Between their last gig in October 2000 and his death in December 2001, Bruce Watson spoke to Adamson a few times by phone “but I could still tell he was still in hell,” he says.

Cherry Red Records – The Journey, Big Country". Cherryred.co.uk. Archived from the original on 18 April 2014 . Retrieved 8 April 2014. I know that really hurt Stuart a lot. I mean, big time,” says Butler. “It wasn’t fair and the album died because of it. A lot of things went sour because of that scenario. It definitely hit Stuart bad. And it really did kill the commercial potential of the band – losing that made the industry feel as though the band had no space.”On 9 July 2015, the band announced that Derek Forbes would no longer be performing with Big Country, and that all forthcoming gigs would go on with a replacement, Scott Whitley. [30] On 12 November 2021, the band announced that bassist Scott Whitley would be leaving the band to pursue other interests. His replacement is Gil Allan from Dunfermline. [ citation needed] Band members [ edit ] Current members [ edit ] Image The band broke massively worldwide with the release of the album’s classic singles ‘Fields Of Fire’, ‘Chance’ and signature song ‘In A Big Country’, which went on to become massive worldwide hits, selling over 2 million copies and driving ‘The Crossing’ to 3 prestigious Grammy nominations in the USA. I’ve survived a lot to get this far,” he says, “and I wish Stuart could have had one more day to think about what was happening to him. Maybe he’d still be here, and I wouldn’t need to be and I’d be sitting here just as a fan, just like you, and we’d be going up the front and singing our heads off to the songs,” he shakes his head. The culmination was a concert at the Glen Pavilion in Dunfermline and an interview with BBC Radio Scotland where the CBS Studio demos were utilised. The band then played live with Alice Cooper's Special Forces tour for two concerts in February 1982 at Brighton and Birmingham. This EP has everything one could love about the band, but is low on the earnestness factor. There's even a little lightheartedness.

Big Country star found dead – The Scotsman". News.scotsman.com. 18 December 2001 . Retrieved 8 April 2014.The guitar playing gave the bass a unique role. “The bass was the third guitar basically,” says Butler. “It kinda held down notes now and again but it joined in melodies and counter points and stuff which is what really interested me in playing with the band cos it explored stuff like that and there weren’t lot of people that I knew that who were doing that on bass, really.”

a b c d e f g h i Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums (19thed.). London: Guinness World Records Limited. pp.56–7. ISBN 1-904994-10-5. Sisältää hitin: Levyt ja esittäjät Suomen musiikkilistoilla vuodesta 1961" (in Finnish). Sisältää Hitin - Suomen listalevyt (Timo Pennanen) . Retrieved 11 August 2016. Grant: “What made it so special? It’s just a certain chemistry. You can’t quantify it – it either comes or it doesn’t. The passion and the motivation of everyone – some of it rubs off. Like you put a dry log next to an ember and it catches fire – it’s the same thing.” It’s my birthday on the 17th of December,” says Grant. “I was having breakfast with my family and my mother said, ‘Have you any news on Stuart?’ and just as she said that the phone rang and I knew the number: it was Kim his sister. She said, ‘He’s died. He’s killed himself’. I went for a walk…” On Christmas 1984, the four members participated in the Band Aid charity record " Do They Know It's Christmas?". They are among a small handful of acts to contribute a spoken message to the B-side of the single.Honolulu Star-Bulletin Hawaii News". Starbulletin.com. 18 December 2001. Archived from the original on 24 August 2008 . Retrieved 8 April 2014. Adamson met singer-songwriter Marcus Hummon, with whom he would form a country act, the Raphaels, and through Hummon he met his second wife Melanie Shelley. “He moved there,” says Grant. “I don’t dwell on it, but it was the worst thing that ever happened really, cos he was out of sight then you never knew what was happening. He got comfortable in Nashville and I think he thought he could drink again.” It also gave the press another stereotype to play with: the dour Scotsman. In the eyes of the music press, the band were pompous and dreary and so not cool, darling. Big Country released the non-LP extended play single " Wonderland" in 1984, [1] while in the middle of a lengthy worldwide tour. The song, considered by some critics to be one of their finest, [4] [5] was a Top Ten hit (No. 8) in the UK Singles Chart [3] but, despite heavy airplay and a positive critical response, was a comparative flop in the US, reaching only No. 86 on the Billboard Hot 100. It was the last single by the band to make the US charts. You couldn’t help Stuart,” says Watson. “Any alcoholic will tell you, you cannot help an alcoholic. He’s got to get that help for himself.”

Gwenda (19 January 2012). "Big Country Interviews 1984-1986". Archived from the original on 25 March 2019. A support slot with Alice Cooper went disastrously too, the band’s half-baked sound grating on an audience looking for glam-metal thrills. By the second night of the tour, Cooper’s tour manager was on the phone to Grant: “Your band’s off the bill, no arguing”. Excellent songs, totally unique guitar sounds, amazing musicianship and production. There is absolutely zero filler. The Irish Charts - All there is to know". irishcharts.ie. Archived from the original on 5 January 2010. DVD includes highlights from the Glasgow Barrowlands concert, together with promo videos for the singles ‘Ships’ and ‘Alone’

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Tony Butler, a session musician tired of being a gun for hire, had found the band he was looking for: “I thought what Bruce and Stuart were doing guitar-wise was immense. And it was lyrical, it was melodic, it was powerful – it was just lovely. I’ve got Scottish roots and it really kind of erupted from me when I first heard these guys playing…” Adamson later spoke about the period: “I stopped working and quit bevvying because I was drinking too much and I didn’t enjoy that too much either. You get used to having a drink now and again and then you just get used to using it and I didn’t like that about myself too much…” I think [we were] trying to understand masculinity in a way,” says former Skids frontman Richard Jobson. “And that military imagery is so potent. If you look at the sleeves of Masquerade and Charade [pictures of the battle of Culloden and uniformed men playing cards with a gun on the table, respectively], thematically, they’re about masculine grace. If you were really going to analyse all the work, I think you’ll find that’s at the root of it all – finding some kind of grace in the whole process of being a man. And not being ashamed of that.” Big Country's first single was " Harvest Home", recorded and released in 1982. [1] It was a modest success, although it did not reach the UK Singles Chart. [3] Their next single was 1983's " Fields Of Fire (400 Miles)", which reached the UK's Top Ten and was rapidly followed by the album The Crossing. [3] The album was a hit in the United States (reaching the Top 20 in the Billboard 200), powered by " In a Big Country", their only US Top 40 hit single. [1] The song features heavily engineered guitar sounds, strongly reminiscent of bagpipes; [1] Adamson and fellow guitarist Watson achieved this through the use of the MXR Pitch Transposer 129 Guitar Effect. Also contributing to the band's unique sound was their use of the e-bow, a device which allows a guitar to sound more like strings or synthesizer. The Crossing sold over a million copies in the UK and obtained gold record status (sales of over 500,000) in the US. The band performed at the Grammy Awards and on Saturday Night Live. Music used to be a thing where working people got together on a Saturday night and played some songs. Someone’d play the guitar or the fiddle or an accordion. No bastard’d played the synthesiser. Stuart Adamson