Mike McCartney

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Mike McCartney
Birth name Peter Michael McCartney
Born 7 January 1944 (1944-01-07) (age 64)
Liverpool, England
Genre(s) Rock
Pop Rock
Occupation(s) Photographer, musician
Instrument(s) Piano, guitar
Years active 1966–1976 (musician)
1966-present (photographer)
Label(s) Parlophone
Island
Warner Bros.
Associated acts The Scaffold
Grimms
Paul McCartney
Website Mike McCartney Website

Mike McCartney (born Peter Michael McCartney, 7 January 1944, at Walton General Hospital, Liverpool), known professionally as Mike McGear, is a British performing artist and rock photographer and the younger brother of Paul McCartney. He attended the Liverpool Institute two years behind his brother.

Contents

[edit] Early years

Main article: Jim & Mary McCartney
20 Forthlin Road is now owned by The National Trust.
20 Forthlin Road is now owned by The National Trust.

Michael (b. 7 January 1944) and his brother Paul (b. 18 June 1942) were both born in the Walton General Hospital in Liverpool, where their mother, Mary McCartney, had previously worked as a nursing sister in charge of the maternity ward.[1][2]

Michael was not enrolled in a Catholic school as his father, Jim McCartney, believed that they leaned too much towards religion instead of education.[1] The McCartneys had a full set of George Newnes Encyclopedias which Jim encouraged Paul and Michael to use, and as Jim was avidly interested in solving crossword puzzles he told his sons to look up any word they did not understand.[3] Michael remembered that Jim had a temper when he was provoked, and that both Paul and he were "duly bashed" (hit) when they were young. This is contested by other members of the family, who say that Jim or Mary never smacked them, but took them to their rooms and gave them "a good talking-to".[4] Before moving to 20 Forthlin Road, Jim had been the secretary of the Speke Horticultural Society, and often sent Paul and Michael out to canvass for new members.[5] Mary died of an embolism on 31 October 1956, after a mastectomy to stop the spread of her breast cancer. Her last words to Dill Mohan were, "I would love to have seen the boys [Paul and Michael] growing up." Mary was buried on 3 November 1956 at Yew Tree Cemetery, Finch Lane, Liverpool.[6][7] After Mary's death Paul and Michael were sent to live with Jim's brother Joe McCartney and his wife Joan for a short time, so as to let their father grieve in private.[6] As Michael and Paul were interested in music, Jim connected the radio in the living room to extension cords connected to two pairs of Bakelite headphones so that they could listen to Radio Luxembourg at night when they were in bed.[8] Owing to problems with money in their early years, Paul and Michael were the first to buy cars in the McCartney family.[9][10] When he was seventeen-years-old, McCartney started his first job at 'Jackson's the Tailors' in Ranelagh Street, Liverpool. The year after he took an apprenticeship at 'Andrew Bernard', a hairdresser for ladies in the same street.[11]

[edit] Musical career

McGough, McGear (McCartney) and Gorman on the album cover.
McGough, McGear (McCartney) and Gorman on the album cover.

At the time the Beatles became successful, Mike McCartney was still working as an apprentice hairdresser.[12] However, he was also a member of the Liverpool comedy-poetry-music group The Scaffold, which included Roger McGough and John Gorman and had formed in 1962 (the year of The Beatles' first hit). McCartney decided to use a stagename, so as not to capitalize on his family connections to the Fab Four. After first dubbing himself "Mike Blank",[13] he settled on "Mike McGear", using the Liverpudlian equivalent of "Fab".[12] The band was subsequently signed to Parlophone, the same EMI label which recorded The Beatles.

The Scaffold recorded a number of UK hit singles between 1966 and 1974, the most successful being the 1968 Christmas number one single, "Lily the Pink". McCartney composed the band's next biggest hit, 1967's "Thank U Very Much". In 1968, he and McGough released a "duo" album (McGough & McGear) that included the usual Scaffold mix of lyrics, poems, and comedy.

