The Belfast Gypsies' career lasted a bit over a year, but their history was remarkably convoluted for a group so short-lived. In 1965, the members of the great Irish R&B band Them were feuding, leading them to split into two factions. Both versions of the group were touring the U.K. as Them until a legal decision gave Van Morrison's version the rights to the name. However, those rights didn't extend around the world, and the version led by keyboard player Pat McAuley toured Europe and the Netherlands as Them, while playing in England as the Other Them. The Other Them crossed paths with notorious American producer Kim Fowley, who signed the act to a record deal. By 1967, an album comprised of Fowley's British sessions with the Other Them, combined with other material cut in Copenhagen, was released in Sweden, months after the Other Them broke up. However, Fowley didn't like the name the Other Them, and released their music under the name the Belfast Gypsies, a moniker the band never used themselves. The Swedish label gave the LP the confusing title Them, and record stores filed it with their former band's releases more often than not. Given the strange story of the Belfast Gypsies' sole album, one might not expect much from the finished product, but the truth is, Them is a solid and satisfying blast of U.K. R&B, and better than the albums the post-Morrison Them would release. Keyboard player and lead singer Jackie McAuley sometimes overdid his efforts to sound like Van Morrison (with some Eric Burdon thrown in), but at his best he was a fierce R&B howler, and his brother Pat McAuley, moving from keys to drums, was an energetic and imaginative percussionist. Add Ken McLeod's razor-sharp guitar on numbers like "Gloria's Dream" and "People, Let's Freak Out" and Mark Scott's steady, muscular bass work and you get a band that was well-versed in R&B, blues, freakbeat, and garage-centric rock. Even when they slow down on numbers like "The Crazy World Inside Me" or "Portland Town," they maintain intensity and excitement. It's sometimes obvious this album was cut quickly on a budget, and not all the material is top shelf. Still, Them (or Them Belfast Gypsies, as some fans call it) deserves a wider hearing and better exposure than it received in 1967; if they had stuck around for a few years, it's not hard to imagine they could have matured into serious rivals to the Pretty Things.
© Mark Deming /TiVo