MOJO RECORDS
THIS PAGE IS STILL UNDER DEVELOPMENT, MORE WILL BE ADDED
SOON.
The first incarnation of ‘The Producers’. The band began in 1990 as an offshoot from
several others, namely ‘The Rolling
Drunks’, ‘Ringo Chubb and the
Screaming Toiletfish from Mars’ and ‘Manitou’. The name came about because we didn’t
know what to call the band and had to supply a quick answer at an interview
with the Bournemouth Echo. We had been watching the film of the same name
the night before. This photo-montage shows the personel of the first
line-up Pete Hibbit (drums) Harry Skinner (guitar /Vox) Dave Thomas
(keyboards, bottom right) who were all from the rock band ‘Manitou’. Peter was a founding
member of the Ringo Chubb band
and Harry was occasionally involved in the ‘Chubbs and the blues / R and B outfit for which Dave Saunders
played bass, ‘The Rolling Drunks’. Bottom left shows Dave Saunders (Bass) and Hugh
Budden (centre on harmonica). In the very early days Hugh was not a regular
musical contributor to the band however as things progressed he became a
full time member of the band.
Following the departure of Peter Hibbit and Dave
Thomas in the early 90s (this coincided more or less with the finish of the
band ‘Manitou’ too, The Producers sought replacement players
on drums and keyboards. The new members were, on drums, Brian Wright (2nd from the left) who had
been a regular contributor to Bob Pearce’s and Pete Harris’s Southampton
bands, amongst others and Barrie Cole on keyboards (2nd from the right).
Barrie had been a student at Bournemouth and Poole college (studying music)
and came straight into the band for a tour of Ireland following a very
short audition at the college and a gig in Wimborne the night before the
band departed.
The
Producers mark 3. Following the departure of Barrie Cole the
band decided to remain as a four piece. By now the band was well
established and apart from having a number of albums under their belt had
attracted a strong following nationwide and in Europe. This photograph was
taken whilst on tour in Belgium. Hugh was later replaced by guitarist Tommy Allen and
after a short while, multi instrumentalist Dave Allen (aka Dr Stomp). Dave
only stayed with the band for a short while and was himself replaced by
Simon Kenevan on harmonica. The band stabilised again with Simon and the
line up stayed this way until the band finished. Neither Tommy, Dave or
Simon actually recorded material with the band in the studio though some
live recordings do exist (hopefully these will appear on this page soon) As
yet we have not found any photographs of these later line ups.
