In 2019, It Bites’ drummer Bob Dalton announced the band had split up. Two years on, the band’s 00s albums, The Tall Ships and Map Of The Past, have lovingly been remastered and reissued amid rumours that new material could well be on the way. Prog caught up with Dalton and John Mitchell to find out the real story behind their stormy past.

Words: Dave Ling Portrait: Tom Barnes

Standing tall: Bob Dalton, John Mitchell and John Beck in 2008.

“We tried to get John Beck and Bob Dalton involved in the sleevenotes, but it was like getting hold of Lord Lucan and Jesus Christ.”

John Mitchell

The saga of It Bites could easily fill an entire issue of Prog. Formed in Cumbria in ’82, the quartet made some of the most exciting music of the 1980s before crash landing in the most spectacular fashion in the early 90s during the buildup to their fourth album. Having just completed a tour that included a date at London’s Hammersmith Odeon, expectations from fans and their record label were sky-high, and the band flew to California to write and record. What happened next perfectly highlights the volatility that went hand in hand with such Olympian levels of creativity.

“Frank’s first conversation with me in Los Angeles was: ‘Let’s get rid of John Beck,’” recalls drummer Bob Dalton. “He had decided that we should become a guitar band like The Black Crowes.”

The Tall Ships (2008).

Although Frank, aka guitarist/vocalist Francis Dunnery, was the group’s talisman, the other three members – Dalton, keyboardist John Beck and bassist Dick Nolan – realised that Dunnery, who was heading out of the door, was more of a loose cannon than they had suspected. The first chapter of the It Bites story was over.