Mama's Boys History
Pictures 1980-1984
The beginning of the rock group Mama's Boys goes back to the times when the McManus brothers Pat, John & Tommy played and toured as a band together with their parents from their family home in Enniskillen, Country Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. The music was traditional Irish Folk and they were playing gigs and appearing on Irish TV shows from as young as 7 years old.
This all changed when the brothers were impressed and in awe of Phil Lynott and Thin Lizzy who was one of the first Irish bands to break outside Ireland. They put their fiddles, pipes and drums in the corner and became a rock band under the name of 'PULSE'. They were an immediate success in Ireland and recorded their first albums on local indie labels. Tony Prince, at that time a DJ at Radio Luxembourg, gave them the name 'MAMA'S BOYS', because of their youth and naivety (Tommy was only 13!). What started out as a joke stuck - and they continued using the name.
The International breakthrough soon followed and Mama's Boys fulfilled a first great ambition supporting on the THIN LIZZY FAREWELL TOUR. The three brothers went from strength to strength with tours of the USA, Canada, Japan and most of Europe with bands such as SCORPIONS, GARY MOORE, BON JOVI, FOREIGNER, RATT, TWISTED SISTER AND RUSH. They then signed a worldwide deal to the Jive Records label after a blistering appearance at the Reading Festival in the UK - and three albums were released.
But although things were going well, it was too good to be true. Tommy suffered a relapse to the leukemia he had miraculousy survived as a child. While Tommy was in hospital, Jive Records decided to "change the band as a marketing ploy" and for the first time brought in a session singer KEITH MURRELL who did TV jingles making the act a 4 piece. Although Tommy recovered completely, the band lost impetus and in 1988, even though the latest single went into the Billboard top 100, the band's contract with Jive Records was not renewed - and a new management came on board.
After a long gap, singer MIKE WILSON approached the brothers with his demos. He was working in an UK kitchen factory and longed to be in a band. Some enquiries for gigs in Austria and Switzerland has come in, so they played a few shows with the new frontman. A tour followed with dates in the UK, Switzerland, Austria, Spain and France. On this tour the album "Live Tonite" was cut with tracks recorded at various concerts on the tour. This self-financed and self-produced album was released throughout Europe and met with both acclaim and success.
1991 found Mama's Boys properly back on the road. They played more than 100 successful concerts in the UK and Europe. The management was out looking for a new record deal and approached several labels but could attract no serious interest. With the success of "Live Tonite" as an in-house production, to release a studio album on the same basis was a logical conclusion.
The
new studio album titled "Relativity" was released in 1992 in the
UK and Europe - again on their own label.
But again Tommy became ill as the band were on tour and all bookings were cancelled. The doctors felt that it would be sensible for Tommy to have a bone marrow transplant, while he was still young. When a match was found, the transplant went ahead. Sadly Tommy passed away aged 28 in London in November 1994.
This left Pat and John totally devastated and neither could ever see themseleves playing music ever again.
Pictures 1985-1988
Pictures 1991-1993