big country comprised stuart adamson (formerly of skids, vocals/guitar/keyboards), bruce watson (guitar/mandolin/sitar/vocals), tony butler (bass guitar/vocals) and mark brzezicki (drums/percussion/vocals). before the recruitment of butler and brzezicki an early incarnation of big country was a five-piece band, featuring peter wishart (later of runrig and now a scottish national party mp) on keyboards, his brother alan on bass, and clive parker, drummer from spizz energi/athletico spizz '80. parker had approached adamson to join his new band after the demise of skids.