IN THE BEGINNING...
Early 2006, workmates Lee Brierley, a guitarist, and Mick Morley, a bassist, got together to form a new band. Under the temporary name of Monkey Bum Head they recruited fellow colleagues, guitarist Jonny Corrigan and drummer Tom Murray, into what was primarily a covers band. Within a few weeks, they had become The Legoheads, named after a new girl at work whose hair-style resembled that of the plastic-headed toys from Denmark.
Lee and Jonny shared the role of lead and rhythm guitar as and when it suited the song and playing styles. In addition, as it was Lee and Mick who took care of most of the vocals, Lee couldn't always cope with intricate lead and remembering all the words to a song in the correct order. Jonny promised to let us hear his dulcet tones in the near future whereas Tom, uninspired by the likes of Dave Grohl, remained firmly mute. A lead singer was never really considered. As Lee pointed out, "Who needs an egotistical front man...?".
The Legoheads played their first live event, from the back of a trailer, on 24th June and were warmly met by the crowd, despite the temporary absence of Jonny and the short 6 song set. Following that first gig, The Legoheads started working hard on getting some new songs sorted and a few more gigs under their belts. Lee already had a lot of ideas. He'd spent the last three years learning the precise lead to a whole bunch of songs and he wasn't going to piss away all that hard work... hence the Stone Roses set. It was Lee who also brought tracks from the likes of Razorlight, Jimmy Eat World and Foo Fighters. Mick's ideas were a little more on the quirky side and as a big fan of less obvious cover versions, he wanted to do something unusual. The results were a rocked up version of Kraftwerk's, "The Model" and a cover of The Sonic's, "Have Love, Will Travel". He also decided to beef up the "retro indie" feel of the set with covers of The Mock Turtle's, "Can You Dig It" and "Sit Down", originally by James. With Jonny being a big Oasis fan, it was just a matter of time before "Live Forever" and "Hindu Times" made the cover set. Tom would just bang along to any old shit that the other three played. Any attempt to get any of his favourite tunes into the set were met with, "fuck off you daft prick"...!!! The rest of the tracks in the early cover set were pretty much a contemporary selection of popular hits including Snow Patrol's, "You Are All That I Have", Arctic Monkey's, "Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor", The Strokes, "Last Nite" and Kasabian's, "Reason is Treason". There are some more vintage tracks from Nirvana (About a Girl) and The Cure (Boys Don't Cry) to complete the retro part of the set.
By the Autumn of that year, The Legoheads had built up two complete sets and were expanding further to give flexibility to their stage show. As well as more covers, the lads had also started to work on their own material...
Original Material
Despite lots of ideas and writing by the various members, the covers set took priority for the first year or so to bring in some money and pay for equipment. That said, the band had increasingly worked towards an original sound with each and every original song. The Brierley-Corrigan writing partnership proved most prolific in achieving this goal with quirky indie riffs and "slice of life" lyrics portraying the perils of getting pissed, having fucked up mates and shagging. By 2008 the band had built up a reasonable set of original material and in November of that year, they supported The Complete Stone Roses at Oxford's Carling Academy. The set for that gig included Alky Aspirations, Packet of Three, Rubbish at Girls, 22, In the Doghouse and Unbreakable, all of which can be found as rough demos if you know where to look.
Unfortunately, drummer troubles plagued the band throughout the first few years and as a result, progress from cover band to originals band wasn't as swift as the band had hoped. Good drummers are rare and finding one that fitted the band's image and ethos only made it harder. After several false starts with numerous stick bangers, the band eventually settled on Paul Fortnum. It would have been full steam ahead but then early in 2009, Mick announced that he would be leaving the band before the end of the year for a new life in the USA. Guitarist, Phill Mulvano was recruited and laid down his 6 string in favour of the bass. The latest line-up hit the studio in 2010 with some fresh tunes including Lee's childhood memoires, Bus Stop Thrills, and the scathingly funny Blonde Bombshell, along with a revamped early acoustic tune, Joanne's Song and the ever solid 22. All 4 of these tracks can be found on the music page or The Legoheads' Facebook and Myspace pages.