) didn't want Frankie and Brian and I getting up to play. It was as simple as that. That's what it was about.

It started because they (Gonzalez) said, "No, you're not getting up." Frankie retorted, Brian retorted, I didn't say a fuckin' word, I was standing behind them.

Brian Robertson : I think Frank probably cheesed somebody off. To be honest, I don't remember what triggered the whole damn thing. It was the end of the set, I was basically taking my guitar off, when I turned round and saw this guy go for Frank with the bottle and I just thought, 'No, no, that's not right.'

To be honest, nobody is going to just stand there and watch their friend get bottled. Frankie was, well, legless is not the word really, he was actually on all fours crawling around the stage…

Ray Minhinnett : Was he fuck! That's rubbish. Frankie was leaning round, holding the wall on the right of the curtain, leaning into the dressing room. Brian was standing beside him. I have a clear memory of this and so has Frankie because he wasn't that out of it. We'd been working.

Brian Robertson : … when the guitar player, that twat Gordon, (Gordon Hunte, Gonzalez) smashed the bottle and went straight for Frank's face.

Ray Minhinnett : I remember it as a broken pint glass.

Frankie Miller : He'd broken it and was about to screw it in ma face – and Brian put up his arm and got it instead of me. I was legless, couldn't even see.

Ray Minhinnett : This guy just lunged and Brian stuck his hand up. I couldn't believe he did it. I saw what happened and the blood just fountained out of Brian's finger.

Brian Robertson : I just put my hand out thinking, 'Oh, he's a fellow guitar player, he's gonna back off'. But he didn't.

The glass went straight through my fingers then sliced down and cut the tendons and nerves. It cut an artery as well, so there was blood spouting all over the stage.

Frankie Miller : After Brian got cut I just remember hitting three people – one with ma head, one with ma boot, one with ma fist.

Ray Minhinnett : The way I remember it, there was no fight as such. All this crap that appeared about Brian taking three people down and breaking somebody's collar bone, I've never heard such a load of rubbish in my life.

There was a bottle bank by the door of the restaurant in The Speak, just a couple of yards away across the dance floor. They used to put people's bottles with their name on them if they hadn't finished. I ran over there and grabbed a couple of tea towels, ran back, wrapped his hand up with his finger, which was hanging on a thread, in there. I've never seen so much blood!

Brian Robertson : They sent for an ambulance. Nobody would have let me in their car because there was way too much blood.

Ray Minhinnett : There was no ambulance. Norman Watt-Roy and I got him by the elbows, his feet were virtually off the floor, and we ran him through The Speak, up the stairs, and luckily there was a minicab outside and we got him into the cab and down to St. Mary's Hospital. I tell you, the back of that cab was about a quarter of an inch deep in blood. We were sitting in Robbo's blood.

Brian Robertson : I had to have a blood transfusion and I was in surgery for quite a while. They put a cast on it and basically told me I would never play guitar again. They were entirely wrong about that.

There wasn't any pain until after I'd been to the hospital. I was going, 'Come on, stop fuckin' about, just put a plaster on it. I've got a tour starting tomorrow.' And they're going, 'Oh, no, no, no, no.'

I left after they stitched me up. I met Frankie in the lobby of the hospital. He'd been brought in at the same time as me. He was being shown out, staggering out, by a couple of nurses. He was going, 'Take me back in. X-Ray ma heid'. He thought he'd been battered. At that point I was in the lobby on the payphone to my manager [Chris O'Donnell] saying, 'Listen, I don't think I'm gonna make the tour…'

Chris O'Donnell, manager, Thin Lizzy : I got a phone call from Brian in St. Mary's Hospital in Paddington, at two o'clock in the morning. I was asleep at home in West London.

He told me this fracas had happened at The Speakeasy, so I got in my car and drove over to St Mary's.

Ray Minhinnett : So we were at the hospital and Chris O'Donnell arrived, and he started wading into us. I said, "Woah, woah, woah, woah, it wasn't our fault. Nothing to do with us. We just brought him here.'

