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Bio:
Legendary Belfast band, contemporaries of Them, with guitarist Herbie Armstrong.
The Wheels began life as The Golden Eagles. Rossi and Armstrong had both
earlier been members of the Manhattan Showband. Rossi was a distinctive
front man with his shaved head (he also has a tattoo of a wheel on his
scalp).
The original rhythm
guitarist was Kit Carson who left during a residency in Blackpool
in 1964. He was eventually replaced by Rod Demick in late 1965, who
sang most of the R & B numbers, while Rossi was more
of a crooner and did the more sophisticated material.
The band built up a very strong following in the North of England
and went on to record several wild beat singles.
The Wheels recorded "Bad Little Woman" twice, once for the Irish/UK
market as The Wheels and once for the U.S. market as The Wheel-A-Ways.
The American version came out on Aurora Records and it is
generally considered the best of the two. The B-side is an R&B tune
with piano and harmonica.
"Bad Little Woman" was covered by Chicago legends The Shadows of Knight.
Brian Rossi left after the second and was replaced by Eric Wrickson (AKA Eric Wrixon,
ex Them, The People)
who appears on the last single "Kicks". He later joined The Trixons.
Brian Rossi rejoined the band for a final tour
in 1967.
All Wheels singles tracks are compiled on the Belfast Beat Maritime Blues CD
along with five previously unreleased reccordings, making 12 tracks / 32 minutes
in all, making this CD an essential purchase.
Almost certainly not related to obscure Belfast group the Wheels of Time.
Help!: We need your help to complete this entry. If you can tell us more about this band then please do! We welcome any corrections, missing details, connections to other bands, where are they now, etc. We also need photos, scans, copies of releases or live or demo recordings, and any other memorabilia gathering dust in the attic.