Ian McNabb

United Kingdom

Liverpool

The Cavern Club

Ian McNabb - Live at the Cavern Club

English singer, songwriter, and guitarist Ian McNabb is a long-standing voice of British pop, with a melodic rock style that he's used to explore both the introspective and the excitingly extroverted over a decades-spanning career. McNabb got his start in the '80s as the principal songwriter for the Icicle Works, but his work as a solo artist developed consistently from the time of his band's breakup in the late '80s until well into the 2020s with output like his 1996 album Merseybeast, 2013's Eclectic Warrior, 2024's New Brighton Rock, and many other projects arriving regularly.

McNabb was born in Liverpool in 1960 and formed the Icicle Works in 1981 after playing in various cabaret groups as a teenager. Over the ensuing decade, the Icicle Works became lesser players in a scene of proto-college rock/pre-indie bands that included the Psychedelic Furs, Echo & the Bunnymen, the Teardrop Explodes, and the like. The original lineup of the band broke up in 1988, and McNabb continued leading the project with new players for a few more years before debuting as a solo artist under his own name with 1993's Truth and Beauty. Throughout the '90s, he would collaborate with members of Crazy Horse on his 1994 Mercury Prize-nominated album Head Like a Rock, tour occasionally, and release two other full-length albums, 1996's Merseybeast and 1998's A Party Political Broadcast on Behalf of the Emotional Party. In addition to maintaining a prolific solo presence throughout the 2000s, McNabb worked briefly as the bassist in Ringo Starr's band, reactivated the Icicle Works name for some concerts in 2006, and published his autobiography (also titled Merseybeast) in 2009. His songwriting continued to grow both on-stage and with regular new studio output. Throughout the 2010s and 2020s, McNabb released new music at a clip of one new album every few years, with collections like 2018's Our Future in Space and 2024's New Brighton Rock being added to the growing highlight reel. ~ Fred Thomas, Rovi

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