Taken from The Southern Star published on Saturday, July 2nd, 1977

By Con Downing

AN ESTIMATED 9,000-10,000 jean-clad young people invaded the normally quiet Muskerry capital of Macroom last week-end for the much-heralded Rory Gallagher pop concert.

Gallagher, at right, who charged £10,000 for his appearance, entertained the massive crowd for two hours and the event went off without untoward incident of any kind.

Since the concert cost £23,500 to stage, the organisers say they just broke even on the promotion.

In a hard-hitting address to the gathering at the Rory Gallagher Concert at the Macroom Mountain Dew Festival last Sunday, the guitarist's personal manager and brother, Donal Gallagher, severely criticised R.T.E. television authorities for not even sending one camera to cover the largest ever Rock Concert organised in this country.

He stated that this showed how blatantly the young people of the country were being ignored and appealed to all present to take up their pens and to write letters of protest to R.T.E.

Donal thanked the crowd for being so orderly, stating that their good behaviour had allayed the fears of many people and gave hope for further concerts of the type.

He appealed to them to co-operate with the local Geardai after the show so that people could see that they had come strictly for the music.

Master of ceremonies for the day was Radio Eireann Disc Jockey, Ken Stewart, who reiterated Donal Gallagher's remarks, before introducing the first act of the afternoon, local band Sunset.

They played a pleasant set with Paddy McCarthy on drums, beating out a good rhythm to songs including three originals by lead guitarist Andy O'Sullivan.

Incidentally, the band's bass guitarist, Eric Ketteringham, was Rory Gallagher's original bassist.

The audience warmed appreciatively to the Cork group's performance.

Next came English group Nutz, who produced a really full heavy rock sound with the aid of a synthesizer.

This group hail from Liverpool, with the exception of Kenny, the keyboards player who comes from Whorley just down the road near the coast.

At Coolcower House later that evening I spoke to lead guitarist Mike Devonport, who told me that all the group members' parents were of Irish origin.

He also spoke of an incident where on the night before the concert, he phoned ahead to Macroom to check that reservations for their accommodation were in order.

The lady who answered the call said that she knew nothing of the booking and stated that as far as she was aware the band were due to stay at another hostelry in the town.

"But we're Nutz," protested Mike, to which the lady wittily retored, "You certainly must be to come here for one day like this."

Happily, everything was sorted out and Nutz had a roof over their heads that night.

Sonny Condell, backed by Supply, Demand and Curve, took the stage after Nutz.

The Irish folk singer did a competent acoustic set.

Then came another folk singer, this time Belgian Roland Van Campenhout, who supplied some deft touches on guitar and was well-received by the crowd of almost ten thousand people basking in the June sunshine in the Castle Grounds.

Then at 5.30 p.m. came the moment the crowd had waited so patiently for—the appearance of Rory Gallagher on stage, bedecked in strow hat and suede jacket.

This brought the audience to their feet as they cheered on their hero through a selection of his big hits like "Going to My Home Town," "Too Much Alcohol" and "Messing with the Kid," which he did by way of an encore.

...All in all, it was a successful event.

The organisers broke just about even financially, the crowd behaved themselves creditably and the town was not wrecked.

More important, everybody there had a good time, which is the essence of the whole thing.

It seems that there is a bright future for this type of event.

The main credit for organising it so successfully must go to Donal Gallagher, but we must not forget the trojan work of the eleven directors, especially Mick Lynch, Pat Kelleher, John O'Callaghan, Pat O'Connell, Martin Fitzgerald, Donal O'Callaghan and Denis Murphy.

When the history of Irish Rock Music is written in years to come, I think these men of vision deserve special mention for their tireless efforts towards its betterment.

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