Before collaborating with Paul McCartney to form Wings Denny Laine was a member of what legendary group?

Answer 1

Denny Laine (ne Brian Hines) was a member of a number of groups, starting with Johnny Dean and the Dominators (he as Johnny Dean), which morphed into Denny Laine and the Diplomats.

After unsucessful attempts to procure a recording contract with the group, Laine took up the offer to form a sort of Birmingham supergroup with Mike Pinder and Ray Thomas (El Riot and the Rebels), Graeme Edge (Gerry Levene and the Avengers) and Clint Warwick (The Rainbows). Initially the group was called the R&B Preachers but changed to the M&B 5 in a shrewd attempt to obtain sponsorship and performance locations from the local brewery, Mitchell & Butler. When that failed, the band stayed with the initials, calling themselves the Moody Blues 5 and then simply the Moody Blues.

When follow-up singles to the phenomenally successful Go Now! failed to ignite the charts, Denny Laine grew frustrated and, in the autumn of 1966, called it a day and left (to be replaced by Justin Hayward). For the next five years, he took part in a number of bands, including the Denny Laine Electric String Band, Balls, the Denny Laine Band, Ginger Baker's Airforce, Burton, Laine and Gibbons and the initiation of a true solo career that resulted in the album Ahh... Laine!

In 1971, Laine was contacted by Paul McCartney (a friend from the early part of the sixties when The Beatles and the Moody Blues regularly performed and partied together and even shared a house for a while) to join a new group he was forming. McCartney had released Ram earlier that year with wife Linda and drummer Denny Seiwell performing with him on it. Maintaining that threesome and with Laine making the quartet, the band was called Wings. Starting off at small venues such as student dance halls at universities, the band grew to international stardom that almost reached the following of the Beatles. Other than the McCartneys, Laine was the most faithful band member, staying with it through seven line-up changes before McCartney wound the band up in April 1981. During this time, Laine released a Buddy Holly covers album, Holly Days, which involved the McCartneys (therefore, really a Wings album but with Laine on all lead vocals). The band also released two singles under pseudonyms: Suzie and the Red Stripes (Linda on lead vocals) and the Country Hams (Paul in the harness).

After the demise of Wings, Laine embarked on a solo career releasing several albums through the eighties, although the second version of the Denny Laine band was resurrected to record new versions of Go Now! and Say You Don't Mind as a double A-side.