Founding member Paul has served with Major Accident since day one, and apart from a short stint in around 1978, has been on vocal duty throughout.
He has been lead vocal on every official song recorded by MA except for an alternative version on That’s You on the B-side of Mr Nobody that featured Dave and the cover of Get Ready on the Crazy! album that was sung by Con.
Interesting fact: Paul’s infamous grandad haircut (above) led to many awkward conversations with people on tour in 80/81 when people would try to avoid looking at it believing he had gone baldy at 17 years old. TO be honest it was nothing compared to the shock that his mother got when she woke him for work the morning after he returned late from the tour.
Con Larkin
Bass
Founding member Con has served with Major Accident since day two, and endured the ride till he got married in 1986 and called it a day. The band split shortly after but Con was pivotal in the reformation of MA in 1996 and stayed ever since
He has played bass on every song recorded by MA except for a version of Sherwood Rangers released unofficially in the 90s. Ritz (now of Gimp Fist) stood in to play some dates in France in 1987 when Con originally packed in.
Interesting fact: officially the handsomest, smartest, wittiest and coolest member of Major Accident, he is still jibed about the time he tried to heat a tin of soup in a charity shop pan over a candle in the back of the Major Accident truck and spilling the contents into the back of Dave’s portable TV.
Dave Hammond
Guitar
Founding member and Branksome lad Dave has served with Major Accident since day one, and has been a mainstay most of the years since. His style of guitar came from the fact that we only had cheap copy instruments and amps and the sound of sustain was something we could only dream about.
He played guitar on most recordings apart from the Crazy! album and is responsible for failing for 40 odd years to get anywhere with his “Let’s not drink too much this time lads” line before each gig.
Interesting fact: Dave had to have a finger on his left hand amputated after a building site accident. We put out the story that he had to relearn how to play guitar left handed. Truth is he was already left handed anyway.
Laze (Andy Lazenby)
Drums
When Major Accident reformed in 1996 Laze came on board as drummer after honing his skills with Darlo ska band The G Men.. He played on The Ultimate High, Step By Step 7″ and The Cry Of The Legion, and every gig we played since 1996.
He was our first “band whore”, playing for other bands as well as Major Accident including Last Rough Cause, No Fun and The Struggle (Andy W was our other band whore).
Interesting fact: Despite easily being the youngest member of the band, Laze achieved the name of “Dad” as he would organise everything while the older members were too interested in the call of the bar (and I don’t mean the legal one) and were/are good for nothing in that arena.
Andy Wears
Guitar
Andy was the singer, bass player and songwriter for Last Rough Cause who would regularly support Major Accident in the early 80s. He joined when we reformed in 1996 and played lead guitar on the Ultimate High album, and played many gigs in Europe and UK.
Andy wrote some great songs in his time with us including Lies and Worst Enemy.
After leaving he reformed Last Rough Cause and recorded another album with them.
Interesting fact: Andy is legendary for “not giving a flying fuck” how he looks and would turn up to rehearsal in his son’s discarded track pants that were unsuitable for human interaction, leading to his nickname Rab C Wears! He is also the only member to crash a Major Accident tour vehicle into a brand new Mercedes car.
Timmsy (Ian Timms)
Guitar
Ian was a long term friend of the band and roadied for us on several European tours. He strapped on the guitar when Andy decided to leave around 2000 and played lead guitar on the The Step By Step 7 inch and the Cry Of The Legion album, and played many gigs in Europe, USA and UK.
Interesting fact: Ian was a lifetime fixture in most of the pubs in Darlington but has recently gone incognito, and nobody knows what he is up to these days. He was deaf in one ear and was famous for being able to plug his Gibson Les Paul into his Marshall amp and step forward to play with a guitar sound that sounded like his speaker was bubble-wrapped and in a room 3 doors down. Even Laze, a drummer would get up and twiddle the knobs for him while he stood there non-plussed.
Stu Lee
drums
Stu grew up on Branksome Estate in Darlington, same as Paul, Con and Dave. Stu was incredibly old – mid 20s when he recorded the Massacred Melodies album and the Mr Nobody single.
