Bonus Video!

Since I posted a Rathkeltair video a couple of days ago I though you might be interested in what their lead singer Trevor Tanner looked like in his youth. This is the group The Bolshoi doing the song A Way.

This essay which I found on YouTube is the best short history of the group that I've found so I bring it to you here:

The Bolshoi formed in Leeds, England in 1983. Founding members Trevor Tanner (guitar/vocals) and Jan Kalicki (drums) soon recruited Nick Chown (bass) and by 1984 they found themselves opening for such acts as The Cult, Lords Of The New Church and Wall Of Voodoo. On the merits of these performances and the success of their first independently released single, "Sob Story", they were soon signed to I.R.S. Records.

Their debut IRS release was the EP Giants in early 1986, which included the song "Happy Boy". Critics responded positively to The Bolshoi, saying, "Strong on broody melodies, driven along by forceful rhythms and crashing splinters of trebly guitar, all showing enough fire and ambition to crash through the dark undergrowth of the post-punk jungle... admirable stuff." And, "The Bolshoi have vision and lyrical flair - a refreshing alternative to some of the rancid pap that currently clogs up the charts." That appeal they had with critics, unfortuantley did not translate to the music-buying public. Bands such as The Bolshoi that were trying to fill the gap between the fading "Punk/New Wave" culture and the rising "Grunge" movement were hard pressed to find an audience.

Later in 1986 the trio expanded into a quartet adding Paul Clark on keyboards and recording their first full-length LP, Friends. The lead tune, "A Way" became a critical success and even managed some chart action. The accompanying video was also put in heavy rotation on MTV's 120 Minutes. Trevor Tanner's mesmerising stage presence combined with his superior writing skills revealed a dark and pensive tone in his compositions, touching on subjects most would otherwise choose not to explore. They succeeded in doing this by mixing dark subjects with moderately amusing melodies, memorable choruses and a clearly danceable beat.Despite critical success in the music press, the MTV exposure and the minor success of "A Way" sales of the LP were lacklustre and IRS let The Bolshoi go. A year later they put out their final album (on RCA), Lindy's Party. Soon after the band split up. Trevor Tanner continues to have the occaisional independent project, but The Bolshoi are now part of post-punk music history, a bright spot in the otherwise vapid "Goth" movement of the late 1980s.

From FritzLang

The story behind the song is that the title is not away, as in "go away", but a way, as in "I've found a way". The way for the lovely young woman in the song is a marriage to a wealthy man rather than going her own way in the world, sinking or swimming on her own merits.

I first became interested in The Bolshoi back in the mid 1980's when a woman I knew was always playing their tapes* at the pub where we both worked.

*Tapes, or cassette tapes were a recording media used before the CD in which the music was reduced to an analog, that means non-digital, signal and recorded on a long narrow magnetic ribbon. The ribbon was wound around a spool and enclosed in a plastic box called a "cassette".

PS - Does anyone else think the young Trevor looks kind of like the new Dr. Who?