My friend Michael Roberts, usually known as Mick, who has died in his sleep aged 57, was the charismatic singer with the Leeds band the Bridewell Taxis. They emerged alongside the Stone Roses and Happy Mondays in the late 1980s/early 90s indie-dance boom. Although they never made it as big as their “Madchester” counterparts, the Bridewell Taxis’ exuberant audiences included a young Liam and Noel Gallagher. They were championed by Roxy Music’s Phil Manzanera, who became their executive producer.
I first met Mick when I interviewed him for Melody Maker and recognised that behind his cheeky grin and rapscallion image was a sensitive soul, whose wonderful lyrics insightfully captured the pressures and vulnerabilities of working-class life. “He was a poet,” said Paul Weighell, who signed the band to Empire Music Publishing in 1990. “Such a crying shame that he and the Bridewells did not become household names. Seeing them playing to a completely packed Leeds Warehouse was one of the best gigs I ever witnessed.”
Born in Stalybridge, Greater Manchester, Mick grew up in Cross Gates, east Leeds, one of the four children of a printer, also Mick, and a home care manager, Susan (nee Miller). He attended Corpus Christi Roman Catholic high school. In 1987, aged 19, he married Samantha Cogger and they had a son, Christian. He took various short-lived jobs before joining the band Morality Play, soon renamed the Bridewell Taxis after a local nickname for police vans.
Armed with Mick’s heartfelt vocals and Chris Walton’s distinctive trombone, the band headlined larger venues such as the 1,800-capacity Leeds Coliseum (now the 02 Academy) and their singles made the independent charts. Sadly, trouble at a London show scuppered a potential major record deal. After Mick was stabbed in the throat in a Cross Gates pub trying to stop a fight – he required reconstructive surgery and lost most of his hearing – the group gradually disbanded, having released the compilation Invisible to You ’89-’91.
Mick fronted a remodelled line-up called the Bridewells, who played live, and released an EP, Smile (1992), and an album, Cage (1993), on Manzanera’s Expression Records. Their final performance was filmed at Leeds Warehouse for ITV, in April 1993.
Deafness had an impact on his confidence, but Mick studied art at Thomas Danby College in 1999 and while he eventually withdrew from a subsequent degree course at Leeds Metropolitan University, he managed the band’s comeback tour in 2005, “feeling” the music through his feet. In 2013 a box set, Bridewell Revisited, was released, containing their complete output.
Mick’s sister Lee explained that he was left “broken-hearted” after the sudden death of their younger sister Beverly last year, but had never stopped making pottery, painting and writing lyrics. “I found crateloads of them in his flat,” she said. “Just words and words and words.”
Mick and Samantha divorced in 2000 but remained friends. Mick is survived by Christian, his parents and his sisters, Lee and Amanda.
