| ▪ Caption/Abstract: | | Gomez open their UK tour with an evening at Inverness Ironworks on Wednesday 15th November 2006.
Gomez are;
Ian Ball (Guitar, Vocals),
Ben Ottewell (Guitar, Vocals),
Tom Gray (Vocals, Guitar, Keyboards),
Olly Peacock (Drums),
Paul Blackburn (Bass),
Dajon Everett (Instrumentalist).
The genesis of Gomez was the meeting of four friends from Southport. Guitarist and vocalist Ian Ball and drummer Olly Peacock had previously played together in a local heavy metal band called Severed. They joined with guitarist / vocalist / keyboardist Tom Gray and bassist Paul Blackburn. Ian Ball met vocalist / guitarist Ben Ottewell from Matlock Bath in Derbyshire at Sheffield University, where they were both studying.
The band played their first gig together in late 1996 in Leeds without a formal name. The band left a sign out for a friend of theirs whose surname was Gomez to indicate that it was the site of their first gig. People saw the sign and assumed that the band's name was Gomez - the name stuck.
The band started recording four-track demos in a garage in Southport soon after. A bidding war erupted when they sent the demos to recording labels, with the band finally signing with Virgin Records' subsidiary, Hut, in 1997.
Their debut album, 'Bring It On', won the Mercury Music Prize in 1998, although so far this is the only Gomez album not to have charted in the US. |
