Lyres were the creation of vocalist, keyboard player, songwriter, and uncontested leader Jeff Conolly, who formed them in 1979 shortly after the demise of his like-minded group DMZ. Lyres quickly became mainstays on the Boston rock scene and were one of the key bands on the garage rock revival scene of the '80s, on the strength of the albums On Fyre (1984) and Lyres Lyres (1986). Conolly was nicknamed "Monoman" partly because of his love of monophonic recordings of the 60's, and in part because of his monomaniacal obsession with vintage rock & roll. He was born in Albany, New York, moving first to a town near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and then to Darien, Connecticut, by which time he'd already began playing keyboards, and had developed a taste for the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, and Paul Revere and the Raiders. He fell in with a group of musically minded peers in his teens, and hoped to attend music school, but his parents had other ideas, and in 1976 he enrolled at Boston University, although he soon dropped out to play rock & roll. One of his friends at BU, Adam Schwartz, was singing in a band called DMZ, whose style blended raw 60's sounds with the speed and attitude of the burgeoning punk rock movement. Conolly saw DMZ play at a party, and was impressed by them, but Schwartz was soon bounced from the line-up for seeming too mannered, and seeing an opportunity, Conolly volunteered to take his place, and became their lead singer while also playing electric piano. Following the release of an EP on the esteemed independent rock & roll label Bomp! Records in 1977, Sire Records offered the band a major label deal, but their 1978 self-titled debut album, produced by Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan of the Turtles and Flo & Eddie, didn't capture the full impact of their live show, and by the end of that year, DMZ had split.
By January 1979 Conolly had put together Lyres, who eased back on the 70's punk facets of their music to focus on 60's-style material, with Conolly moving from piano to a Vox Continental organ, and featuring just one guitarist instead of DMZ's two. The first Lyres performances featured the final DMZ rhythm section of Rick Coraccio on bass and Paul Murphy on drums, with Rick Carmel on guitar, and this line-up cut the first Lyres single, 'How Do You Know' b/w 'Don't Give It Up Now', for Sounds Interesting Records in 1979. By August the band has splintered, and Conolly recruited guitarist Alex Kronos, bassist Scott Parmenter, and drummer Bob Mackenzie for live work, but the final line-up of Peter Greenberg on guitar, Mike Lewis on bass, and Howie Ferguson on drums didn't finalise until mid-1980. This line-up would record the first Lyres release for Boston's Ace Of Hearts Records, a four-song EP that came out in 1981 called 'AHS-1005', with the record winning the group attention outside of Boston. The single 'I Really Want You Right Now' b/w 'Help You Ann' followed in 1983, but that line-up of Lyres soon disintegrated, and Dan McCormack came aboard to play guitar, while the initial rhythm section of Rick Coraccio and Paul Murphy returned to the fold. This was the band that recorded the first full-length Lyres album, 1984's 'On Fyre', which was a powerful set that featured five original tunes and five covers, with the band sounding solid enough that it was hard to tell which tunes were which. The album earned great press and good sales for an indie release, and this line-up of the group stayed together until the dawn of 1986. After Johnny Bernardo replaced Paul Murphy on drums, Lyres returned to the studio to cut their second album, 'Lyres Lyres', released by Ace Of Hearts in 1986, which was a more contemplative set than the debut, with a greater number of Conolly originals, and it was once again successful, with the band touring North America extensively.
1988 saw the release of their third album, 'A Promise Is A Promise', which included guest appearances from Stiv Bators of The Dead Boys and Lords Of The New Church, and Wally Tax of Dutch beat-era heroes The Outsiders, alongside another Lyres line-up, with Conolly, Murphy, Jack Hickey on guitar, and Matt Milkos on bass. This line-up played shows in North America and Europe, while in 1988 they also recorded a version of Love's 'Signed D.C.', later used for an Arthur Lee tribute album, with Judd Williams taking over on drums. In 1989, Conolly decided he'd grown tired of Boston, and moved to San Diego, California, assembling yet another version of the band, with three members of the group the Nashville Ramblers, guitarist Carl Rusk, bassist Tom Ward, and drummer Ron Silva, but by 1991 he'd returned to Boston, and re-formed the Carmel/Coraccio/Murphy line-up. This edition of the group cut the 1993 album 'Happy Now', which was released on their new label, Taang! Records. From the mid-90's onward, Conolly continued to perform with Lyres, often in lineups featuring Rick Coraccio and Paul Murphy, but the group's recording activities were limited to singles for various specialist labels, including Telstar, Feathered Apple, and Living Eye. In 2015, Conolly began work on a new Lyres album, and launched a crowdfunding campaign to help finance the project, although to date the record has not appeared. Lyres are the perfect band for this type of post, as they released a lot of stand-alone singles, each with two new songs on them, and so this two-volume set collects all the non-album tracks from those releases into one place. There have been a number of compilations released over the years, but they all omit some of these songs, so this should be the definitive collections of rarities from the band.
Track listing
Disc I - 1981-1991
01 Buried Alive (from the 'AHS 1005' EP 1981)
02 In Motion (from the 'AHS 1005' EP 1981)
03 High On Yourself (from the 'AHS 1005' EP 1981)
04 What A Girl Can't Do (from the 'AHS 1005' EP 1981)
05 I Really Want You Right Now (b-side of 'Help You Ann' 1983)
06 Someone Who'll Treat You Right Now (single 1985)
07 You've Been Wrong (b-side of 'Someone Who'll Treat You Right Now' 1985)
08 I'll Try Anyway (b-side of 'Someone Who'll Treat You Right Now' 1985)
09 Stacey (b-side of 'How Do You Know?' 1987)
10 Jezebel (b-side of 'Touch' 1988)
11 Go-Go-Girl (b-side of 'Touch' 1988)
12 Signed D.C. (from the Arthur Lee tribute EP 'Unloved', recorded 1988, released 1994)
13 We Sell Soul (single 1991)
14 Busy Body (b-side of 'We Sell Soul')
Disc II - 1992-1995
01 How Can I Make Her Mine (b-side of 'Nobody But Me' 1992)
02 Gettin' Plenty Lovin' (b-side of 'Baby (I Still Need Your Lovin')' 1992)
03 Boston (single 1993)
04 Shake It Some More (b-side of 'Boston')
05 Self-Centered Girl (single 1993)
06 What's A Girl Like You Doing In A Place Like This? (b-side of 'Self-Centered Girl')
07 Stay Away (single 1994)
08 Grounded (b-side of 'Stay Away')
09 Don't Tell Me Lies (single 1994)
10 Baby It's Me (single 1994)
11 I'll Make It Up To You (b-side of 'Baby It's Me')
12 "7" (single 1995)
13 Feeling No Pain (b-side of '"7"')
14 Give Your Love To Me (Come On) (single 1995)
15 Security (b-side of 'Give Your Love To Me')
