Day 418

Lost Ships: Portsmouth, UK. A fine EP from the band that back in the 90s were The Kites. Remember I interviewed them? Anyhow, give yourself 15 minutes and check their new EP “Nostalgia” which is out now on Subjangle Records. 5 songs of jangly pop music. Nice!

Fresh: the London punk pop band is back with a new 12″ EP titled “The Summer I Got Good at Guitar”! There are few copies now of the record, so hurry. The EP has 5 songs of fun and catchy punky indiepop that definitely makes you miss going to gigs.

Cozy Slippers: two new songs by this great Seattle combo, “When Will When Come?” and “Be Alone With Me”. This is their latest digital release and doesn’t look like there’s a physical release. But don’t despair. The songs are available to listen on repeat of course. Poppy and fun. As always.

Pier Lights: the 3rd single from the UK band Pier Lights is out now. It is called “The Dunes” and is available on Soundcloud. It is a very nice piece of guitar pop with electronic sounds. The band is the side project of Rich May from The King of Mirrors and Jonathan Troy of The Hi-Life Companion. So you know, good stuff.

Tynall Tywyll: this is not new, but it is new for me. First time I’m seeing a live performance of one of the most wonderful bands, Tynall Tywyll! I wrote about them many years ago and until today I haven’t been able to get in touch with them. But this video of the band playing “Jack Kerouac” at the Heno Nol Yn TV programme, in 1991, makes you shiver of how good they were.

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A few weeks ago I interviewed Henry Does a Runner. When I asked which band they would recommend me they said Jo Jo Namoza. Also when I interviewed Resque they mentioned Jo Jo Namoza.  So here I am looking for info for this 80s Reading band.

I actually own a record that has a song of theirs, “Kissing the Babies”. It is the classic LP compilation “The Final Teaze” released in 1987 by Final Records (FINAL LP42). The funny thing is that they appear as Namoza. Maybe that’s why I didn’t make the connection. Also with thee name Namoza they appeared in a compilation tape called “The Fence” in 1989. This tape was put out by Tracksuit Tapes and it seems featured many great bands from the area, including The Rain and Feverfew (!).

On Discogs there are a few releases listed. There is a tape that has no date, probably a demo tape. It has two songs, “Kissing the Babies” and “Back at the Farm”.

“Live at the University of Surrey” is a live tape the band self-released in 1988. This tape had 10 songs, “Arabian Dance”, “Assault and Battery”, “Heartland”, “Monkey on the Floor”, “Casbah Accomadation”, “Elevator”, “Back at the Farm”, “African Heart”, “Kissing the Babies” and “Bamboo Houses”. This live gig happened in Guilford, on June 30, 1988.

In 1989 the band released their sole proper record, a 7″ with two songs, “Kissing the Babies” and “Flipside” on the flipside. This one came out on Acorn Records (ACOR 7), a label from Bramley that was foundeed by Mark Olrog and Bob Kiddle. Also worth noting is that “Kissing the Babies” is credited to N. Hawkins” while “Elevator” to Jo Jo Namoza.

Then I sort of hit the jackpot. There is a Facebook page for the band as well as a proper website. On the website, I find that prior to Jo Jo Namoza, in 1980, Mark Hawkins (keyboards), Steve Norris (bass/guitar), Kenny Stone (drums) and Neil Hawkins (vocals/rhythm guitar) started a band called Marble Arch. This band recorded a 3 song demo in 1981 and then another in 1982.

In 1983 the band went to the recording studio once again. To Matinee Studios in Reading. At this point the band changes their name to Namoza. They record a 3 song demo tape with the tracks “Wild Life”, “Taking Punches” and “Empty Hands”.

It is in 1985 that the band becomes Jo Jo Namoza when Francis Magee joins them thanks to an advert in the Melody Maker. The first gig with this new lineup happens at Winchester College. Francis had been previously in a band called Jo Public. Because of this the band added Jo Jo to the Namoza name. It is with this new lineup, in 1986 that they record the demo tape I mentioned first, the one with “Back at the Farm”.

One interesting thing about Jo Jo Namoza is that they went on a mini tour of Norway in 1987. They played in Stavanger and also in Bergen at The Hulen. In 1988 they would play again in Bergen at The Fish Factory. During this time Emma Banks and Neil Richards became managers of the band.

They would also play at The Ceanarvon Castle and Dingwalls in Camden in London as well as becoming regulars on the British university circuit.  In Reading they used to play in The Majestic it seems.

In 1988 the band recorded an EP in Matinee Studios. The songs included were “Arabian Dance”, “Elevator”, “Heartland”, “Assault and Battery”, “Monkey on the Floor” and “African Heart”. Not sure if these were released on tape or any other format.

Other recordings of the band include a live gig at Reading University in 1989 where the songs “Cannibals”, “African Heart”, “Casbah” and “To the Bone” were recorded live.

There was also another demo that was recorded in 1989 at a studio ran by Martin Rushent in Streatley Hill. Sadly these recordings seem to be lost.

In 1989 the band recorded two more songs. This time at The Whitehouse Studio in Kewstoke. The sound of the band was evolving at this time.

The band was gaining some momentum. In 1990 the band had already agreed to release “Elevator” and “Assault and Battery” as a 7″ with Sonet Records from Acton in London. Sadly two weeks after the agreement the distribution company of the label went bust.