Chris O'Donnell : I will never forget going into A+E and seeing Brian with his hand completely wrecked and Frankie Miller, having passed out, lying on a trolley in the corridor. He was all dressed in black, hands folded on his chest and his hat on top of his hands. Completely comatose. I thought he was dead.

Ray Minhinnett : Frankie didn't come to the hospital with us. It was just Norman Watt-Roy and I. We left when Chris O'Donnell arrived and Frankie wasn't there then.

Chris O'Donnell : I took Brian out of the hospital across to the road to the only all-night Wimpy in London. We had black coffee and then I put him in a cab and sent him home.

The road crew by now were already in America preparing for the tour, and the band was due to fly out that next morning. So the first thing I had to do was call them and tell them it was off, because there was no way we could have done that tour as planned.

Frank Murray (Tour Manager, Thin Lizzy) : I'd already been in New York with Big Charlie for a few days doing front work for the tour, dealing with the record company, doing press arrangements, and checking out gigs with the agency.

Everybody was jazzed up for the tour, when I got a phone call at my hotel, very early in the morning because of the time difference, and Chris O'Donnell from the management office was anxious to let me know as soon as possible.

I was told that we had to cancel the tour and would I go and talk to the agents and the record company?

All I was told at that point was that Brian and Frankie Miller had been in a fight at The Speakeasy and his hand had been slashed. We were two days away from our first gig so there was no disputing that the tour had to be cancelled.

Brian Robertson : The pain kicked in a couple of hours after I left the hospital. I've never experienced anything like it. I was climbing the walls. They'd given me all these pain killers, heroin-based things, DF118 [Dihydrocodeine], and I was droppin' them and droppin' them but the pain would not go away.

It didn't go until about two days later when Frankie and Ray Minhinnett came round to my flat with two bottles of scotch, and that on top of the pain killers stopped the pain.

Frankie Miller : Later, I was on the phone to get some people down from Glasgow, but I knew that if I did that it would turn into a war, and people get killed in wars.

Brian Robertson : When Frank came to my flat he was saying, 'I'm gonna get Jimmy Boyle and the boys down and sort this shite out.' I think he felt guilty about what had happened. And I'm goin', 'Frank, no, really, this is not a good idea.' He was serious about getting the boys down from Glasgow.

I started ripping the bandages off before they even took the stitches out and I tried to play scales and stuff, but the wound burst open again and I had to go back to hospital twice or three times to get it re-stitched. They thought I was mad but all I could say to them was, 'Right, you're a doctor but this is my life. I don't care what you say, I'm gonna play the guitar again.'

The whole thing was, you know, obviously I couldn't do the tour.

Frank Murray : At the time everybody was angry. There wasn't a lot of sympathy in the camp for Brian.

Scott Gorham (guitarist, Thin Lizzy) : Phil (Lynott) was beyond livid, man. He was enraged that Brian could put the band in jeopardy like that. Everybody in the band knew how important this tour was for us. Phil was beyond being able to speak, even. So Brian was out of the band right at that moment. Bang, you’re outta here!

Frank Murray : I think, in his own head, Brian was only ever a part-time member of Thin Lizzy. I mean, him and Philip would be at loggerheads with each other. I mean, you either went along with what's happening in the band or you didn't, and Brian didn't have a leg to stand on after his previous behaviour. Brian had chalked up a few bad marks for himself.

Well, everybody was psyched up and ready to go. It was a shock. The band were still in London but we had to cancel everything and then get home on the next available plane from New York.

Chris O'Donnell : About a week later, myself and Chris Morrison, the co-manager, flew to New York to meet with the record company to decide what we should do. Postpone the tour? Wait til Brian was ready? It was hard to know what the outcome would be.

While I was in New York, though, Queen's agent was in Los Angeles trying to track me down because Queen were trying to recreate the atmosphere they'd had when they toured America as support to Mott The Hoople. Thin Lizzy was their favourite band so they wanted Thin Lizzy to support them on their next tour, their biggest arena tour to that point, and they needed a 5,000 seat support act. So we accepted that offer with alacrity, which meant drafting Gary Moore back in for his third stint with Thin Lizzy. He'd been in Thin Lizzy briefly when Eric Bell left, and he came in to cover some dates

So, anyway, Gary wasn't busy when Robbo injured his hand so we drafted him in to do the Queen tour.

