By Danielle Lee Aderholdt
DM Music Columnist
Editor's note: This is the first in a two-part series on Gavin Friday. Look for the interview with Friday Friday.
Not too long after a Dublin kid named Larry Mullen, Jr., posted a note on his school's bulletin board that he was a drummer looking to start a band, Fionan Hanvey and friends took a stab at the music thing, too.
Adam Clayton, Paul Hewson and brothers Dik and Dave Evans showed up at Mullen's house to jam. Eventually Dik left this baby band and joined Hanvey and his ragtag crew, and the rest, as they say ...
Paul Hewson was dubbed Bono, Dave Evans became The Edge, and Mullen and Clayton, never ones for such things, felt their boring old real names were quite enough, thank you. The four became U2.
As for the fate of Fionan Hanvey ... meet Gavin Friday.
Friday and Derek Rowan, better known as Guggi, formed the backbone of a frighteningly-good Irish performance-art band, known more for early punk showmanship than tuneful introspection.
As arguably Ireland's first real punk band, The Virgin Prunes were all about confrontation. Gavin, called Handbag Hanvey in his younger days, paraded around Dublin City in a dress and pulled pigs' heads from under his skirt on-stage.
There was nothing subtle about the Virgin Prunes. Everything was full-tilt, in-your-face, take-no-prisoners. They were loud, theatrical, shocking, messy. They were young.
And they were completely intoxicating.
Somewhere along the road, 1986 to be exact, Gavin Friday grew up. He left the Virgin Prunes, who struggled along for a few more years as The Prunes until they finally admitted defeat. It just couldn't be done without Gavin and Guggi, who had left in 1984.
Until 1989, Gavin mucked about town, stopping in here and there to lend his voice and name to a handful of other people's projects. He indulged in his other love, painting, culminating in a show called "Four Artists, Many Wednesdays" with pals Bono, Guggi and Charlie Whisker. He opened a cabaret in Dublin called the Blue Jaysus and played there with famous and not-so-famous friends on weekends. But all that creativity still wasn't enough for a man with more artistic talent in his little finger than any of us will probably ever have.
At the end of the 80s, a decade of bad hair, even worse fashions, power ballads and the unfortunate Milli Vanilli incident, Gavin turned the music industry on its ear and refused to be one of the sheep.
He and writing partner Maurice Roycroft (nicknamed "The Man Seezer" by Gavin) released "Each Man Kills the Thing He Loves," containing daring dips into cabaret theatricals with "Apologia," "Rags to Riches" and Jacques Brel's "Next;" "You Take Away the Sun," a freshly anguished twist on the tired pop medium; "He Got What He Wanted," a bluesy folk piece; "Man of Misfortune," a straight-up rock song; "Another Blow On the Bruise," an aching, haunting blues lament; and "Death Is Not the End," a Bob Dylan classic.
Whew! Quite a trip for a 29-year-old Northside Dublin boy.
With "Each Man Kills ..." Gavin Friday put out arguably one of the '80s greatest records. And nobody cared.
"Nobody," meaning rock's intelligentsia -- that is. His passionately devoted cult following loved it. But it's all about pleasing the lowest common denominator in this business, and Friday simply will not do that. Gavin Friday will never be a superstar, and that seems to suit him just fine.
"The word 'marketing' is probably the biggest cancer of the 20th century," Gavin said last week, on the phone from Dublin.
It's good he feels that way, since he's impossible to market. He's a chameleon, demanding that his fans really love the art of music to stick with him.
Friday's 1992 release, "Adam 'N' Eve," is only slightly more commercial than "Each Man Kills...," and it gets darker and darker as it plays along. "I Want to Live," "King of Trash" and to an extent, "Falling Off the Edge of the World," teeter dangerously close to top-40 radio viability. But then you hear the raucous "Fun & Experience," the jazzy "Melancholy Baby," the angry "The Big No No" and the slightly bitter "Where In the World?" and realize that, nope, thank God, yer man hasn't sold out after all.
Another great record. And still, no one cared.
In 1994, Friday collaborated with Bono for the enormously successful soundtrack to Jim Sheridan's film "In the Name of the Father." So ah yes, you've heard Gavin before after all. That rap on the title song, so commonly thought to be Bono, is, in fact, Gavin Friday. Sorry to burst your bubble. (Contrary to popular belief, Gavin and Bono are not the same person.)
The 1995 release of "Shag Tobacco" sealed Friday's fate as a sex symbol with female fans the world over. The title track is a predatory love song, the object of affection being his wife. "Caruso," an ode to opera star Enrico Caruso, is Friday's admission that "I'm not myself today." "Angel" made the cut on the first ridiculously successful soundtrack to "Romeo + Juliet." On "The Last Song I'll Ever Sing," Friday literally chokes back the tears for a dying friend.
There's also a tribute to a drag queen friend of Friday's whose name we can't print here. Quite a hodgepodge, quite brilliant, as usual.
That brings us to "The Boxer," the Friday-Seezer score for Jim Sheridan's newest film, starring Daniel Day-Lewis and Emily Watson. Read tomorrow's DM for a review and extended interview with Mistah Friday. In the meantime, keep this handy-dandy Friday Primer close by for future reference.
Danielle Lee Aderholdt, a senior from Clarksdale, is set to begin working with Gavin Friday on his official biography. As soon as she makes enough money to move to Ireland, that is.