He also played on the demo version on The Glorious 9th. Stu toured the UK with us to promote Massacred Melodies when we supported Chelsea
Sadly Stu passed away a few years ago. RIP Stu!
Interesting fact: We once left Stu at a service station north of London when people in the back of the van (yes a Ford Luton not a minibus) thought he was sitting in the fron and thos in the front assumed he was in the back.
It was summer and he was dressed in only a pair of football shorts and trainers. It can get bloody cold in the UK on a summer evening!
He managed to blag a lift to London in a minibus of girl guides but by the time we picked him up at Tottenham Police Station that night he was famously resembling a refugee, wrapped in a blanket, hugging a mug of soup – At least he didn’t have to heat it over a candle.
Evo (Paul Evans)
Drums
Evo joined the band at the second attempt. After his first audition Con told him he was way too slow to play at the frantic pace we were churning out at that time (oh yeah, and get a haircut). Fair play to him, he went away and came back again next time we needed a drummer and he had spent the time in between battering the hell out of the skins a blinding pace. The hair remained the same tho.
He recorded the Fight To Win and Leaders of Tomorrow singles and toured the UK with us when we were supported by The Blood and Dogsbody. After that tour he jumped ship and joined The Blood, then The Angelic Upstarts.
Interesting fact: Evo went on to form his own band Warfare and grew a huge cult following around the world and were generally considered to be at the forefront of the thrash-metal genre. Warfare have recently released an album, featuring some big names like Fast Eddie Clark, Nik Turner and Paul Gray. He did ask Con but he had prior commitments.
Andy Harding
Guitar
Andy was the first “Lead” Guitarist to join Major Accident and his style immediately gelled with the progressing Major Accident sound. He wrote solos that fitted the song rather than showed off how flash he could be. testament to this are 2 of the greatest punk guitar solos in my opinion on Respectable and Affliction. (BTW Affliction featured lyrics by along with Twisted Mind. Peter Roper who sent them to us in around 1983. Peter is the mainstay behind Oi band Retaliator these days).
He recorded on the Leaders of Tomorrow single and the A Clockwork Legion album. He also toured the UK with us to promote the Respectable single.
Interesting fact: Andy once met the band at The 100 Club after not being able to travel with the band due to work commitments. He struck lucky on the train and ended up sitting next to a bloke who had a full crate of Newcastle Brown Ale for the journey. He collapsed unconcious on stage that night, but I think we got away with it!
The Big G (Gareth Jones)
drums
Gareth hailed from the market town of Thirsk and worked at North Yorkshire County Council. He has been to more punk gigs than possibly anyone in the UK. He recorded the drums on A Clockwork Legion and Tortured Tunes. Between recording his tracks he would sit in his car to listen to cricket on the radio – how english is that!?
Gareth jumped ship in favour of his job when we first got to visit USA. Evo filled in for him at short notice.
Interesting fact: Gareth was a 100% die hard Accident member until the night Major Accident and 999 gigs clashed! Gareth phoned in a sickie, saying he was unwell. He turned up at the 999 gig!! Oh by the way Gareth has a 999 tattoo.
Staps (Paul Staples)
Guitar
Staps originally played for Blind Attack from Crook and they supported Major Accident on several occasions. After joing Major Accident he recorded the Crazy! album and toured France (twice) and Holland in the drum seat. His whereabouts are currently unknown. His last contact with us was in the 90s.
Interesting fact: Big Accident fan Staps had a self made Major Accident tattoo on his arm. The tattoo started about 3cms on the M and shrank to about 1cm on the last t of Accident. Till this day it’s not known if this was a design to give a 3D effect, or if he misjudged the amount of ink he had or the tattooing experience was too painful he wanted to get it out of the way quickly
Rich (Mark Richardson)
Drums
Rich hailed from Bishop Auckland and joined in 1985. He played many gigs around UK and the swan song shows in France. He played on Sherwood Rangers that surfaced later on Clockwork Heroes. It’s possible that the warm up covers on Clockwork Demos were from that session as well. He now lives in New York
Interesting fact: When the band were returning from France in the 80s, the custom officials were checking the bands equipment, they started to unscrew the scratch plate of a guitar, Rich laughed and said, ‘is that where you hid the drugs.’ Custom officials weren’t laughing, full strip search for the lads. Ben Dover!