In the end, a re-recorded version of “Kissing the Babies”  (recorded at Eedgar Broughton’s studio in Barnet, London) and “Elevator” (previously recorded at Matinee Studio in Reading) were released by Acorn Records. The band wasn’t pleased with the sound of the record…

Two more important details to mention is that the band would grow in number, adding Andy Marshall as backing vocals and percussion and James Carter on guitar.

One last thing from their website, there is a live video of the band playing at The Hulen in Bergen, Norway, in 1987. The two songs on the video are “Casbah Accomodation” and “Back at the Farm”.

But there’s more, it turns out Francis Magee, who actually hailed from Dublin, Ireland, (and was raised in the Isle of Man) was on the British soap opera EastEnders from 1993 to 1995. He then appeared on movies like Layer Cake and The Calling. And even cooler, he was on Game of Thrones (!). He played Yoren, a member of the Night Watch on the first and second season of the show.

How cool. I’ve listened many of their songs now. The sound of the band could change a bit, but they were pop at heart. And some songs are really great indiepop tunes.

I hope to learn more about them soon. Anyone remember them?

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Listen
Jo Jo Namoza – Kissin’ the Babies

Day 415

Verandan: our last 7″ was by this fantastic Finnish band (have you got your copy yet??). Today we see they release a new song, “Open Sea”, which is really really pretty. I had heard an earlier version of this song as a possibility for releasing it and it was a hard choice I must say to choose which songs would go on the record that we released. Highly recommended.

The Summer Triangle: this looks lovely. A 10″ by the new project of Dale (Some Gorgeous Accident, Apple Orchard) and Connie (Carnival Park). They are releasing a self-titled 10″ vinyl on May 7 with 4 songs. We can preview the opening track, “Distant Skies”, which is really nice. The 10″ is a lathe cut, so it is very limited.

Piroshka: the new band that features Miki from Lush is touring the UK later this year. They are also releasing an album called “Love Drips and Gathers” on July 23rd. To promote this album they’ve put a video for the song “Scratching at the Lid”. It sounds great. I will definitely get the record. And I am hoping next year they come to the US. Or I go to the UK. The idea of touring bands seem so strange these days.

Parker Lewis: it was a long time ago when we did a 3″CD with the Swedish artist Parker Lewis. It is great to see he continues to make music. He has released a vinyl album on the Italian label We Were Never Being Boring called “Tass Tass”. The record is very limited and at the time of writing this there were 5 copies left. The record has 8 songs and you can preview one of them which is very nice, “Unga Nycker”.

Fábrica de Espejos: and to end this week I present you to this Spanish band from the city of Lugo. The band has just released a new album called “Mundo Incierto” which seems to be available digitally only. The album is good mix of shoegazey and dreampop sounds, with some very enjoyable moments like songs like “La Fiesta” or “Capas”.

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When I discovered, many months ago, a Bandcamp of the Spanish indiepop band Los Empresarios I was quite surprised. How come I haven’t heard of them before?!

Hailing from Cuenca, the band was active between 1998 and 2002 and from I understand they left 14 songs. At least that’s what it looks like on Bandcamp, where a compilation called “Así Sonaban Los Empresarios (1998-2002)” looks like a full retrospective of the band.

There are no details about the band sadly. We just now that the Bandcamp was put together back in 2012. A long time ago. The 14 songs included here are “¡Viva leer!”, “El Hijo Secreto de Franco”, “Vuelvo a Sonreír”, “Tengo qeu Renovar el DNI”, “Las Chicas de las Tiendas de Fotocopias”, “La Farmacéutica Intrépida”, “La Erosión”, “Solo Copiamos Lo Malo”, “La Novia del Ingenero (versión suite sinfónica)”, “Fiestas Patronales en Beirut-Oeste”, “¿Resistirá la velada familiar frente a las modas adolescentes? “, “Biología y Destino”, “Claroscuro” and “Juan Miguel”.

Then I find a blog called Sólo Maquetas. Here they have shared some tracks from the band’s early demos as well as sharing some interesting information. It turns out the band’s first demo was called “Currículum” and was released in 1999. This was released by the band’s own label Latifundio Records. All their releases would be self-released even though there was interest from the Spicnic label.

Most of the members had been in the band Núcleo 7 but after their drummer Tom Destroy was replaced by a drum machine they changed their name to Los Empresarios (the businessmen). The band was formed by Emilio Augusto (vocals, guitar), Marc-Antoine (aka. Lulú Ruiz) on bass, Ana-Belle on vocals and keys, and Hot Lips on sax. After the release of “Currículum” Hot Lips left the band and was replaced by Donna Lydia who went to play keys and backing vocals. It doesn’t say exactly which songs were included here.

The next releases of the band were “Ganar” (2000), “A Privatizar” (2001) and “Las Fuerzas Vivas” (2002). I will try to find what songs were included in them.

One thing I did find was a live gig of them dating from March 23, 2002, at the Garaje de la Tía María in Murcia, Spain. It is 40 minutes long, so enjoy it.

Then on this same channel I find a video of the band Los Animalitos del Bosque covering the song “Nave del Amor” by Los Empresarios.

Sadly I can’t seem to find any other details about them. So any help finding out more info about them will be appreciated. It now seems clear to me that the band recorded more than the 14 songs on Bandcamp. I would love to get copies, or at least listen to them! Who remembers them!?

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Listen
Los Empresarios – ¡Viva leer! 

Day 413

Almost Charlotte / Bluff: many of you may remember that I interviewed the classic indiepop band Almost Charlotte on the blog. They hailed from Brighton and after their demise they became Bluff. Well, there is a compilation CD that is essential for indiepop lovers available now on Moments of Pleasure Records. It contains all of the recordings by both bands! I repeat, essential.

