HELLO GOODBYE
Gavin Friday and the Virgin Prunes
It began with punk and youthful bravado. But as members bled out, maturity called a halt.
A plum gig: The Virgin Prunes backstage at the Project Arts Centre, Dublin, September 18, 1978 (from left) Strongman, Pod, The Edge, Derek ‘Guggi’ Rowen, Bono, Elsie (fan) and Gavin Friday; (at the front) Dik Evans and Dave-id Busaras.
Patrick Brocklebank, Peter Rowan
HELLO OCTOBER 12, 1978
We all knew each other even before the band happened – myself, Guggi the other singer, the bass player Strongman, the original drummer [Pod]. We all grew up on Cedarwood Road in Dublin, the same road that, you know, Bono grew up on and all of that. It’s not that rare for a bunch of 12-,13-year-old boys to make up an imaginary world and give each other names. The name Virgin Prunes – basically, anyone that was a bit of a weirdo, we’d say, “Yer man’s a bit of a prune” – we had that as 15-year-olds. We had a gang, but the real glue was music, and an actual special dislike for sport. None of us liked football.