...weren't they on that fairly poor NWOBHM collection 'Metal For Muthas'?? As for Rage, did they feature a member called John Mylett? I believe that's the guy Fish of Marillion wrote a song for, called 'Mylo'.

Most of the bands I really love are well before my time anyway but some I really think should be better known:

Rare Bird- an early prog band on the Charisma stable, much admired by Genesis' Tony Banks and Mike Rutherford if the recent 'Chapter and Verse' book is anything to go by. Their first two albums for Charisma are fantastic but I disliked the soft rock direction they went in when they signed to Polydor. Had a great vocalist in Steve Gould, who ended up on a dodgy Dave Greenslade solo effort called 'Cactus Choir' but I don't know of any other albums he was on.

Web- yes another band from the prog era but they had more of a jazz-rock influence a la Blood Sweat and Tears/Colosseum. Never heard the first album but the 2nd, 'I Spider', is fantastic. Again, the lead singer defected to work with Greenslade but their albums aren't really a patch on 'I Spider', IMHO.

Spring- another prog band, I'm afraid. They did one album for RCA Neon which had tons of Mellotron and really great songs to boot. A second from the period has now been released but I haven't heard it.

Billy Nicholls- his album 'Would You Believe' attracted a cult in recent years and it's well worthy of it, IMHO. A lovely bit of psych-pop that was released briefly on Immediate before being withdrawn.

Always had a soft spot for these guys, not least because Clive Gregson proclaimed his love for early Fairport, and looked as much of a geek as me. Saw them live several times, from the (last night, no less, of the) Nashville Rooms, to 2nd on the bill at Birmingham Odeon (to Judie Tzuke). Always seen very much as 2nd string costello-lite I fear, he went on to the estimable Clive Gregson, not unreasonably, & Christine Collister, 80s stalwarts of the Folk Circuit, and regulars in Richard Thompson bands of the day. Still plugging away as a solo artist, sometime member of Plainsong and backing band memeber of Dennis LaCorrieres touring band, he is a thoroughly decent cove. Recent Any Trouble reformation shows no shortage of songs, but now they all look like their dads, and it ain't a good look.

But the topic merits the response.

Lost Heroes?

Pele/Amsterdam, Ian Prowse's two bands of the '80's/'90's.

Pele so nearly made it big but were beset with record company problems despite the strength of their material. I point you in the direction of their debut album 'Fireworks' and the songs 'Raid the Palace', 'Fair Blows the Wind For France', 'Megalomania', 'Fat Black Heart' etc.

Dropped by their label because 'guitar bands were out of fashion' just before Britpop happened.

After scratching around for a while Prowsey resurfaced with Amsterdam, the best by far of the recent crop of local Liverpool bands, with loads of great material. Brilliant live, wonderful, intelligent tunes (Feels Like Growin' Up, Love Phenomenon, Joe's Kiss....) but no commercial success to speak of.

I commend the last album (The Journey) and the forthcoming album (Arm in Arm, actually got a review in Q this month).

Also, Prowsey is a thoroughly nice bloke. My son was doing a project for his Media 'A' level, got in touch with Ian via his MySpace page and met up with Ian in the studio for an 'interview' and chat about this and that. Ian was absolutely top, no need at all for him to give my lad the time of day but was more than happy to do it - nowt in it for him at all, other than the opportunity to make one 17 year old kid extremely happy.

Ian Prowse. Nice guy. Great musician. all round excellent bloke.

Imagine the best bits of The Beatles, The Beach Boys and XTC with the production fireworks of Phil Spector, and the sound quality of George Martin

The first album Bellybutton is great, but the follow up Spilt Milk is simply stunning. The keyboard player Roger Manning went on to work with Beck and start the Moog Cookbook

Am I the only man in christendom to own all the albums (including Live At The Venue and the single album version of Wrong End of The Race) and every vinyl single? Probably. My admiration knows no bounds.

I like Any Trouble, I bought the Pele single "Fair Blows The Wind For France" and Jellyfish's "Bellybutton" album.

But I used to really like the Q-Tips. And The Farmer's Boys - they were great.

early '76 - Sounds briefly touted them as the Next Big Thing - swept away by punk unfortunately. Only heard a few of their songs but remember thinking they were really good. Don't know what became of them.

Also - Girls At Our Best - perfect early 80s punkpop. Should have been massive but never troubled the charts.