Nah…: it is not common for me to beat the limited releases. This time around, I was able to secure one of the 50 copies of the new CD “Airy Day” by Nah… The Dutch/German combo has self-released this new EP that has four songs, “Airy Day”, “Walking in the Sun at Midnight”, “Wellen der Liebe” and “Dagen Van Gras, Dagen Van Stro”. It is cool to see them singing in their own languages, even though we just have to imagine for now, as we can only preview the title song!

Morellas Forest 1988: Their name sort of confused me. Thought it was a band from the 80s! Well, there is this one song called “Sweet Charity” on Soundcloud that sounds good to me. This song will be included in the upcoming album “Tales” that is being released on May 14 via Velvet Blue Music.

My Lucky Day: so I have tried to find myself a copy of the band’s CD. Sadly shipping from Japan is crazy at the moment. To send a CD to the US it seems to be around 25-30 dollars. That’s a bit too steep. Feels wrong. And I thought US shipping prices were bad. I believe it has to do with the pandemic. But it’s been a while and you would think prices would be normalized. Anyhow, I shared a link to their Bandcamp last week, today I bring you the beautiful video for “Sunny Day Highway”

Lisasinson: and lastly a few weeks ago the Valencia, Spain, all-girl combo published “Perdona Mamá” on Elefant Records. This album was released as a 10″ vinyl and is limited to 500 copies. It has 9 infectious, catchy, pop songs in Spanish including their great hit “Barakaldo” (which should have been a 7″).

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I believe there are many bands called The Village. So I’ll make it clear since the first paragraph that today’s band hails from Ireland, from Waterford to be more precise. I discovered this band through The Fanning Sessions Archive blog. That seems to be the usual when it comes to Irish bands, right?

From the Fanning Sessions post we know the band was a four-piece formed by Paddy Jacob on vocals, Mick Heery on guitar, Paul Condon on bass and Paul Moyser on drums. Here they have shared a RTE Radio 2 Dave Fanning session the band recorded on November 19th 1985. This time around they recorded four songs, “Life is a Stranger”, “June in Me”, “Fear of Time” and “Sacrifice”. You can listen to all of them in that post. But that’s not all, they also link to a TV appearance of the band!

Indeed, there is the band performing the song “Mental State” on the RTE show “Visual Eyes”. This appearance dates from 1986. A comment there has a funny anecdote, saying this footage was actually 100%. He says: this is 100% live,think this is the 5th take if i remember correctly 4th take went well until the drummer farted on the cameraman underneath him.

The other great resource for Irish bands is Irishrock.org. Here we find that the band formed in 1984 and made their Dublin debut at the Underground in 1986. That same year they released a single.

This single is listed on Discogs. It was released by BUS Records (BUS 30). I am not familiar with this label but I can see they’ve released a lot of 7″s up until 1994! The songs on the record were “Mental State” on the A side and “In My Vision” on the B side. Both were recorded at Cooleycall Studios and produced by Paul Spencer from the band Billy Roach Band.

Irishrock.org mentions a song “Prisoners of the Heart”, but they can’t remember where was it released or even recorded. Another interesting bit is that the band’s PR was done by Eoin Ronayne who was the manager of Neuro. It seems Paddy Jacob was a roadie of this band.

It seems the band was featured in a documentary called “051”. This documentary film was about the Waterford scene. It is on Youtube, here is part 1 and part 2. I found Mick Heery on Part 2 around the 11:20 minute mark. But around the 7:10 minute mark you can see the band playing live at The Bridge. A comment in this same link it mentions that Brian Daniels, keyboardist of The Village passed away.

The band reunited in 2006 for a one-off gig and I believe in 2019 they did too. I found they even have a Facebook page! I find flyers of gigs. So we see the band played at the Bridge Hotel in Waterford, at Katie Reilly’s with Toy with Rhythm and The Flat Tops, at the Waterford Savoy on November 4, 1984 (this one you can listen in its entirety on Soundcloud!!),

And that’s it. The band didn’t release any other records, but it does look like the band had a following and made an impact in their scene. I am sure many Irish fans remember them. Would be great to know their story someday!

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Listen
The Village – Life is a Stranger

Day 411

Un Día Soleado: a new digital single by Enzo Raffler from Argentina. His solo project name, which translated would be “Another Sunny Day”, tells a lot of his influences. The two new songs are very nice jangle bedroom pop. They are “Amigx Invisible” and “Sentirnos Tristes (No Está Mal)”.

Peter Loveday: I got this Youtube link the other day and really enjoyed it. It is one of the songs that Peter (with Naomi Wedman and Sarah Davison) played in Barcelona last March. This song is “Sunshine on Stone”. Peter Loveday was once in the fantastic Brisbane band Tiny Town.

The Darling Buds: I discovered a song called “Jump In” by the classic indiepop band. I don’t think it’s been released previously (but correct me if I am wrong). It appears on a compilation flexi disc released by R*E*P*E*A*T Records (hard to type this name!) and I really liked this track. Sadly the other tracks in the flexi are not my taste of music. But The Darling Buds one is! So I am hoping to see a new release by them in the near future, and to include this song.

Hadda Be: back in February I recommended their single “Another Life” and today I recommend their album “Another Life”. Yup, same name. We can preview three tracks out of the eleven that will be included, “Another Life”, “Wait in the Dark” and “This Won’t End Well”. The Brighton/SE London is releasing this record on April 30 on Last Night with Glasgow, a label that has been putting some nice records as of late but has some very bad customer service in my experience.

