The Strougers “Faster Than The Ramones”
The Strougers from; Dublin Active; 1977 – 1981
Style; Punk
Original Line Up:
Vocals & Guitar; Pete “The Roz” McCluskey
Lead Guitar; Denis Rusk
Guitar; Noel Kelleher
Bass; Shay Hiney
Drums; Denis “Chopper” Byrne (R.I.P.) 2015
Main Line Up:
Vocals; Gerry “Bitzy” Fitzgerald
Vocals & Guitar; Pete “The Roz” McCluskey
Lead Guitar; Denis Rusk
Guitar; Noel Kelleher
Bass; Shay Hiney
Drums; Brendan Byrne Drums
Formed in September 1977, The Strougers were one of the original Navan Road Pop/Punk Bands. Pete McCluskey was a founder member of the band. Pete played a left handed flying “V” guitar & also wrote all the bands original songs. He was with the band until 1979. Gerry “Bitzy” was a punter at the first Strougers gig at the Navan Road Assembly Hall. They also played one date on the infamous “Dream Date” tour, filling in for “The Boy Scoutz” at Carrickmacross. The Strougers also played at The Dandelion Market on 3 occasions. Denis was in The Citizens before joining The Strougers and would later be in New Career, Cuba Dares & Venetian Blonde. Bitzy is still playing today as the front man for fabulous Lee Harveys.
Stac Coll U2’s sound engineer ’78 – ’80
“The Frames [the ORIGINAL Frames], the best band that never got anywhere, & The Strougers, a bag of laughs who were musically adept & blessed with Bitzy’s presence.”
Danceline Records
Pete & Eddie Joyce formed Danceline Records in 1988 featuring the latest indie Irish music. Check it out at WWW.Dancelinemusic.com
Many thanks to “Bitzy”, Shay, Denis & Peter for their help with this page!
Memories of Denis
Denis Rusk In 1978 I was a mere 18 years old and the punk revolution was in full swing. I was playing in s band called the Strougers and we enjoyed respectable success in Dublin playing hundreds of gigs and we developed a reputation for delivering tight well rehearsed power pop sets that were reminiscent of the undertones and the Ramones. Joey even wore a strougers badge at the Ramones gig in Cabra and dedicated a song to us. We made our first TV appearance that year playing two songs on TX with Dave Heffernan in the chair. I genuinely thought the recording had been lost but lo and behold it surfaced on the internet last night. It’s of its era and it was great to see it again after 40 years. But I hardly recognise the young handsome man I used to be!. That’s me on the left with the black guitar. The link contains the entire show and our two songs start at just after 4 minutes. So once more for posterity, here it is.
https://www.youtube.com/embed/FCiepZp9J60?feature=oembed
Found this video cassette when de-cluttering attic, and got it digitised on Saturday (spurred on by Bitzy Fitzgerald Andrew Keating Jeff Muir and Eugene Connolly at the recent Reasons gig!) Sound ain’t bad after nearly 40 years! We were in the studio in RTE that day with The Undertones & The Outcasts….we got very little camera rehearsal time so some camera angles not great! Future Generation written and arranged by Peter McCluskey, (10 Years) It’s Enough by Bitzy musical arrange Bitzy Denis Rusk and myself. Know I an biased…but great songs.
Denis covered some of it in his post ,but as The Strougers – Bitzy, Pete, Denis, Noel Kellegher,
Drummer Brendan Byrne , myself, original drummer Denis Chopper Byrne (RIP) and part time / occasional members Martin (Galo) Gallagher and Deirdre Lynch – we had cheers beers and tears! Enjoy this blast from the past