Rory Gallagher

County: Cork

Genre: Heavy Metal/Hard Rock Blues rock

Decades Active: 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s

About Rory Gallagher

Rory Gallagher was one of the most highly regarded musicians to come out of Ireland. He was a brilliant guitarist, among the world's very best, and wrote some great rock and blues rock music. He lived for his music and had a very strong-minded determination to stay true to his musical instincts and never compromised his independent spirit. He was in his element when playing live on stage and was a very exciting player to watch. His music and playing have inspired many well known rockers and over a decade after his death he still has a huge loyal fanbase many who travel from all over the world to attend festivals devoted to his music such as the annual festival in Rory's birthplace, Ballyshannon. Rory has been a huge inspiration to countless Irish bands and musicians as well as many top international guitarists.

Rory was born in Ballyshannon, Co. Donegal. His family moved to his father's home-town, Derry when Rory was a baby and then moved to Cork when he was eight. He got his start in the music business as a teenager playing in showbands which travelled around Ireland playing the popular hits of the day. In 1963 Rory joined the Fontana Showband which later changed it's name to The Impact. Rory incorporated more blues and rock into the band's set and started writing some original songs. The Impact split in 1965 and Rory and a few of the members went to Germany to play the Hamburg clubs. After he came back to Cork he formed the first iteration of Taste in 1966, but the power-trio line-up which became legendary was formed in 1967, featuring his guitar and vocals, the jazz-tinged drumming of John Wilson and intricate bass playing of Richard McCracken. Recordings of the earlier version of Taste are still available and it's interesting to compare Rory's rudimentary guitar playing to the virtuosity that became evident fairly soon after in the later Taste. Taste released two studio albums, Taste and On the Boards, and made two live recordings showing the band at its incendiary best, Live at Montreux and Live at the Isle of Wight.

In 1970 Rory went solo, hiring bassist, Gerry McAvoy from Belfast, and various drummers, the most notable being Rod De'Ath. McAvoy would remain with Gallagher throughout his career. He released more than a dozen albums, among them Rory Gallagher and Deuce from 1971, Blueprint and Tattoo from 1973, Irish Tour from 1974, 1975's Against the Grain, featuring his old worn out looking Fender Strat on the cover, and Calling Card in 1976. His brother Dónal Gallagher was his manager.

A shy and humble man, Rory never married and had no children. Instead he devoted his life to his music, especially the blues. He played and recorded what he said was "in me all the time, and not just something I turn on ...". Though he sold over 30 million albums world wide it was his marathon live performances that won him greatest acclaim. His passion and skill for the blues is well documented in the 1974 film "Irish Tour '74" directed by Tony Palmer. Rory had the fortune to play with many of the genre's biggest stars, including Muddy Waters on tracks recorded in London in the early '70s.

In 1972 he was voted Melody Maker's Top Musician of the Year, dethroning Eric Clapton. His album Live in Europe has been a big selling album not only in Ireland but also internationally. Generally regarded as one of the top ten guitarists ever, many of today's top musicians, including The Edge from U2, Slash of Guns N' Roses fame, Johnny Marr of the Smiths and Brian May of Queen cite Rory as an inspiration in their formative musical years. Brian May recalled in a 2015 documentary “We’d go and see Rory every week and [be] open-mouthed at the way the guy played, the person he was, and the way he interacted with his audience – the way he could just hold people by tapping his foot or his fingers or whatever he did, He was just a magician as far as we were concerned, as an entertainer, and funny enough he probably wouldn’t think of himself as an entertainer.”

Rory lived for a time in Belgium and from the late 1980s suffered increasingly poor health yet he continued touring. His final performance, by a visibly unwell man, was in February 1995 in the Netherlands. Rory Gallagher died in London on 14th June 1995 from complications following a liver transplant.

Rory's Battered Stratocaster

Rory was always associated with his famous well-worn sunburst 1961 Stratocaster, which currently resides in the custody of his brother Dónal Gallagher who has officially retired it. It was reputedly the first in Ireland, first owned by Jim Conlon of the Royal Showband who decided he wanted a red strat instead, so it was sold to Rory for just shy of 100 quid. The guitar was never intentionally modified, but years of touring and stage use have instilled it with many idiosyncracies. The most notable effect that years of touring have had on the strat is the almost complete removal of the guitar's sunburst finish, though being left out in the rain in a ditch for days after being stolen from Rory also had a large effect on the strat's condition. Other quirks include a 'hump' in the scratch plate which moves the neck pickup closer to the neck on the bass side and a replacement of all of the pickups, though this replacement was due to damage rather than a perception of a tonal inadequacy. Reproductions of the guitar have been produced by Fender, though with smaller frets and lower action than the original. These reproductions, though accurate in the parts used down to the single white dot used to replace a clay dot at the 12th fret, have had criticism aimed at the quality of their 'relic' paint job. In 2024 Donal Gallagher announced that he had decided to sell the strat - “Since 1995, I have always felt that there was a mission to be fulfilled to cement Rory's legacy and widen the knowledge of his music,” he says. “So, in what is one of the most difficult and sensitive decisions to reach, I have decided to facilitate the release of his instruments for sale, so that these emblems of his legacy can be enjoyed by others.”.

Albums released during Rory's career

1. Rory Gallagher - 1971
2. Deuce - 1971
3. Live In Europe - 1972
4. Blueprint - 1973
5. Tattoo - 1973
6. Irish Tour '74 - 1974
7. Against The Grain - 1975
8. Calling Card - 1976
9. Photo Finish - 1978
10. Top Priority - 1979
11. Stage Struck - 1980
12. Jinx - 1982
13. Defender - 1987
14. Fresh Evidence - 1990

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