Kero Kero Bonito: “Civilisation II” is the band’s new EP which acts as a sequel to 2019’s “Civilisation I”. The band on this EP continues to explore vintage hardware to create the three songs that make up this EP. It is not as catchy as their albums, but still a very nice listen.

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I was looking for info about the 90s French (I think) band The Jellybabies. But I ended up remembering an early 80s UK band called The Jelly Babies that sounded very nice to me.

I have to thank my friend David from Barcelona who had shared their song “The Pleasure of Her Company” that was released in the band’s one and only release, a 7″ that came out in 1981 titled “De Nada EP”. That made me remember them.

Released by Stroke Your Pets Often (JB 001), probably their own label, this EP had 5 songs. The A side had “Roller Skate” and “The Rascal” while on the B side we find “The Pleasure of Her Company”, “Niki Laudas Car” and “INto the Valley of Death Rode the Five Brave Jelly Babies”.

Only 500 copies were made of this EP. The labels were just hand stamped. There are five different wraparound sleeves. On the back of the sleeve you see the same information. Danish was on vocals, Alan T Wireless & Beaver on guitars, Steve on bass and Ant on drums.

I have some CDs that feature the band like the “Messthetics Greatest Hiss” compilation CD released by Hyped to Death in 2008 or the “Messthetics #107 – DIY ’78-81 London III” released by the same label in 2009. ON the first one the band had “Candy Bricks” and “Soylent Green” while on the 2nd comp they had “Roller Skate” and “Living it Up”.

But that’s not all, they had the song “I Like Boats” on the cassette comp “It’s My (The) Age 2” released by Compact Cassette Echo and “Roller Skate” appeared on the bootleg comp “Killed by Death #1234” released by Redrum Records in 2000.

Thanks to the Messthetics comp’s liner notes we know some more details about the band.

For example we know the song “Soylent Green” came from a tape called “Sod Romance – Here Come the Fire Engines” and “Candy Brick” came from another tape called “Almost Live”. I don’t have any details about these tapes. Were they compilations? Demo tapes? “Living it Up” is a live recording.

And here are some interesting details I’ve picked from there:

The Jelly Babies were named after the favoured food of the fourth and then-current Doctor Who. The “De Nada” EP was recorded at Dirt Cheap studios. The lyrics from “The Rascal” were lifted off a children’s book, “Roller Skate” were lyrics from a friend that wasn’t in the group, “The Pleasures of Her Company” had lyrics by Paul’s father who was a 60s popstar it seems. The story of the different sleeves is that each member of the band and each of them did their own sleeve, so there were 5 different ones. This EP was reviewed by NME and Sounds.

Alan T. Wireless went afterwards to be in the band Alan Tyler and the Lost Sons of Littlefield. Alan was also the was the last to join the band. After he joined the band went to the Dirt Cheap studio again but the recordings from that 2nd visit haven’t seen the light of day it seems.

Later on the band morphed into the Fire Engines (not the Scottish band FYI) and then into the Sputniks A Go Go. After Alan left the band morphed into the Bachelor Party. Later on Paul Beveridge started a project called Birdlife UK, Steve Solo went into the Bastoids and also Stetson Stan.

What else we know? We know Paul Beveridge used to run a fanzine called Crash Smash Crack Ring where he wrote mostly about The Fall. It seems the band start happened with a tape called “Posing at the Scala”. On this tape Paul and Steve contributed most of the songs with ‘imaginary’ bands like The Ocean Bandits, Technosnort, The Red Plagues and more. After this the band formed and recorded their first tape “Sod Romance – Here Come the Fire Engines”. This tape included practice sessions and rough-mixes of their EP songs. Okay, so we found out the story of this tape. Would be nice to hear it sometime.

I found too a small bio Paul wrote in 2008. Here he mentions a song called “Digging Graves in Budapest”. Seems it was never recorded. The other good details is that the band hailed from Rainham.

And that’s what I found out. This song is very nice, jangly and poppy. Wonder if they had more songs like this… these were the sort of obscure songs I loved putting on mix CDs.

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Listen
The Jelly Babies – The Pleasure of Her Company

Day 408.

Pony in the Pancake: a new album by the Albany, New York, band. It is called “Ocean Love” and has 13 songs of lo-fi bedroom pop. The album is out now digitally and also on cassette. I have previously recommended the band, their previous singles, so it is good to see a good old-fashioned album out.

Ta To Boy: The news of the new album by Ta To Boy hasn’t reached to me until now. It seems they are releasing their new album on May 10th on Make Me Happy Records from Athens. There is no Bandcamp or anything similar. But there have been a few songs posted on Youtube. The latest is called “Disco in Heaven”. Let’s see when they announce pre-orders and so on.

The Spires: last year I recommended this Ventura, California, band as they released the album “LOOK”. Last December they released another album called “Era Was” and I totally missed it. It is now sold out, both on vinyl and CD. The album had 10 poppy songs which you can still check out on Bandcamp.

Plastic Palms: It is always a surprise when I discover an Italian band that sounds good! That is proper indiepop! Plastic Palms from Turin is a total surprise then. Their 7-song mini-album “Yellow Panda” sounds lovely. Poppy and fun. Great melodies, great vocals by Clarissa Ghelli. This is pretty good. Hopefully gets properly released.