When I lived in Dublin in the late eighties I went to see them play every week. Fronted by a great songwriter, Pete Cummins, who obviously revered Dylan and Terry Allen, and Frankie Lane (sic) who played electric table and sang dementedly on a brilliant version of Allen's What of Alicia, they were totally Country & Irish. Their guitarist for a while was Henry McCulloch out of Wings and the Grease Band and they were held in high regard by all the other established Dublin musos, fielding guest appearances by odd Waterboys, Nanci Griffith and Mary Coughlan. I loved them.

This band should have been gigantic, but ruffled too many feathers. "Around The World In 80 Days" is one of the greatest songs ever recorded.

Is it just me or is that one of the crassest, most indefensible album covers ever?? Instant berth in the hall of shame also populated by Scorpions, UFO and other bands too ghastly to recall.

I was very keen on a band called Mandalay - I only ever heard 3 singles from late 90s though wikipedia tells me that they had 3 albums. (Amazon beckons I think...)

Also really loved the single This Is Your Life by Banderas. They only had 2 other songs before apparently disbanding.

2 really lovely voices that I liked a lot.

I was always a huge fan of the band Easyworld, fronted by David Ford who crops up on the Word CDs from time to time. They were a bit more pop and a bit less earnest than Mr Ford, but had a couple of albums with some cracking tunes on

Whatever became of these maniacs?

I often saw them playing support, but alas they seem to have fizzled out sometime mid 70s. I'd always thought that they played really well, and held a lot of promise.

They were, like Stray, one of those bands who, upon seeing their name in the support slot, assured you that your investment in a ticket would be worthwhile even if the main band turned out to be pants.

...Own their albums and they get regular plays.

Stray are seriously overlooked, yet they have some famous admirers. Captain Sensible of The Damned is a big fan, I believe (he's also into other great overlooked acts like Egg and The Groundhogs), and Iron Maiden covered 'All In Your Mind'. The first three albums are very innovative heavy rock albums; I've generally always preferred the heavy rock of the 70s to most of the metal that emerged in the mid-80s. The later Stray albums are a lot less interesting, though- I owned 'Stand Up And Be Counted' and they'd gone really dull. Heard various later songs on a best-of and none were anywhere near the quality of the early albums.

Overlooked but influential. But this was an era for lost heros. I'd like to nominate Satan's Rats. Great live band and a handfull of great 45's. Ditto Radio Stars, Penetration and a hundred others.

I was going to mention Stray - I had the first 3 albums on vinyl and had really fond memories of them.Bought the 2 cd anthology last year and it is a great piece of nostalgia.

My other mentionables would be Edgar Broughton band and City Boy.
I have a twofor of Broughton stuff which includes one of my all time favourite songs across the rooftops.Havent yet got any City Boy into my solely disc only collection and i feel a visit to Amazon is imminent. I remember one peculiar song with the words'I first got my chance at the Oddball dance'.

Also,in another thread someone mentioned Man - I have a desire to put some into my collection but dont know where to start - i recall some of the stuff being a bit sloppy but then other songs being on the money.I remember the Deke Leonard solo albums being pretty decent - any pointers for where i should start?

When I were a lad, a friend of mine had "Be Good to Yourself" and it were fab. Roll on many a long year of disappointment with the next new big thing, and I wondered how it held up. The Man website told me how it wasn't even considered one of their best, cos Deke Leonard was on sabbatical. So I bought the above, a 2 cd best of. Yay, it had the 2 long tracks I loved and remembered from (gulp)'72, but largely, yup, you've guessed it, unlistenable claptrap. Still pleased with the purchase. 6 songs made the trnsition to i-pod, btw,which is a stackload better than the dire Tom Baxter, which somehow Unshod (or Slomo, I forget) tricked me into trying recently

The sole album, "Play It By Ear" should have been the first of many, but circumstances conspired, as they do, and the band never made it any further.

There's a CD compilation called "Cincinnati Fatback" that I recommend if you like tight funky pop music of the kind Mr Costello made famous shortly afterwards. Funny how he looked just like Danny Adler, the Roogalator head man.

...but at this point, a band called The Seers, late eighties, Bristol. Punky psychy pop, fronted by a skate punk called Spider with a voice from a Nuggets compilation. Two albums, handful of singles, then split.

Oh, and what about Sensation, formerly trading as Soul Family Sensation? One Little Indian outfit, tried to fuse classic pop songwriting with classy Chicago house music. Came pretty close imo, as well.

Great name and a great band. Neverneverland is a brilliant debut album. Another band who showed so much promise but sadly fell by the wayside.