Original Members of the Band Nazareth Embroiled in Name Dispute
Even small-town journalists can experience encounters with celebrities. This weekend, I had a celebrity encounter over the phone.
Pete Agnew, of Nazareth fame, was calling my small-town newspaper from overseas before taking the stage in Germany as part of the group's 40th anniversary tour.
What rock fan has not jammed to the tunes of "Love Hurts" and "Hair of The Dog"?
For those with no knowledge of the band here is some background.
According to former band member Manny Charleton's Web site, Charleton started out as a guitarist in the 1950s with a band called Mike Satan and the Hellcats. In 1968, Charleton joined The Shadettes. The Shadettes were formed in 1962 by Agnew and Alfred Murray in Scotland.
Soon the band consisted of McCafferty, Charleton, Agnew and Darrell Sweet and the group changed their name to Nazareth in 1970.
Charleton was with the band until 1990. Since then he has performed solo and as members of other bands.
Billy Rankin replaced Charleton and performed with Agnew, Darell Sweet and Dan McCafferty and Jimmy Murrison and Ronnie Leahy joined the group in the '90s. Sweet passed away in 1999 and Lee Agnew stepped in as the drummer.
Pete Agnew was calling my small-town newspaper to express his concerns with Charleton, who is playing in America and calling his band Nazareth.
Charleton and his American band members were scheduled to perform in Oklahoma that night.
Agnew wanted to make sure that fans knew they were not going to be enjoying the original sounds of Nazareth, as he and the others were on tour overseas in Germany.
Agnew said that Charleton and other former members of legendary rock bands are teaming up with a company out of Florida called Artists International Mangement, (AIM).
The former members tour the country using the name of their former bands. To some the marketing tools are not clear, and some fans may think they are seeing the original band.
Charleton and his new bandmates are the second group to come to our town.
A few months ago, Bad Company, featuring former lead singer Brian Howe, came to town and Molly Hatchet is scheduled here in May.
Agnew and the others have posted a press release on their Web site, www.nazarethdirect.co.uk about Charleton and his group.
Charleton's promotion has not set well with Agnew as he indicated he is in a court dispute with Charleton.
A press release on the AIM Web site, www.aimrocks.com, states that TMZ has confirmed the court dispute.
The release reports that other legal proceedings brought against Charleton has been dismissed and that the overseas band and its Candian agent maybe under investigation.
In my opinion, which probably means very little, I would refer to the guys overseas as the real Nazareth. To me it only makes sense. However, I'm sure a court somewhere will make a ruling one day.
If you are a true fan of Nazareth, you would probably enjoy see Charleton's band as well, since he is a part of the band's original roots.
Other promotions by the AIM group include: BTO, Dr. Hook featuring Ray Sawyer; Firefall, and The Little River Band.
I believe true fans of the bands will do their homework and know if they are about to enjoy the sounds of the real thing or not.
In the meantime, a note to all journalist, be nice when you answer your phone, you never know who will be on the other end.
Published by Marie Lowe
I have a degree in journalism and work for a daily newspaper. In 2005 I was honored as the Oklahoma Farm Bureau Journalist of the Year. Have just entered the fourth year of my mother's battle with ovarian... View profile
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15 Comments
Post a CommentInteresting, esp. for a small town journalist, eh?
Interesting report. Glad you straightened it out for us:)
Saw (what I consider to be) the real Nazareth last night in Letchworth. (UK) Absolutely brilliant! Pete Agnew is one heck of a bass player... and best of all he looks like he enjoys it.
Reminds me of a very similar dispute concerning Deep Purple and former lead singer Rod Evans. The whole episode eventually cost Evans dearly, and he lost mad stacks of Benjamins in settlements, and rights to royalties for the albums he appeared on.
I have seen Nazareth with Manny and without Manny.Both versions were very good.I have seen Manny with his solo band and the Nazareth tunes they played sounded great.Look Manny was a very important part of Naz's career till he left.Besides playing guitar he also produced some of the bands albums.Are Dan an Pete also important in the career of Naz's career,definitely.They just need to figure this out.I think Manny just got tired of getting no respect when trying to get his solo career going so figured using the Nazareth name was his way to really get some respect back.Manny released some real good solo albums under the Manny Charlton Band.MANNY is based around Dallas,Texas and has been for awhile now.
As a longtime and avid fan of Nazareth, my opinion is, there is only one true band called Nazareth. That band would be the overseas version with Dan McCafferty at lead vocals and Bass Player Pete Agnew. Nazareth could never be Nazareth without Dan's unique sandpaper voice.
lead singer Dan Mcafferty, Drummer Darrrel Sweet, Bass guitarist Pete Agnew, Lead guitar Manny Charleton
It appears i left some of their first names off, just click on the link to Manny Web-site and the history is there.
Does anybody know who the original band members were?
Very interesting article. If anyone thinks this sort of thing hasn't been going on for a long time, check out the history of 'The Surfaris', best known for the song 'Wipe Out.'