GRAND SLAM

There are many lost futures in the ever-twisting history of rock’n’roll, and Grand Slam is perhaps one of the most tantalizing. After the sudden and shocking dissolution of Thin Lizzy in 1983, Lizzy frontman and hero to us all Phil Lynott rebounded with a new band full of friends old and new, including then-current Lizzy members Brian Downey and John Sykes, and Magnum keyboard player Mark Stanway. Grand Slam was a fresh start after a decidedly rough patch for Lynott, who was deep in a drug haze that he desperately wanted to climb out of. Sykes famously left to join the revamped, hair-tousling version of Whitesnake, and an old acquaintance of Phil’s, Stampede guitarist Laurence Archer, was brought in.

The band wrote new songs and played familiar venues, but nothing much ever came of it. A few live tapes made the rounds in the tape-trading circuits, a demo or two, but that was it. There was no album. Phil did a couple of solo things and then, in 1986, he passed