The Obsessives: and to end this week we check out Philadelphia’s The Obsessives. They are releasing on April 30 a very limited 7″ single for their song “Lala”. The 7″ will have two more songs, “I’ll Always Love You” and “Divine Hammer” which are not available to listen on Bandcamp. But “Lala” is and it sounds very good.

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I just discovered The Penguins. I have no clue whatsoever of who they are. There is this song on Soundcloud called “Any Minute Now” and it seems it came from a demo tape. It sounds great, with female vocals and chiming guitars. and as you will probably be able to tell it dates from the early 80s. It sounds a bit like The Big Outdoor Type or Tralala, bands like that. And I enjoy that sort of sound, of course!

The only info we get is that the song was recorded at Catch 44 Studio in Godalming. We know that this studio was run by Greg & Guy Skerman and that The Housemartins recorded in this same studio. We know too that the band was based in Basingstoke. And we get something that may or may not help me find more info about them, the band members.

Raz on rhythm guitar, synth and backing vocals, Andi Harris on lead and backing vocals, Delta Del on lead guitar, Mike on drums and Tim on bass and engineering.

On the web I find that Delta Del was in other bands like Out to Lunch and Against the Grain. But nothing about the other band members.

This is going to prove hard. To find any info about The Penguins I will require the help of the blog readers. So I trust you all. Maybe some of you were around that time in Basingstoke? Who remembers them?

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Listen
The Penguins – Any Minute Now

Day 406

Farnborough Groove Vol. 12: I’ve discovered so many bands thanks to the series of tapes, and now digital, Farnborough Groove. They have just released the 12th volume marking too the 30th anniversary of these legendary series. I am not very familiar with most of the bands, I think the only one I know is Kodiak Island, but I am discovering some nice songs here. Worth a listen!

Blue Ocean: No, not the Ocean Blue, but Blue Ocean from Oakland, California. They have an album out now on Paisley Shirt Records with 9 songs that sound fun. It is a ramshackle feast of pop songs. Crash pop, lo-fi, a sound that is endearing to me. This self-titled album is actually a compilation of the band’s two previous EPs, “Summer of Hands” and “Fade”, and I recommend it!

Las Ligas Menores: Yay! A new song by my favourite Argentinean band of the last few years. “La Nieve” is classic Las Ligas Menores. Brilliant as always. Perfect pop music. I really hope there’s a new album in the way!

Lunation Fall: here is a cool shoegaze project from Lyon, France. They just released a mini-album titled “Near” on tape and vinyl LP. The cassette is already sold out but copies of the 12″ are still available. The 6 songs in it are dreamy and really enjoyable especially when Célia Broch takes lead vocals.

The Castle Forever: this is such a blast from the past. I love The Cavalcade and the band that came after, The Castle Forever. I wanted to release a single by both of these projects. Now I see the great Indonesian label Shiny Happy Records mentioning they planned to release the “Gathering Dark” album that came out many years ago. A classic in my book. I hope the Indonesian people can put it out, so those who missed out on this record can have a copy!

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Remember the Brisbane Music Graveyard Bandcamp? I discovered this Bandcamp when I wrote about the band Who’s Gerald? I have been little by little discovering the music that was recorded in Brisbane during the late 80s and early 90s that is available in this great archive.

One of the bands that caught my attention was the Fugitive Microbes. Not that much by the A side of their own and only 7″ which is called “Mad Dave”. The one song that I think is a piece of pop genius is the B side, “Living with a Schizophrenic”. What a slice of pure p!o!p!

The band released this 7″ back in 1992 on Sundown Records which may or may have been their own label. The artwork is sort of strange, it has a Jesus Christ sort of figure walking over water and a duck. On the back of the sleeve there’s a woman on top of a wombat (?).

Luckily, on the Bandcamp we get more information.

So we know that the band was formed by Kristin Black on guitar and vocals, Tony Kneipp on guitar and vocals, Colin Barwick on drums (who was the drummer in the early days of Died Pretty), Patrick Kneipp on lead guitar and Peter Fergusson. Safe to think that Tony and Patrick were brothers? Then the A side, “Mad Dave” was written by Tony while “Living with a Schizophrenic” was written by Kristin. That makes sense. Whoever wrote the song was to sing it.

Both songs were recorded at Burbank Studios, in Brisban, between January and February of 1991.

Tony also reminisces about the band. He mentions that he met Kristin at the Kelvin Grove campus while he was studying to be a secondary teacher. That was 1989, and by the end of that year they were playing gigs. Their first performance was at the Bye Bye BCAE Breakup Bash. During those early days the band had other members like Oscar on drums and Irena Luckus from Xero and Airborne Toxic Event on synthesiser and vocals.

Irena would leave. Then soon after Colin Barwick joined the band and then in 1990 Oscar would leave. He would return to his native Netherlands. Peter Fergusson who was Kristin’s boyfriend at the time, now his husband, and who was playing in the band Splat Acrobat, replaced Oscar. Then he mentions that his brother Patrick never played live with the Fugitive Microbes, but helped with recording sessions. Actually Tony and Patrick had played together in bands like Ronnie Reebit and the Toadettes.

On Soundcloud I find some more songs by the band. Here is “Fuck Fashion“, “Blackest Heart“, “Alice (from the Brady Bunch)” and “Six O’Clock Lies“. My favourite from these group is “Alice (from the Brady Bunch)”. I really enjoy Kristin vocals and pop melodies.

