A second band of maniacs has been scheduled to perform at the McCauley Mountain Festival on Saturday, August 6—one that’s very different from the 10K variety—they are Mark Doyle and the Maniacs, a talented quartet out of Syracuse.
The eponymously named outift is the brain-child of Grammy-award winning producer and guitarist, Mark Doyle.
Signed to RCA in the early ’70s with his first band, Jukin’ Bone, Doyle has has gone on to record and tour with artists as varied as Meat Loaf, Judy Collins, Leo Sayer, and Hall & Oates.
He also contributed backing vocals and arrangements to Bryan Adams’ hit “Straight From The Heart.”
Later he became a producer for the New Kids On The Block.
In describing “Shake ’Em On Down,” his first record with The Maniacs group, Mark said he reached back to his earliest musical influences, specifically Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, Peter Green and Kim Simmonds.
“Old heroes die hard, and these were mine back when I was a teenager and first started playing the electric guitar. I’m sure [they] had their own heroes—‘authentic’ blues men like B. B., Albert, and Freddie King, Otis Rush, Hubert Sumlin and Buddy Guy, but I did not yet know of them, and only discovered them translated and morphed through the brilliant playing of those four English kids,” Mark said.
Their most recent album, “Comin’ Home,” was created as a way to preserve and respect the great music of the British Blues Boom era of the Sixties.
With an impassioned line-up that includes Frank DeFond on drums and percussion, Michael P. Ryan on bass and vocals, and Terry Quill on harmonica, second guitar, and vocals, this quartet has set out to preserve the pioneering sounds of Blues, Rock and British Blues.
And they are anxious to bring their performance to McCauley’s Old Forge audience.
“We’re thrilled to be a part of the festival!” wrote Greg Jackson, the band’s manager, on Facebook.
