T-BiRDMAN BAND
  • Blondie's Blues
Biography
T-Birdman originated on a Thursday in the mid-seventies at an open mic talent night, an off night at Mattero’s T-Bar in Milmont Park Pennsylvania. The T-Bar drew major live bands from the New York, New Jersey and the Philadelphia areas. It was the place to be at that time and it was usually packed. The T-Birdman Band was assembled from members of the audience which meant the nights were never the same. Suddenly, Thursday nights were packed and the T-Birdman (AKA Mike Manley) was rocking the house with his original songs, wild and zany stage antics with a top hat and eyes painted blue. One night T-Birdman had a fight with “Bug Man” on stage, it was really something.

Although the realities of life took T-Birdman in a different direction, those times were simply the best of times. There was actually a silent 8mm film clip of the T-Birdman performing live at the T-Bar In December of 1976...a real hoot! You can see an updated version with the some of the new music at www.tbirdmanband.com

Thirty-five years later Facebook arrives on the scene and suddenly people are able to get in touch again in the most incredible ways. Mike ended up finding people he hadn’t heard from in a billion years. Most of these people were from the T-Birdman days and the T-Bar. They would go on and on about those T-Birdman times. In fact, many only knew Mike as the ‘T-Birdman’.

One of T-Birdman’s greatest friends was Skip Smith, just simply a great guy in every way. They would talk about the T-Birdman days for hours at a time, for months. In those days Skip would pick up T-Birdman in a new Winnebago and drive to the T-Bar for every performance. Along the way the party started and the girls would put the final touches on T-Birdman’s outfit, it was incredible, they had the best time!

Through their conversations Mike learned that Skip had been very sick over the last couple of years fighting cancer. Skip now lived in Fort Myers Florida, which was about 3-4 hours away from Mike. Skip asked how much it cost to record a song these days. T-Birdman said he had no clue; it had been thirty-five years! Skip wanted the “Five Day Love Affair Blues” song recorded because he said it was the greatest blues song he had ever heard...and he had to have it. T-Birdman said not to worry and he’ll get ‘er done! Skip was going off to try some experimental treatment in Philadelphia and T-Birdman headed to the studio to record the song. They planned to listen to the tune together at Skip’s place in a couple of weeks.

A few days later T-Birdman had an appointment at the Palm Beach Sound Studio, owned by Chuck Hemann. T-Birdman commented to the owner, “I felt like a caveman, a fish out water with no clue how things are done these days with all this new technology”. Here’s an excerpt of how T-Birdman tells the story..

So, I told Chuck what I wanted to do and that I was the T-Birdman, you should have seen the look on his face! I told him I was the greatest blues-rock singer of my time, you should have seen the look on his face! I told him when we finish this song we will have a hit on our hands and he could possibly win a Grammy. You should have seen the look on his face! I finally said, “Don’t worry, let’s just do this song and have some fun.”

They began recording and what started to come out of that studio was nothing short of miraculous. Just by sheer chance T-Birdman had background singers and a saxophone player who worked with Aretha Franklin’s band and a guitar player who played with Eric Clapton’s band. He had other players with masters’ degrees in music and a Grammy nominated engineer, and of course there was T-Birdman.

T-Birdman called his sister Theresa and filled her in on what was happening. Here’s a little of that exchange:

She said “You guys are just living your second childhood” and I said “really”? She said “really, but that’s ok because that’s just the way you men are, go and have some fun”. I said “really”? She said “really”! After thinking about that for a while I figured she was probably right, so that’s how the title of the album, “Second Childhood” was born.

After a few long weeks the music tracks were laid down and T-Birdman returned to the sound room to sing the vocal track. Not remembering all the words he called another great friend of his Michael Carr who was the original drummer in the T-Birdman Band. During that conversation he mentioned there might be an old recording of one of the live performances. He couldn’t find it before the recording appointment so T-Birdman went in there and sang the song as he remembered it. The result is exactly what you hear on the album. “The 5 Day Love Affair Blues” with only one take, and it remains on the final cut.

About two weeks later Carr found the cassette tape and sent it to T-Birdman. WOW! What a flashback! It was exactly the way it was thirty-five years ago! Along with the cassette tape there were two 8mm film clips and a few photo negatives. The film and images are some of those you see in the promotional material today.

While all of this was going on T-Birdman continued to check in with Skip, updating him about the song, the newly discovered tapes, and the original film. He loved all the news and couldn’t wait to hear the tune. T-Birdman couldn’t wait either to share the tune, so he played a little bit of the song over the phone. They concluded with absolute certainty that it was in fact the ‘greatest blues song of the twenty-first century’. Skip insisted that they release an album and he was confident that every song was a hit. He told T-Birdman that as soon as he started feeling a little better he was going to buy a new Winnebago. He had already talked with the dealer and plans were set to go on a World Tour. This was getting serious!

T-Birdman told his son all about Skip, what a great guy he was and all the fun they had. T-Birdman planned a long weekend trip to Fort Myers with his son, to visit Skip along with other mutual friends. They loaded up the car, had the CD with the song ready to go and they planned to leave early the next morning for what was sure to be a wonderful time. Late that night T-Birdman got a phone call from another great friend, James Montgomery Chamberlain XIII, with news that Skip had passed away earlier that day.

Although greatly saddened by Skip’s death, T-Birdman was inspired by his dear friend, and motivated more than ever to complete the collection of tunes that Skip would have called “The Greatest Blues Songs Ever Written”.

Mike Manley is ‘The T-Birdman’

The "BirdMan" is BACK! Not a flashback...but the best rockin', drivin' blues ever heard!
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  • Profile Last Updated:
    08/14/23 20:55:05

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