Icebreaker

The original line up from 1987

• Mick Morris (Guitar Vocals)
• Jack Castle till '87( Guitar Vocals)
• Derek Bowley ( Lead Vocals)
• D Evans (Bass) - Max Hoad
• (bass & vocals)
• Matt Hoad (keyboards)
• Bob Brown (drums).

Since Mick Morris and Jack Castle had both left Easy Action, they had continued to talk on and off about getting together again and forming a new band. In late 1985, they got back together with former Mirkwood singer Derek Bowley. Max Hoad joined them on bass and vocals. Mick and Jack had known Max for some time and had tried to get him to join Mirkwood some years earlier, but Max had been in demand in jazz circles and also played on and off with Vanity Fayre so it hadn't worked out then. The drum seat was taken by Fred DeGrussa, another former member of Easy Action. Due to other commitments however Fred was unable to continue and his place was taken by the excellent and now sadly departed Bob Brown. The line up was completed when Max' son Matt joined on keyboards.

Strangely, the new group didn't really have a name for some time! At the beginning this didn't matter much as it was more of a fun project in that they were playing together mostly for their own enjoyment and were content just to play occasionally. Matt's contribution quickly proved to be a cornerstone of the sound - so much so that when in 1987 Jack left the area to move to Wales, the band decided that Matt's expansive keyboard sounds would enable them to cope without looking for another guitarist. Incidentally Matt also provided the band with a much needed name - ‘Icebreaker’ was the name on the label of his padded jacket!

The newly named group started to play more venues becoming very successful and continuing until the end of 1996. By then they'd had a good run but during the mid 90’s started to feel that what they wanted to play didn’t correspond with what some of their audiences wanted to hear.

Mick Morris has said that from a guitarist’s perspective, he remembers thinking that, “ ….. whilst on the one hand I was pleased that Brit-pop was making guitar-based groups fashionable again, it wasn’t what we wanted to play. Although we took some liberties with the music, Icebreaker was essentially a covers band featuring the cream of material from great bands like Toto, Van Halen, Journey, Queen, Bon Jovi etc. and we’d been spoiled by having had nearly ten years of indulging ourselves - playing superb music that featured challenging instrumental and vocal parts for all of us. Whatever, the new stuff just didn’t do it for me!”

Inevitably there were changes of personnel over the years but the group maintained its popularity throughout. Among the other musicians who made valuable contributions to the sound of Icebreaker between 1990 and 1996 were Ken West, Paul Cuffley, Tony Lister and Jason McCluskey (drums), Tony Holt (guitar, keyboards, vocals) & Sean Flynn (bass).