Crucial Three

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Crucial Three was a very short-lived band but notable because of the individual success of the three founding members: Ian McCulloch (later of Echo & the Bunnymen), Julian Cope (who went on to join The Teardrop Explodes and then release many albums under his own name) and Pete Wylie (later of many "band names" usually featuring the nonsense exclamation Wah!). McCulloch sang, Cope played bass, and Wylie played guitar. A drummer, Stephen Spence, also joined at some point in their brief life.

History

The band formed in May 1977 and split in June 1977. Rock journalism's favourite observation about the brevity of this outfit is that all three egos were much too large to fit in the same room.

According to Cope the trio met at Erics night club in Liverpool on May 5th 1977 during a gig by The Clash; "By the end of the evening, we were a group. It was all Wylie's trip. He suggested Arthur Hostile & The Crucial Three. Duke [McCulloch] said, 'Sod the bloody Arthur Hostile bit off, it's crap.' So we were The Crucial Three. Wylie went on about how legendary we would be, and Duke and I went along with him, as part of the in-joke."[1]

Although they wrote and rehearsed a number of songs, they weren't a band long enough to record anything. According to McCulloch, the band were "..just mates - we never did anything. We wrote one crap song." [2]

Some of their songs have seen the light of day posthumously, most notably the Cope/McCulloch collaboration Books, which appeared on both The Teardrop Explodes's and Echo & The Bunnymen's respective first albums (although the Bunnymen version is titled "Read It in Books"). Robert Mitchum, another Cope/McCulloch collaboration appeared on Cope's 1990 album Skellington. The song Spacehopper from Cope's solo album Saint Julian was also written during his time in the band, allegedly with some help from McCulloch. [1]

The Crucial Three underwent a name change and together with Mick Finkler, and Dave Pickett became the even briefer lived 'A Shallow Madness', McCulloch's non-attendance at rehersals led to Cope taking over vocals and thus The Teardrop Explodes was born. [2]

The well publicized animosity between Cope and McCulloch finally reached a boiling point when Cope fired McCulloch's friend Mick Finkler from The Teardrop Explodes. [2]

The memory of the Crucial Three was revived in 2004 by BBC Radio 2 DJ Mark Radcliffe whose show features a nightly quiz of the same name. The quiz is introduced on alternate evenings with recorded announcements by McCulloch and Cope. Wylie has yet to contribute.

References

• [1) Cope, J., (1994), Head-On: Memories of the Liverpool Punk-scene and the story of The Teardrop Explodes (1976-82). Thorsons ISBN 0722538820
• [2] Fletcher, T., (1987), Never Stop: The Echo & The Bunnymen Story. Omnibus Press ISBN 0711911215