I was in Castleford the other day. Quite a rare event even though the town is only a 10 minute or so drive from where I live in West Yorkshire. So what’s that got to do with NWOBHM you are probably asking yourself. Well, let me tell you…….
Whilst I was trying to find where I was looking for in Castleford it struck me that I was wandering around the home town of Mendes Prey. A band from the good old New Wave of British Heavy Metal days I’d not thought about for many a long year or written about on this humble blog.
So time to do something about that. Perhaps more so as one of (in my opinion) THE great NWOBHM acts – the marvellous Vardis – also from this neck of the West Yorkshire woods and had a connection with Mendes Prey via bassist Tony Boulton.
If I remember remotely correctly Mendes Prey came in to being around 1980. Had a bit of a following particularly locally gigging and trying hard for the elusive record deal and big break which, sadly for them, neither would happen. A couple of low key singles and a couple of tracks on a couple of minor compilations would at the time be the extent of the band’s recording output despite some positive attention from the industry press.
Here’s a video for Cry for the World. A bit of a Wishbone Ash thing going on don’t you think?
An interesting piece of trivia is that the band’s song What the Hell’s Going On was somehow picked up and used in a Levi’s jeans advert. These days of course that would have meant mega-money and exposure though not so much back in the early 1980s. I think the company threw them all a few pairs of product and sponsored some gigs.
That would be the band’s claim to fame as despite all the effort and gigging enough would become enough with a split in around 1985/1986 with band members scattered here and there – I believe vocals John Seymour lives in Australia.
But as we know, NWOBHM never dies. Last year (2015), No Remorse Records arranged with the band for a full length CD of Mendes Prey songs from the old days to be issued and titled the Never Ending Road. A recommended listen to discover how good Mendes Prey were.
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