Live in Europe

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Live In Europe would be Gallagher’s most successful record yet on both sides of the Atlantic, but the band’s ferocious work rate was taking its toll on Wilgar Campbell. The only member of the band with a family, he found the strain of touring too much and began missing shows. The final straw came when he bailed out on the day the band were to due to fly to Ireland to play a gig that was being recorded for a TV broadcast.

He was very up for the whole punk thing,” says Donal. “He loved the whole attitude and it really hurt him when he got labelled as part of the old guard.” He said, ‘It was probably the worst gig I’ve ever seen and the best gig I’ve ever seen’,” recalls Donal. Our work rate was extraordinary,” says de’Ath. “And Rory’s standards were very high. He pushed himself. When he suffered from exhaustion during my time, the only way we could get him to cancel a show was to say that I was ill. I got a bit peeved about that.” Donal Gallagher recalls his brother’s social life in his later years revolving around the studio, the canteen and the bar, where he’d run up “terrifying bills”. But the punishing schedules took their toll. Gallagher’s drinking escalated, eventually reaching full-blown alcoholism. He also began to experience stage fright, a fear of flying and bouts of physical exhaustion. He dealt with his problems by turning to prescription pills, soon developing an addiction to them as well. As he rarely socialised with anyone offstage, no one had any idea how many pills he was taking.

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I asked Rory before we started working in Tattoo if he could write down lyrics for me so I would have something to work from,” says de’Ath. “But he never did. I don’t know what he was thinking.” Live In Europe has served as a massive influence on budding musicians: Adam Clayton and The Edge of U2 both cite this album as the recording that made them want to learn guitar and play in a band – they were still schoolboys at the time!

He was a confident guitarist, albeit one with a rebellious streak. One appearance at a school talent show provoked the ire of the Catholic brothers who ran the establishment. The reason: Gallagher had covered Cliff Richard’s chaste 1959 hit, Living Doll. It was in Belfast that Gallagher began searching for a new band. He soon found two players he could work with: drummer Wilgar Campbell and 17-yearold bassist Gerry McAvoy, whose own band, Deep Joy, had supported Taste. Ironically, Deep Joy had split up on exactly the same night as Gallagher’s former group, just down the road in Ulster Hall. Like every young Irish musician who came of age in the early 60s, Gallagher served his apprenticeship on the showband circuit, playing covers of popular hits.The resulting album, Irish Tour ’74, remains the highlight of Gallagher’s career. Recorded in Belfast, Dublin and Cork, it finally nailed his live performances on vinyl. One thing does worry him. As we speed into the heart of the city, Rory hunches deeper into his seat. He turns slowly to his driver, crinkling his eyes: “That’s a strange town, you know. When did I ever bust six strings in a night before?” We were one of the only bands to play Belfast,” says Lou Martin proudly. “ Thin Lizzy wouldn’t do it because of the aggravation. But Rory insisted on it.” Nevertheless, Gallagher’s relentless integrity, combined with the furious immersion in his live performances, won him a staunch following. Working as a solo artist following the somewhat tumultuous dissolution of Taste, it took this iconoclastic musician no longer to document his concert work than when he was with the unsung British power trio: the now fifty-year-old Live in Europe album (released 5/14/72) was his third overall release under his own name after the eponymous debut LP and its sophomore follow-up Deuce. Rory avoided pandering to his audience. He preferred to simply play music and, in so doing with such unabashed abandon, he rendered it with an irrepressible glee that radiated from the stage to his enraptured audiences.