Also on Soundcloud there are live recordings. These date from 1989 when they played live at the BC Club in Queensland Uni of Technology. They are “Living with a Schizophrenic” and “Mad Dave“. Then there is “Blackest Heart” when they played at the BC Club in Gardens Point Campus Club at the Queensland Uni of Technology in 1989 supporting the Celibate Rifles. And from 1990 at this same venue there’s “Fuck Fashion“.

I know that Tony Kneipp was at least on another band, The Parameters. I don’t know about the other members. I am curious what happened with Kristin, was she in other bands afterwards? About Splat Acrobat, Peter Fergusson’s band, I should write a post sometime. They had some great songs.

Anyhow, some great music from Australia as always. Again, how come there was no chance to make a compilation with obscure Australian indiepop. I still hope one day I can make it!

Edit: I’ve been told that Kristin is/was an announcer on 4zzz radio on Saturday nights.

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Listen
Fugitive Microbes – Living with a Schizophrenic

Day 404

The Pleasures Pale: you know I interviewed the Dayton, Ohio, band and that I am a big fan. Last week I received the CD for “Daily Living is a Herculean Art”, the second CD release by the band after their self-titled album.  This CD is out now and comes in a carefully packaged edition. 13 songs that show a rougher, edgier, band than in their album. Good stuff!

Rachel Love: according to Bandcamp Rachel from Dolly Mixture released “Down the Line” back on March 1! I can’t believe I missed it. I recommended her previous song, “Primrose Hill”, but this one passed me by. But what’s great is that this song is also a s pretty!  But that’s not surprise as this song was a Dolly Mixture original! It will be included in her forthcoming album!

Still Dreams: Been wanting to listen to all the songs on the “Make Believe” mini-album by the Japanese duo. A song here, a video there. Little by little discovering their music. Well, now finally we can listen to all 8 songs on Bandcamp. I eagerly wait for Jigsaw Records in the US to get copies as I want one!

My Lucky Day: now we head to Kumamoto, Japan, to discover this self-defined shoegaze-pop band. Their first release is a self-titled 5 song EP that sounds great! It is fun, it is catchy. It seems it is only available in digital format but I really hope someone puts this out. I am really enjoying My Lucky Day.

Desperate Journalist: and lastly there’s “Maximum Sorrow!” the new album by the London combo. The album is coming out on July 2nd and will be released on vinyl and CD. Right now we can preview just one song, “Fault”. It is not my favourite song of theirs if I am honest, but I like so many songs and records by them, that I am hoping any of the other 10 songs win me over. I am sure they will.

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Not too long ago I discovered the Irish band The Boy The Boy. In that post I mentioned that Martin Harte, the bassist, had previously been in a band called Absolute Zero. On a soundcloud account I find that time I actually found some songs by Absolute Zero, and I liked the songs. So I totally thought they deserved a post.

The band hailed from Sligo, Ireland, and was active between 1983 and 1986. Absolute Zero was formed by Joe Hunt on vocals, Sean Sweeney on guitar, Martin Harte on keyboards and Tommy Kivlehan on drums. The same band members plus Micky Barr had previously been in a band called Reverb.

According to Irishrock.org the band appeared at the 1984 Drumcliff Festival and at the Dublin Mega-Bash at the Ivy Rooms on August 29, 1985.

After the demise of the band Martin Harte continued as mentioned on The Boy The Boy and Sean Sweeney was on Sid & the Stonecrushers. Martin Harte and Joe Hunt would later be in Indian and The Pink Spiders.

But there’s more good info about this Irish band. They do appear on Discogs. We know then that the band released 3 7″s.

The first seems to date from 1984. It had no sleeve. It was most probably a self-release. It had red labels and it is credited to SRS Records (SRS 1A). The A side was “Go For Your Gun” written by Sweeney and Harte and the B side was “Running”, written by Sweeney and Kivlehan.

In 1985 the band released the “You Will Fall” 7″. This is the song I’ve enjoyed the most. The A side, “You Will Fall”. The B side was “I Want to See Your Face”. Both songs were produced by Eamon Carr. The 7″ was released by Hotwire (HWS 858). The sleeve was designed by Jackie O’Connell and it has the photo of someone who looks like a politician. But I can’t say. Maybe this character is well known in Ireland? The A side is credited to Sweeney and Harte while the B side to Sweeney, Harte and Meehan. Who was Meehan? As far as I know there was no Meehan in the band?

Another interesting fact of this record is that all royalties from it were to be donated to the Irish Anti Apartheid Movement.

Lastly in 1986 the band released the “Vision” 7″ on Direction Records (DIR 001). The B side was “Vale of Tears”. Again no sleeve. A shame. The producer for the songs, as well as the engineer, was Brian Taheny. This time around the songs are credited to the band.

The Fanning Sessions Archive blog also wrote about them, all the way back in 2011. They don’t add much details, but they do share a recording of “Go For Your Gun”.

Sadly I couldn’t find more info about them. Maybe I’ll find more info and details about them, now that there are posts about two related bands. I can only hope so. I have heard a few songs, but I am sure there must be more. I will try to track down their records. I think that would be a good idea.

Anyone remembers them?

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Listen
Absolute Zero – You Will Fall

Day 401

Vocal Age: this is a bit old, dating from 2015, but I am really liking the 4 songs that this Sotckholm band recorded. Their “What If” EP seems that it was only released digitally, if the band had been around 10 years earlier we’d probably found a CDR for this. Don’t know what happened to the band or the band members afterwards, but would be nice to find out. Oh! And thanks to my friend David in Barcelona for this find.