The Scaffold ended up hosting a TV program, which limited the musical portion of their career, and they were dropped by Parlophone. McCartney then signed to Island Records and released a solo musical album entitled Woman in 1972,sample (help·info) which again included many tracks co-written with McGough, and The Scaffold subsequently released their own album on the label, Fresh Liver.

The Scaffold then added several other members and released two albums on Island in 1973 as Grimms (an acronym for Gorman-Roberts-Innes-McGear-McGough-Stanshall).[12] However, McCartney quit Grimms after the second album due to tension between himself and one of the poets added to the group.

McCartney then signed to Warner Bros. Records and in 1974 released his only "serious" musical album, McGear, in which he collaborated with his brother Paul and Paul's band Wings. Although four singles were released from these sessions, none of them became successful. However, also recorded during McCartney's sessions with Wings was a Scaffold "reunion" song, "Liverpool Lou", which became The Scaffold's last top-ten hit and led to their re-formation in 1974 and their last recording sessions of new material.

In the 1980s, after retiring from music, Mike McCartney decided to end his use of the "McGear" pseudonym and revert to use of his family name.

[edit] Photographic career

Mike McCartney
Mike McCartney

McCartney was a photographer during his entire musical career, and has continued with photography since then. Beatles' manager Brian Epstein nicknamed him "Flash Harry" back in the early 1960s because he was always taking pictures with a flash gun.[14]

He has published books of pictures that he took of The Beatles backstage and on tour, and he recently brought out a limited edition book of photos he took spontaneously backstage at Live8.[12] In 2005, McCartney premiered and exhibited a collection of photographs that he had taken in the 1960s, called "Mike McCartney's Liverpool Life", both in Liverpool[14] and other venues, such as The Provincial Museum of Alberta.[15] In addition, an exhibition book was published of the collection.[16]

He also took the cover photograph for Paul McCartney's 2005 solo album Chaos and Creation in the Backyard.[13]

[edit] Personal life

McCartney married (in 1968) and later divorced Angela Fishwick. He later married Rowena Horne. McCartney has six children between his marriages, three from each, including Josh McCartney, who was the drummer in the band The Famous Last Words (formerly known as Trilby).

[edit] Solo discography

[edit] Albums

  • McGough and McGear, EMI (1968)
  • Woman, Island (1972)
  • McGear, Warner Bros (1974)

[edit] Singles

  • "Woman" / "Kill", Island 1972
  • "Leave It" / "Sweet Baby", Warner Bros (1974)
  • "Sea Breezes" / "Giving Grease a Ride", Warner Bros (1975)
  • "Dance the Do" / "Norton", Warner Bros (1975)
  • "Simply Love You" / "What Do We Really Know", Warner Bros (1975)
  • "Do Nothing All Day" / "A to Z", EMI (1976)
  • "No Lar Di Dah" / "God Bless our Gracious Queen", Conn Records (1981)Wedding Song for Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer.

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ a b Miles 1998 p4.
  2. ^ Spitz 2005 p75
  3. ^ Miles 1998 pp12-13.
  4. ^ Spitz 2005 p80.
  5. ^ Miles 1998 p8
  6. ^ a b Miles 1998 p20.
  7. ^ Yew Tree Cemetery, Finch Lane, Liverpool google.co.uk/maps - Retrieved 4 October 2007
  8. ^ Miles 1998 p24.
  9. ^ Miles 1998 p6.
  10. ^ Michael McCartney’s first car liverpoolmuseums.org.uk - Retrieved 7 October 2007
  11. ^ Mike McCartney biog on Beatles Ireland iol.ie/~beatlesireland- Retrieved 16 October 2007
  12. ^ a b c d Mike McCartney’s biog mikemccartney.co.uk - Retrieved: 6 October 2007
  13. ^ a b Barry O'Brien, "The Scaffold: Airbrushed from History?". Retrieved 17 October 2007.
  14. ^ a b Mike McCartney's Liverpool Life exhibition, Museum of Liverpool Life, 2003. Retrieved 17 October 2007.
  15. ^ ‘Liverpool Life’ Exhibition artvisionexhibitions.com - Retrieved 16 October 2007
  16. ^ Press release for exhibition book, dated March 2004. Retrieved 17 October 2004.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

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