Red Guitars

This Hull-rooted guitar-pop outfit assembled its core lineup around Jerry Kidd on vocals, Louise Barlow handling bass, Hallam Lewis on lead guitar, John Rowley supplying rhythm guitar, and Matt Higgins behind the drums. Lewis and Kidd launched the project in 1982, issuing a pair of striking singles titled ‘Good Technology’ and ‘Fact’ before ‘Marimba Jive’ climbed to the summit of the independent charts. That track anchored the November 1984 release Slow To Fade, which appeared on Kidd’s Self Drive Records imprint and showcased a sleek, distinctive pop sound driven by his incisive lyricism, including the lines “I said that I love you/God knows I tried/You say you still love me/But you’re always saying goodbye.” Kidd departed just two months later, issuing a statement that read: “Technically we improved a lot during the last year but musically, from my point of view, we were standing still. New ideas and songs I had for the group no longer seemed to fit in. I still favour independence within the record industry and shall continue to look for success, both artistic and commercial, with releases on my own Self Drive Record label.” Robert Holmes stepped in immediately, making his debut with the group at the University of London Union on 24 May 1985. Lou Howard then took over bass duties, and the band shifted to One Way Records via Virgin for Tales Of The Expected. Although the thematic emphasis had evolved, the outfit retained its capacity for singular, affecting work, most evident on the singles ‘National Avenue’ and the wistful ‘Be With Me’. Both album covers carried quotations from poet Sean O’Brien. In 1987 Hallam and Howard exited to establish Planet Wilson alongside drummer Jonah Oxburrow, formerly of That Noble Porpoise; the new group issued In The Best Of All Possible Worlds and Not Drowning But Waving. Hallam subsequently opened his own studio in Hull, while Holmes put out a solo album in 1989.