En Mi Mente: now we head to Chihuahua, Mexico, to listen Alan Aviles’ band. He has just released a digital EP titled “A Punto de Vivir” with 7 songs. The EP is a nice collection of lo-fi dreampop worth checking out.

The Lost Days: The Lost Days release 5 songs. These are called “Lost Demos”. Lots of losing here. The band hails from California, from Oakland. These songs date from 2019 during the course of 3 lost days. These 5 songs are available not only digitally but also on cassette.

Thala: there is no information about this band, their song “Weep”, or the release. This song is just on the Born Losers Records’ Bandcamp. This is a label from Philadelphia. Safe to assume the band hails from there as well? I don’t know. The song sounds good though.

The Catenary Wires: and to end this week’s new releases review we have to do it with “Birling Gap” the new album Amelia and Rob are releasing on June 18. Great stuff. The album will be released on vinyl and EP and there will be different releases depending on your geographic location. For example for the US Shelflife Records will be their label. On Bandcamp pre-orders are up and two songs are available to check, “Mirrorball” and “The Overview Effect”.

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Today a US band called Lovers Under Pressure. I think on Youtube you’ll probably be able to find two songs, the very Smith-sy “Epitaph” and “Naked Fields”. They are good guitar pop songs.

They were actually released back in 1988 on a 12″ 8-song album called “The Elvis Years”. This record was released by two labels, Stand Up Records (SUR-881677) and Pendulum Records (PP1014). Both labels were based in Minneapolis. That gives me of course the idea that the band must have hailed from Minneapolis or St. Paul. It has to be.

The information is scarce. It was actually back in 2016 that the blog Wilfully Obscure wrote about this band. You know I am against sharing full albums, that’s one thing I’m not a fan of this blog. But they do have a talent for finding great jangly US pop (among other styles of course).

Usually the blog doesn’t have much more information though it does have good descriptions of what sort of music we can expect from these discoveries.

We do know a few things thanks to Discogs. First the tracklist, “No Train”, “Leather Glove”, “The Collision” and “Epitaph” on the A side and “The Plans Went Wrong”, “Naked Fields”, “Dear Saturday” and “Something Stayed” on the B side. We know that all songs were recorded at Blackberry Way Studios in Minneapolis and that they were produced and engineered by Kevin Glynn and Mike Owens (both from the bands Fingerprints and Idle Strand). Natalie Ready is credited for the art.

The band was formed by Larry Ward on bass and vocals, Chris Bolla on drums, Jeff Becker on guitar and vocals. A trio. Jeff Becker was the one who wrote the songs.

The one detail from Wilfully Obscure that is interesting is that it seems there was a second album called “Laws of Song and Nature”. It dates from 2001. Many years after. This record is not on Discogs. It was released on CD and included 10 songs, “Almost Blue”, “Ready for the War”, “Sheila’s Halo”, “Dandelion”, “Intro”, “Frightened Girl”, “December”, “I’m Rain”, “A Day in the Tenderloin” and “Corrie”. This record seems to be available in digital format too.

A few little things that we know thanks to Discogs is that Larry Ward had been in a band called Monster X and Jeff Becker in Four Eyes.

I found a song called “Back Door” on Soundcloud that is not part of any of the two albums. It’s a bit rockier than jangly but still enjoyable.

No compilation appearances are known.

Not much more is known.

So yeah, I would like to know more about the Lovers Under Pressure. Who remembers them?

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Listen
Lovers Under Pressure – Epitaph

Day 399

Po!: good news for Po! fans! A new “bedroom tape” is on the band’s Bandcamp. This one is number 4 and has 9 songs on it. As always Ruth Po! delivers beautiful songs, music, melodies. This tape was released in 1993 and six of thee songs on this tape were later re-recorded and released on Po! albums.

Madder Rose: “To Be Beautiful” is the name of the album that was released last June. I am only discovering the 9 songs that were on it today. They are really nice. Smartly crafted. And Mary Lorson’s vocals are reall y nice. The album is still available from Trome Records from England on blue vinyl.

The Tropicanas: when I first heard the song “Your Man on the Moon” I thought… wow, this is like the Jim Ruiz Group. And I was sold. The four-piece from Livingston in the UK have just released this song and also one called “Shooting Star”. Digital only.

The Churchhill Garden: a favourite of the blog, this project that is made up of Andy Jossi in Switzerland and Krissy Vandeerwoude in the US, has a new song. It is called “Lonely”. It starts slow and soft, but then it becomes bright and shiny. A bit different to the more direct songs the band has put out previously, but still it possesses that beauty they know how to make.

FERS: and the last band on this Wednesday review hails from Singapore. This new project released the “Shallow EP” back in March and it is great to find out about it. It has 5 songs, a combination of vibrant and dreamy sounds.

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Returning to one of my favourite blogs out there, the Fanning Sessions Archive to discover a post from 2014, when Dave wrote about the band The Kendalls.

There is a song posted there, “A Place in the Sun”, which I really enjoy, jangly as I like them. There’s also a photo too. I think I can see the lead singer with an acoustic guitar, a bassist to his left and a guitar player on the right. Happily the post tells us some names. So we know who they were. Johnny McMahon was on vocals, Ben Rawlins on guitar, George Murphy on bass and Alan Biggs on drums. The only other details we get from this post is that the band hailed from Walkinstown in Dublin and that this song came from a 1988 demo tape.

