Sweeney's Men (1966-1968)

In January, 1965, Andy Irvine and Joe Dolan (not THE Joe Dolan) had started playing together, traveling across Europe in search of gigs, According to Andy on his own website, "Two friends of mine had hit the road for Denmark and returned with stories that made my feet itch. I suddenly realised, along with half the rest of Europe’s youth that there was a big wide world out there waiting to be explored. So late in 1965, myself and a Galway man called Joe Dolan set out to travel through Europe, playing on the streets of Munich and Vienna."

In early, 1966, Joe returned to Ireland, while Andy gigged in Denmark and told him they had secured a summer residency in the Enda Hotel in Galway. He returned to Ireland and in May, 1966, Joe and Andy had moved on to Galway (Joe's home town) and formed Sweeney's Men along with Johnny Moynihan from Dublin, who also came for the summer gig. When the gig in Galway ended due to a dispute, they hit the road in their red Volkswagen van.

Relocating to Dublin, the band signed with manager Des Kelly of the Capitol Showband and appeared on several singles released by the Capitol in the same year. It was almost a year before the trio ventured into the studios and produced their first single on Pye Records. Andy takes up the story, "Des decided it was time for us to record. We went down to Eamonn Andrews studio in Henry street and Des played bass guitar. We recorded three tracks; Old Maid in the Garrett which became the A side, The Derby Ram which went on the B side, and Sullivan’s John with Joe singing. This was the one we liked the best. I don’t know what became of it, it was never heard of again." (Editor's note: Funnily enough, Sullivan's John became the band's third single, although we are not sure who did the vocals.)

The traditional song, Old Maid In A Garret did extremely well, climbing into the Irish Top Ten and eventually reaching number 6, staying in the charts for 13 weeks and making the boys a hit on the exploding ballad scene.

A few months later, in June 1967, Joe decided to travel to Israel to fight in the Six Day War (5 - 10 June 1967) and guitarist, vocalist Paul Brady stood in for a few gigs, but turned down an offer to join permanently. Paul instead went to join the Johnstons, with which he had great success before finally going solo a few years later. His permanent replacement was singer and multi instrumentalist Terry Woods. With the addition of Terry, the band members switched between playing tin whistle, concertina, harmonica, guitar, mandolin, banjo and bouzouki, as well as all singing.

Says Andy of the period, "By this time the so called ‘Ballad Boom’ was in full swing. Bands in three piece suits with double basses, banjos and guitars lashed out The Wild Rover, We’re all off to Dublin in the Green and The Banks of the Ohio, taking up a position somewhere between The Clancy Brothers and The Kingston Trio. Sweeney’s Men were somewhat different; we pandered to our own tastes rather than the fashions of the day and though we were up there with the best of them, I think we bemused audiences more than a little. They would yell, "Sing something we all know!" We didn’t."

Around this time, the band was playing the ballad lounges and had a regular gig in the Liberty Hall on Friday nights. They also began to play the in dance halls along with the showbands of the era. Andy explains, "we would only have to play for about half an hour, as a guest spot, and the dancers were supposed to take a break and listen."
 

 

In May, the band went to England to record their first full-length album, Sweeney's Men at The Livingstone Studios in Barnet, Middlesex, in just 36 hours.

 

In May 1968, the band underwent a major change when founding member, Andy, left the band to travel in Eastern Europe. He was replaced by Portstewart guitarist, Henry McCullough, who had previously played with Gene and the Gents and Enniskillen's Skyrockets showbands. He had also been on tour in the USA with Irish rockers, Eire Apparent, but his trip was cut short when he was accused of being in the possession of drugs. Henry played electric guitar, and his tenure saw the band explore more progressive, psychedelic territory. The new lineup debuted on 17 May 1968, and in July, they played The 4th Cambridge Folk Festival, Cambridge, England.

 

Lineup Changes