Thrown Out Of Pubs For Singing...

[Guest Tim]

THROWN OUT OF PUBS FOR SINGING...

 

By Desmond Zwar

 

Nine English soccer players, who used to be regularly tossed out of Melbourne pubs for singing too boisterously, are now Number 10 on the Australian pop charts and will launch a CD in Britain for Christmas.

 

In a mad series of lucky breaks The Music Men (as they now call themselves) have stumbled from pub pavement to 11 live stage and TV performances in a week. Their first CD sold 15,000 copies in a month. Their television commercial has become one of Australia's best-loved.

 

'And we are still mates,' marvels curly-topped David Brooks, 41, their leader.

 

His voice croaking with weariness, ex-Bury star David is juggling night stage performances, a day job as a sales manager, football training with the Melbourne team he plays for and coaches. And making another CD single.

 

It all started in the "poob".

 

'I came out to Australia in 1981 on a three-year sporting visa. It allowed me to play with the Melbourne team for three years and then decide to go back or apply for residency.

 

'I was a bit lonely, like, and when I went for a jar after the game I met other English soccer players. I hadn't known a soul when I arrived. We had a few drinks and became friends and talked about what a great place this Melbourne was. We were on a three-year holiday!'

 

Then one jar at the Windsor Castle in suburban Windsor led to another.. 'And we started a singalong. I had this routine.'

 

Juventas team star, Sean Lane, remembers: 'We'd had our mandatory whinge, then Brooksey would feel a song coming on. "I am the Music Man! I can play the..." It's a schoolkids' song that goes :"I can play the piccolo, or the piano, or whatever."

 

'But Brooksy changed it to "I can do the Groucho Marx", and we'd all horse about doing Groucho, or Gladstone Small or Malcolm Fraser (ex-Australian Prime Minister).

 

"Brooksy", curly-haired and cheery face in a perpetual grin, takes up the story...

 

'Inevitably they'd throw us out of the pub. Then one night we saw a segment called "Red Faces" on a television show. It was a spot where appalling amateur entertainers came on and had the mickey taken out of them.' The Music Men decided to go on for a bit of a laugh.

 

Dressed sombrely in suits, but wearing Groucho specs and noses, they "played the Groucho Marx."

 

They were a sensation. The host was so amazed he scored them an unheard-of nine.

 

But that was that. Until a high-powered advertising agency creative director lowered himself into his First Class Qantas seat on a flight from Auckland to Sydney. He had an important client: Toohey's beer, and he was planning a campaign.

 

The television show, "Hey, Hey It's Saturday," had made a video of the best and worst of its Red Faces segment and Qantas had bought it. There, up on the in-flight screen were the Music Men.

 

'The advertising man suddenly called out "YES!", said David, 'probably startling the other passengers. We were just right for his commercial.'

 

But there was a snag. No agent the ad-man called when he landed in Australia, had ever heard of the Music Men. Then Saatchi & Saatchi, in desperation, called a casting agent.

 

'Wait a minute,' he said, 'I once met this crazy guy in a pub and he gave me his card...'

 

Said Dave: 'Thank goodness he'd kept it!' The rest is now dizzy history. Saatchi & Saatchi made the commercial: the football team being told to have an early night...Dave doing the "I am the Sherlock Holmes" as he raids the refrigerator for a Toohey's Gold during the night.'

 

'It gave us huge exposure, but when the money was divided into 10, not a huge fortune. We'd by now got an agent and we were inundated with television and stage offers. Then Mushroom Records approached us to make a CD before last Christmas and it quickly sold 15,000.

 

'We have been on tour around Australia and average two functions a week. We brought out another CD a month ago and cut a single called "I am a football fan", which was launched before the Australian Rules grand final. In its third week on the charts it reached Number 10. We've been on all the television shows and in the week before the Grand Final did 11 performances.'

 

The hectic pace has been too much for two of the original music men trying to juggle sales jobs with fame. They've dropped out.

 

Why has the success been so phenomenal?

 

'It's about having a go, having a drink or two, sport and taking the mickey,' explains David. 'All of which the Aussies really enjoy.

 

'Now we're doing our thing on English soccer players for the UK CD market. What happens with that nobody knows...'