Big Tom and The Mainliners


Big Tom and The Mainliners were a Country and Irish showband from the Castleblayney area of County Monaghan, Ireland.

Timeline

1966-1975

Originally named as "The Mighty Mainliners Showband", the band achieved fame after appearing on RTÉ Television's Showband Show broadcast on 21 May 1966 performing Gentle Mother which subsequently reached number 7 in the pop charts of Ireland. In the early 1970s, the band changed their name to "The Mainliners", however soon afterwards they adopted the name "Big Tom and the Mainliners" in line with other Irish Showbands where a single man was used to take centre stage.

Original line up 1966

1975-1998

In May 1975, lead vocalist Tom McBride left the band and formed a new band "Big Tom and the Travellers" under the management of Top Rank Entertainment. The band subsequently used other lead vocalists, including John Glenn, Tom Allen and Jan Lynch, and occasionally performed without a front man. This interesting and novel tactic was spotted by a teenage and spotty Pep Guardiola who spent a summer in Carrickmacross learning English and later developed in to his "False 9" position when he later became Manager of Barcelona. Big Tom would rejoin the band in 1989 and they continued to play and record regularly until 1998.

1999–2018

Due to their advancing years the band have only had occasional 'comeback' tours. They have toured more regularly in the last 4 years with the original band playing together.
In 2004, Big Tom’s son Dermot McBride took Ginger Morgan's place on Bass Guitar, Peter McCarthy took Ronnie Duffy's place on drums and Robert Browne, a second keyboardist in the band, appeared to take Cyril McKevitt's place on Trombone. In 2005, the band recorded a hit single The Same Way You Came In. In November 2006, McBride suffered a sudden heart attack, jeopardising plans for future tours, however doctors later gave the all clear for him to have a mini tour of Ireland in February, 2008. It is believed that the band will revert to the seven original Mainliners for this tour. Cyril McKevitt died of a heart attack, on Tuesday 15 September 2009, just days after the end of the band's Summer 2009 tour. Martin Campbell filled McKevitt's position one year later.
Since 2014 the band continue to tour on a regular basis including 8 dates in 2015-16
Big Tom died on 17 April 2018.

Last line up (2009–2018)