Porky Stephenson
drums
Porky is a Darlo lad and recorded the first version of Massacred Melodies that was dumped due to the idiot sound engineer messing the sound up by losing the entire top end by adding Dolby noise reduction. Porky came up with the classic Schizophrenic guitar riff. He is also the only member of Major Accident to sport a “tache”.
Interesting fact: Rehearsing was hard enough in a cold haunted attic above a shoe shop back in the day, but half the time would be spent waiting for or searching for Porky. Usually we would track him down to a local wood where he would have an air rifle and a couple of jack russell terriers indulging in his favourite pass time – “ratting”.
Col Stephenson
Drums
Col is the younger brother of Porky, and they lived less than 2 minutes walk from the site of our first couple of gigs at Skerne Park Youth Club in Skerne Park Council Estate in Darlington. I can only imaging how bad we were at those gigs but we must have had something cos Col was there and wanted to drum for us! I actually have a very very bad quality cassette recording of one of them but i can’t bring myself to listen to it! Although Col was mad into punk he loved reggae more and left to play in a reggae band.
Interesting fact: Col was drumming when Major Accident bagged a “residency” at the Teessider pub in Middlesbrough in 1978. The second time we played some of Col’s friends came along (including infamous Darlo punk Bri A) and they were under age, as was Col and in fact was Paul and Con. The landlord decided to kick them out and we gave them the old “If they aren’t allowed in then we aren’t playing!” And so ended the extremely short residency at the Teessider.
Craig Newnham
Drums
Craig joined Major Accident right in the very first couple of weeks, when we all listened to Johnny Rotten when he said anone can go and start a band. Craig went and signed his life away to buy a drum kit, never having sat behind a kit prior to this. It soon became apparent tho that he didn’t have even a vague sense of timing. Doesn’t help when you are the drummer. So he would spend a lot of the time kicking the drums over in the couple of gigs that he did. At one of those gigs at Skerne Park Youth Club we were supported byt The Eels of Sex, a Darlo band that featured a chap we knew as Rod the Mod, who went on to become the vey famous Vic Reeves.
Interesting fact: Craig used to keep a rat in his bass drum but told his mother it was a giant african mouse. Craig remained with the band as roadie and was an original member of the Darlo Droogs.
Ritz (Chris Wright)
bass
Ritz was a close friend of Staps and stood in on bass to play a few gigs in France when Con called it a day. He plays bass on Sherwood Rangers, the only official Major Accident that doesn’t feature Con on bass. He was called Ritz because he was crackers!
Interesting fact: Ritz is now known as Chris and plays bass in one of the best punk bands of current times, Gimp Fist
The Man
Legend
The Man is a total legend and the inspiration for countless tattoos. He appears in one form or another on all Major Accident output.
Interesting fact:
In early days Craig had a mural of The Man painted on the wall of his gaff. After a night on the ale we all piled back there for after hours entertainment at which more ale and other substances were enjoyed. During the intro to Hawkwind’s Space Ritual some that had partaken in the sort of refreshment that cries out for the mighty “Wind”, reported that the man was actually floating around the room watching them like a hawk, which led to the song “The Man on the Wall”. Is he on the wall or is he in my head?
Major Accident Truck
Transport & Digs
The Major Accident Truck needs to be included as it was our constant transport, friend, hotel, and even almost killer on one occasion.
Interesting fact:
Most of Major Accident plus over a dozens others almost met their deaths on the road to London to play a gig at The Bridge House. The engine had overheated and caught fire on the A1M. The guys in the cab at the front decided to carry on till a suitable pull in point could be found, unaware the the smoke was filling the rear of the truck through slots in the floorboards (yes really!). When we finally pulled over and opened up the back bodies came rolling out coughing and spluttering, eyes streaming, black faces, rolling about on the floor. Was quite funny to those of us up front!