The years 1974 to ’78 were good to Thin Lizzy. The Irish rockers had expanded into a quartet, welcoming Scott Gorham into the fold. Gorham and Brian Robertson on electric guitar would ultimately prove to be the power-up their sound would need.
It gave us one of the greatest live rock albums of all time, Live & Dangerous. Gorham, the easygoing Californian, and Robertson, the fiery Scot had chemistry – even if the latter’s fieriness would often see him fly too close to the sun.
This golden era yielded Jailbreak and Johnny The Fox, but also had its share of drama. Like the time Robertson had to sit out most of 1977’s Bad Reputation after he got injured in a fight at the Speakeasy, in London’s West End.
The incident sank their much-anticipated US tour – Robertson was meant to be flying out to New York the following day. Furthermore, the damage was serious. Robertson had severed a tendon, and wasn’t sure if he would play again. That’s what the doctor told him. Robertson maintains that he was trying to keep the peace, and stop an inebriated Frankie Miller from being bottled.
“The glass went straight through my fingers, then sliced down and cut the tendons and nerves. It cut an artery as well, so there was blood spouting all over the stage,” said Robertson, speaking to Classic Rock in 2017. “I had to have a blood transfusion and I was in surgery for quite a while. They put a cast on it, and basically told me I would never play guitar again.”
Robertson insists he was sober. He just went out for dinner, pepper steak, a couple of whiskies tops. But Thin Lizzy’s management – and especially frontman Phil Lynott – knew what he was like. Robbo liked a drink and a scrap. Who would believe him? Gorham told Classic Rock that Lynott was “beyond livid”.
Brian didn’t like to take orders
Scott Gorham
“He was enraged that Brian could put the band in jeopardy like that,” said Gorham. “Everybody in the band knew how important this tour was for us. Phil was beyond being able to speak, even. So Brian was out of the band right at that moment.”
Gary Moore was hastily drafted. Thin Lizzy would make it to the States. Those who had been watching closely might have predicted it would end this way. Gorham had seen this sort of volatility at first hand. And if the Speakeasy incident was understandably a fraught chapter in the band's history, other blow-ups were over the most trifling matters.
In a recent interview with Guitarist, he revealed that Thin Lizzy nearly split up in a row over Robertson’s newly grown beard.
“We’d just had two weeks off and Robbo had grown a beard,” says Gorham. “Phil says, ‘I’m the only one with facial hair, man – you gotta shave that thing off.’ Of course, Brian’s going, ‘Fuck you, man!’ ‘Well, if you don’t, you’re out of the band!’ How trivial can you get?”
More trivial is the answer to that. You can get more trivial.
“So Robbo says, ‘All right, I’m quitting the band!’” recalls Gorham. “And I’m going, ‘Whoa, I just quit my band, put all my eggs in this Thin Lizzy basket, and now we’re breaking up over a fucking beard?!’”
This was par for the course. Gorham says Robertson was not good at taking orders, and in Thin Lizzy, Lynott was driving the show – “he was the guy who hired your ass!” – whether Robbo liked it or not. And he did not.
“Brian didn’t like to take orders,” says Gorham. “It was the masculine struggle of who’s gonna be the dominant person. Well, we all knew who the dominant person was. It was Phil!”
