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All Music Guide:
During their brief time together in the early '80s, the Bluebells (songwriter Robert "Bobby Bluebell" Hodgens [born on June 6, 1959] [guitar], Kenneth McClusky [born on February 8, 1962] [vocals/harmonica], Dave McCluskey [born on January 13, 1964] [drums], Russell Irvin [guitar] [replaced by Craig Gannon (born on July 30, 1966)], and Lawrence Donegan [bass] [replaced by Neil Baldwin]) made a small amount of music -- several singles, most of which showed up on one EP -- but that is not proportional to the quality of their music. Like fellow Scots Aztec Camera, the Bluebells crafted impeccable, jangly guitar pop, only with better melodies and stronger hooks. Two of their singles ("I'm Falling" and "Young at Heart") hovered around the lower reaches of the U.K. Top Ten in 1984, but they soon broke up, leaving a small, but impressive, body of work. David McCluskey and his brother, Ken, formed a folk duo. Robert Hodgens formed Up. Craig Gannon briefly filled in for bassist Andy Rourke in the Smiths on tour, then stayed as a second live guitarist; he joined Adult Net after being fired from the Smiths in 1986.
Wikipedia:
The Bluebells were a Scottish indie rock band in the 1980s.
Career[edit]
The Bluebells performed jangly guitar based pop not dissimilar to their Scottish contemporaries Aztec Camera and Orange Juice. They had three Top 40 hit singles in the UK, all written by guitarist and founder member Bobby Bluebell (real name Robert Hodgens) - "I'm Falling", "Cath", and their biggest success "Young at Heart". The latter was co-written with Siobhan Fahey of Bananarama (originally recorded on the Bananarama album Deep Sea Skiving) and violinist Bobby Valentino, and made it to number 8 in the UK Singles Chart on its original release in 1984. The band also released one EP, The Bluebells, and one full-length album, Sisters.
The band split up in the mid 1980s, but enjoyed an unexpected revival in 1993 when "Young At Heart" was used in a Volkswagen television advertisement. Re-issued as a single, it was number one for four weeks and led to the band reforming temporarily to perform the song on BBC Television's Top of the Pops. A compilation album followed, The Singles Collection, which peaked at No. 27 in the UK Albums Chart in April 1993.
The band reformed in late 2008, with original members the McCluskey brothers and Bobby Bluebell, to support Edwyn Collins at a show in Glasgow on 23 January 2009. On 29 May 2011, the band performed as part of the Southside Festival.Cite error: There are <ref> tags on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist}} template (see the help page).
Post Bluebells[edit]
After the group's demise, band member Lawrence Donegan played with The Commotions and then trained as a journalist and is now a golf correspondent for The Guardian, having previously worked at The Scotsman. The other members of the band stayed in the music business after the split - David McCluskey and his brother, Ken, formed a folk duo. Ken also works as a lecturer at Stow College in Glasgow teaching music business, and David uses music therapeutically with a wide variety of people. Robert Hodgens returned to DJ duties and more recently formed a new group The Poems - they signed to the American label Minty Fresh; whilst the former Aztec Camera axe-man Craig Gannon briefly filled in for bassist Andy Rourke in The Smiths on tour during 1986, then stayed as a second live guitarist until being fired from the band, after which he joined The Adult Net.