Scott Gorham : We grabbed Gary Moore. Not only was Gary a great guitar player, but he already knew a good portion of the material. And the stuff that he didn’t know, we just kinda threw at him over the next two or three days. When we got to America we got to a rehearsal room and pounded it out, and the next day we were up and running.

Frank Murray : We started rehearsals with Gary Moore just after Christmas. Ideally, we would have done the pre-Christmas tour as headliners then come back and do the Queen tour, so you can see we lost a bit of ground there.

Scott Gorham (guitarist, Thin Lizzy) : It took Brian and me two years to get to where we were as dual lead guitarists, and when we decided that Brian was out, I was a little bit more freaked than anybody else. But, after just eleven days rehearsal with Gary, it clicked.
Source : Harry Doherty, Melody Maker, 1977



Brian Robertson : I wasn't, at that point, told I was out of the band but I kinda figured, you know, 'That's that'. I had no expectations of staying with Thin Lizzy after that. I perfectly understood that they had to get on with their career.

It was my fault for being in The Speakeasy, but that's all I'll hold my hands up for.

You know, Gary was a bit of a loose cannon himself. He did the tour to help the boys out, but I don't think he was particularly into being part of Thin Lizzy. Gary always had a lot of stuff going on. He was working with Colosseum 2, I don't it was ever that he would be in the band permanently.

But I just figured I was out, so I'd have to figure something else out.

The press have always said me and Gary were at loggerheads, but nothing could be further from the truth. Me and Gary were good friends. I totally respected him and everything he ever did. I was happy it was him that stepped in, because on a couple of other occasions they picked a couple of guitarists who were just not up to scratch.

It was a bad wound, so it was a long time getting back. To this day I still have no feeling in one of my fingers. I had to learn how to play the guitar again.

Obviously, I kept in touch with the lads, we went out together quite a lot. Just a couple of days after I'd finally got the stitches out, I went to see them play on the closing night of The Hope And Anchor in Islington, Rat Scabies was on drums and Gary was playing guitar.

So Phil asked me to get up and I did. I played a little bit, very badly, because my hand was still not right. Played a couple of blues songs. You can always get away with the blues. It was nice that Phil invited me up but to be honest, I didn't want to get up because it was still hurting me a lot. I was still on a load of pain killers, and my hand was very swollen. But you know what Phil's like, and Gary was the same, 'Come on, Robbo, get up.' So I wasn't going to back down but it was probably the most painful gig I've ever played.

Chris O'Donnell : We kind of stopped working with him. We gave him an ultimatum because there was an ongoing drink problem, then the injury, there was a multitude of sins that had gone before.

Brian Robertson : I think I'm playing better now than I ever did. I much prefer the way I play now. Once it had healed up and I started to work hard on re-learning how to play, I had to play in a different style, and it took me back to the blues.

I met Gordon Hunte from Gonzalez years later in the studio one night, you know. I was with my ex-wife Dee Harrington. I was producing one of her acts and Gordon walked into the control room and he went, 'Hey, Robbo, sorry about that.' I stood up and, of course, Dee knew who he was and she shuffled him out of the control room because I was just about ready to kill the fucker.
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WHAT HAPPENED NEXT?

Brian Robertson overcame his injuries enough to join Motorhead in 1982, and has also re-united occasionally with Thin Lizzy. In 2011, he released his first solo album, Diamonds and Dirt.

Frankie Miller found his greatest acclaim as a songwriter whose compositions were covered by Ray Charles, Rod Stewart, Johnny Cash and others. A brain haemorrhage in New York on 25 August 1994 put him into a coma for five months, despite which he has since returned to songwriting.

Gonzalez achieved some success in the disco era but disbanded in 1986 to pursue individual projects. Guitarist Gordon Hunte now works with his new band, Mid Nyt Sun in Australia.
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A shorter version of this feature by Johnny Back first appeared in Classic Rock magazine.