Bev Bevan | |
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Background information | |
Birth name | Beverley Bevan |
Born | Birmingham, Warwickshire, England | 25 November 1944
Genres | Rock |
Occupation(s) | Drummer |
Years active | 1966–present |
Formerly of | |
Website | Musical career |
Beverley Bevan (born 25 November 1944) [1] [2] is an English rock musician who was the drummer and one of the original members of the Move and Electric Light Orchestra (ELO). After the end of ELO in 1986, he founded ELO Part II.
Bevan also was drummer for Black Sabbath during the Born Again Tour, and later played percussion on The Eternal Idol album in 1987. Bevan was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2017 as a member of Electric Light Orchestra. [3]
Bevan was born in South Yardley, Birmingham. [4] After attending Moseley Grammar School, where he gained two O level passes, he worked as a trainee buyer in a city centre department store called The Beehive with school friend Jasper Carrott (Robert Davis).
His professional music career started with a stint with Denny Laine in his group Denny Laine and the Diplomats, then with Carl Wayne & the Vikings, followed by the Move in 1966. The Move was known for being the boost to fame for Roy Wood. The Move highest selling songs were Fire Brigade and Blackberry Way.
Bevan has a deep singing voice. With the Move he sang lead on a remake of "Zing! Went the Strings of My Heart" and the country and western spoof, "Ben Crawley Steel Co". He composed one Move song: "Don't Mess Me Up", an Elvis Presley spoof from the album Message from the Country , which was also the B-side of the Move's single "Tonight". He is also credited with writing the rock-blues "Turkish Tram Conductor Blues" on Looking On ; Roy Wood actually composed the song, but gave the songwriting credit to Bevan as reward for his promotional efforts on behalf of the band. [5]
They released their final single, "California Man", in 1972.
After the death of Carl Wayne in 2004, the drummer formed Bev Bevan's Move [6] with Phil Tree and former ELO Part II colleagues Phil Bates and Neil Lockwood, to play a set comprising mostly Move classics on tour. Bates left in July 2007 to re-join ELO Part II, by then renamed to The Orchestra. Bevan was then joined by former Move guitarist Trevor Burton.
To read more on Bev Bevan’s time in the Electric Light Orchestra, see Electric Light Orchestra
The Move’s spinoff, Electric Light Orchestra, was formed by Bevan and Wood in 1970. They released their first album in 1971, by which time the Move existed only as a recording outfit.
On ELO records his voice can be heard most prominently on "Fire On High" and "Strange Magic", both from the album Face the Music (1975). Often called one of the most influential groups in music history, their songs "Mr. Blue Sky", "Sweet Talkin' Woman", "Livin' Thing" and "Don't Bring Me Down" left an impact on 1970s music, all written, composed and sung by Jeff Lynne.
He recorded a solo single in 1976, a cover of the Sandy Nelson instrumental "Let There Be Drums". [7] Bevan played on all Electric Light Orchestra and ELO Part II albums up to 1999. In 1980 he published a historical memoir of the Electric Light Orchestra. [8]
In 1988, Bevan and Jeff Lynne were planning on recording a new ELO album. Lynne stepped down from the project and would not allow Bev to use the Electric Light Orchestra name so Bevan managed to swerve around this by forming a new group called ELO Part II, a band he toured with from 1989 to 2000.
In 1983, he replaced Bill Ward in Black Sabbath for the Born Again Tour. Bevan was known for his heavy powerhouse drumming during this tour. He also appeared in Sabbath's videos "Trashed" and "Zero the Hero". A headlining appearance at the 1983 Reading Festival – extracts of which appear on a reissue of Born Again – was only Bevan's second gig with the band. "It was just all over the shop", recalled guitarist Tony Iommi. "Bev didn't know [the songs] at all. He did try. As we went on the tour, he did get a lot better… We went to America and he done good. That particular stage, doing the Reading Festival, was a definite wrong for us." [9]
Bevan rejoined Black Sabbath briefly in 1987, recording percussion overdubs for the album The Eternal Idol , but was replaced by Terry Chimes after refusing to play shows in South Africa, which was at the time under apartheid rule. [10]
Bevan appeared on Paul Weller's 2010 album Wake Up The Nation and played drums on two songs: "Moonshine" and "Wake Up The Nation". Weller told him that he was his second choice; his first choice would have been Keith Moon. [11]
Bevan currently presents a radio show on BBC Radio West Midlands on Sunday afternoons. He also reviews records for the Midlands newspaper Sunday Mercury and has a blog on its website. [12] It was announced at the Best of Broad Street Awards on 17 January 2011 that Bevan would be honoured with a star on the Birmingham Walk of Stars. [13]
Bevan is also a patron of The Dorridge Music School (Knowle). [14] In 2012, Bevan narrated the audiobook version of Tony Iommi's biography Iron Man – My Journey Through Heaven and Hell. [15] Bevan's 2014 calendar contained no fewer than 102 gigs in 11 months, [16] some of which formed the final gigs for the Move, before Bevan and Burton went their separate ways again.
In 2014, Bevan joined Quill, a Birmingham-based band. [17]
As of 2022, the Bev Bevan Band had played gigs with Bev's former school mate Jasper Carrott under the name 'Stand up and Rock' since 2017. [18] [19]
He follows Wolverhampton Wanderers FC. [20] [21]
Bevan's first marriage was to Valerie Taylor. Their son, Adrian, was born in 1981. [22] [23] On 1 September 2022, Bev married Joy Brain (nee Strachan), his bandmate in Quill. [24]
Black Sabbath were an English rock band formed in Birmingham in 1968 by guitarist Tony Iommi, drummer Bill Ward, bassist Geezer Butler and vocalist Ozzy Osbourne. They are often cited as pioneers of heavy metal music. The band helped define the genre with their first three albums Black Sabbath (1970), Paranoid (1970) and Master of Reality (1971). Following Osbourne's departure in 1979, the band underwent multiple line-up changes, with Iommi being the only constant member throughout their history.
The Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) are an English rock band formed in Birmingham in 1970 by songwriters and multi-instrumentalists Jeff Lynne and Roy Wood with drummer Bev Bevan. Their music is characterised by a fusion of pop and classical arrangements with futuristic iconography. After Wood's departure in 1972, Lynne became the band's sole leader, arranging and producing every album while writing nearly all of their original material. From this point until their first break-up in 1986, Lynne, Bevan, and keyboardist Richard Tandy were the group's only consistent members.
Jeffrey Lynne is an English musician, singer-songwriter and record producer. He is the co-founder and leader of the rock band Electric Light Orchestra (ELO), which was formed in 1970, and as a songwriter has written most of the band's hits, including "Evil Woman", "Livin' Thing", "Telephone Line", "Mr. Blue Sky", "Don't Bring Me Down" and "Hold On Tight".
The Move were a British rock band of the late 1960s and the early 1970s. They scored nine top 20 UK singles in five years, but were among the most popular British bands not to find any real success in the United States. For most of their career the Move were led by guitarist, singer and songwriter Roy Wood. He wrote all the group's UK singles and, from 1968, also sang lead vocals on many songs. Initially, the band had four main vocalists who divided amongst themselves the lead vocal duties.
Roy Wood is an English musician, singer and songwriter. He was particularly successful in the 1960s and 1970s as member and co-founder of the Move, Electric Light Orchestra and Wizzard.
Face the Music is the fifth studio album by Electric Light Orchestra (ELO). It was released in September 1975 by United Artists Records and on 14 November 1975 in the United Kingdom by Jet Records. The album moves away from the large-scale classical orchestrated sound of the previous album, Eldorado, in favour of more "radio-friendly" pop/rock songs, though the string sections are still very prominent. The new sound proved successful for the group, for Face the Music was the first ELO album to go platinum.
Born Again is the eleventh studio album by English heavy metal band Black Sabbath. Released on 12 September 1983, it is the only album the group recorded with lead vocalist Ian Gillan, best known for his work with Deep Purple. It was also the last Black Sabbath album for nine years to feature original bassist Geezer Butler and the last to feature original drummer Bill Ward, though Ward did record a studio track with the band fifteen years later on their 1998 live album Reunion. The album has received mixed reviews from critics, but was a commercial success upon its 1983 release, reaching No. 4 in the UK charts. The album also hit the top 40 in the United States. In July 2021, guitarist and founding member Tony Iommi confirmed that the long lost original master tapes of the album had been finally located, and that he was considering remixing the album for a future re-release.
Robert Norman Davis, best known by his stage name, Jasper Carrott, is an English comedian, actor, and television presenter. He starred in the sitcoms The Detectives and All About Me, and presented the game show Golden Balls.
Kelly Groucutt was an English musician, best known as the bassist and second vocalist for the rock band Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) between 1974 and 1982.
Richard Tandy is an English musician. He was the keyboardist in the band Electric Light Orchestra ("ELO"). His palette of keyboards was an important ingredient in the group's sound, especially on the albums A New World Record, Out of the Blue, Discovery, and Time.
The Orchestra is a rock band formed by former members of the Electric Light Orchestra and ELO Part II. It is the continuation of ELO Part II following Bev Bevan's departure and selling of his share in the rights to the ELO name to Jeff Lynne.
The Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) Part II was a British-American rock band formed by Electric Light Orchestra drummer and co-founder Bev Bevan. The band also included former ELO bassist and vocalist Kelly Groucutt, and violinist Mik Kaminski for most of its career, along with conductor Louis Clark, who toured as a guest with ELO in its later years.
The Electric Light Orchestra is the debut studio album by English rock band Electric Light Orchestra (ELO), released in December 1971 in the United Kingdom by Harvest Records. In the United States, the album was released in March 1972 as No Answer, after a misunderstood telephone message made by a United Artists Records executive asking about the album name; the caller, having failed to reach the ELO contact, wrote down "no answer" in his notes, and this was misconstrued to be the name of the album.
"Curly" was a song recorded in 1969 by the English rock group The Move. It was written and produced by Roy Wood. In the 19 July 1969 edition of Melody Maker, Chris Welch said the song was "an obvious success for The Move".
Trevor Burton is an English guitarist and is a founding member of The Move.
Philip Bates is an English musician who has been a member of many notable bands, including Trickster and Quill, and was the lead guitarist, songwriter and joint lead vocalist for ELO Part II from 1993 through to 1999 and then its successor band The Orchestra from 2007 to 2011 and both times being replaced by Parthenon Huxley.
The Born Again Tour was a concert tour by in support of Black Sabbath's Born Again album. Both the album and the tour were the only ones of Black Sabbath's to feature former Deep Purple frontman Ian Gillan on lead vocals. Ex-Electric Light Orchestra drummer Bev Bevan was hired to replace Bill Ward, who had returned to the band for the recording of the album after a two-year hiatus, for the tour. This was the final tour to feature original Black Sabbath bassist Geezer Butler until 1992's Dehumanizer tour.
Heart Beat 86 was a benefit concert staged at the National Exhibition Centre near Birmingham, England, on 15 March 1986. It was organised by Bev Bevan to raise money for Birmingham Children's Hospital.