Walkinstown (Irish: Baile Bhailcín) is a suburb of Dublin, Ireland, situated on the Southside of the city, approximately 6 kilometres south-west of Dublin city centre. Walkinstown is a suburb consisting primarily of privately owned residential housing with some social housing remaining in the Dublin City Council area between the Walkinstown and Long Mile Roads and Ballymount Lower. It was built as an estate of starter homes after World War 2 with the council housing being developed as social rented homes later in the early to mid fifties. 

Then I check at the comments and I find a very sad thing, George Murphy, the bassist, seems to have passed away. That’s not the kind of info I like finding when I search for obscure bands.

There seems to be no more info about the band on the web.

So I try to see what are they up to now. I am not sure how common the name John McMahon might be in Dublin. There is a musician of the same name who was in a band called Rollers/Sparkers. Is it the same person? Ben Rawlins I believe is a recording engineer these days and part of a band called Saso.

I couldn’t find anything for Alan Biggs…

Not really surprising. But what surprises me is that even Irishrock.org doesn’t have any info on The Kendalls, they usually do.

So I will require help from anyone that remembers them. Would be great to find more info about them, especially what other songs were on that 1988 demo tape and if there were more demo tapes of course!

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Listen
The Kendalls – A Place in the Sun

Day 397

Lavender Blush: we have to start this week with the wonderful new 7″ by San Francisco’s Lavender Blush. Three tracks, “Sundays”, “Lullaby” and “Come Along”, make up this nice release that is coming out on April 23 on Blue Aurora Audio. $10 for the regular black vinyl and $15 for the coloured vinyl. Right now you can preview the opening track, “Sundays”, which sounds great!

Grrrl Gang: the Yogyakarta trio is back with a new punk poppy EP titled “Honey, Baby”. But it is sort of a different sort of EP. Yes, Grrrl Gang’s song opens the EP but then we find 4 other Indonesian bands covering the same song. These bands are Vira Talisa, Dongkere, Kaveman and Yosugi. The EP is also available on CDR on Kolibri Records.

Remanentes: “El Tiempo de Nuestro Lado” is the latest EP from this Argentinean band. It sounds quite good to me, very influenced by Spanish indiepop I’d say! This EP has 4 songs and is available digitally, but what caught my attention is that the band has been going for many years and it is actually Buenos Aires’ Production Minister who leads the band!

Portable Radio: last month the Manchester combo released their self-titled album on vinyl. It is still available, which is good news. Here we find 11 jangly songs. They are nicely crafted songs, with lots of care you can tell. I especially like the more upbeat songs like “Hot Toddy” or “Worse Case Scenario”.

Butohes: this Tokyo band is new to me. Formed by Michiro, Ryuto, Keisuke and Naoto, they have unveiled their latest track “Hyperblue”. It is a fun song, with lots of guitar textures, a very fine slice of dreampop. The upbeat kind. The uplifting kind. Great stuff.

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The Youtube channel stoneeyedkiller is a good place to look for unknown indiepop bands. The latest band I discovered there was The Niagaras. In the channel the song uploaded is called “Grand Dame”. It immediately picked my curiosity.

I find a blog called Jim Santo’s Demo Universe where a demo tape including this song has been shared. They are actually in a Soundcloud so we can listen all four songs! This is good news. The three other songs are “Coronation of the Clown Prince”, “Hands of Providence” and “Two Women”.

I guess the opening track is my favourite, but the other ones are good too! On the aforementioned blog it mentions two names, two brothers, Robert (vocals) and Frank (drums) Whaley. But who were the other members?

It seems that in 2014 the band did a reunion gig but can’t find any info about that. What I did find was that this NYC band did a rock musical called Wrong Way UP at the New York Performance Works’ Red Line Theater on October 19 of 2000. The band even had a website then.

This is a bit confusing. Because of the song I would think this band hailed from the 80s. But maybe not? Maybe they are more recent?

The blog also mentions that Robert Whaley was in a band called Comic Tales of Tragic Heartbreak and that his brother Frank was an actor/director. And indeed he is an actor, having appeared in Pulp Fiction, The Doors and lately on Hustlers for example.

I find that both brothers contributed to each other, Robert wrote music for the movie “Joe the King” which Frank directed and wrote.

On a forum I find that the band used to play in venues like The Continental or Mondo Cane. They mention that Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman would often go to their gigs. So this means not the 80s. Probably the band was around in the 90s.

I find on Youtube some videos of The Niagaras playing live! There are two videos. Here is part 1, and part 2. It is true that on these videos they are a bit more out there, less indiepop than in the tape we heard on Soundcloud.

Now we head to Discogs and discover that the band left us two albums. The first was a self-titled album that came out on CD in 1990 on the JoLynn Productions label (JL – 0001). This album which features a band photo on the front had 14 songs, “Terrified”, “Reborn”, “Charitable”, “One Left”, “Train of Thought”, “Blacklist”, “Down with the Door”, “Last Words”, “The Twenty-Sixth”, “Two Woman”, “My Woman Wants Me Home”, “The Coronation of the Clown Prince”, “Overdrawn On Your Account” and “For Some Reason Leah”. On the back of the sleeve we find the names of the other band members: Tony Grimaldi (lead guitar, vocals), Paul Himmelein (bass guitar, vocals) and Ken Rizzo (acoustic, 6 and 12 string guitars, vocals).

The 2nd album, “Report From the Interior”, came out in 1997 on Charitable Records (000228). This record was produced by Tamir Muskat and included 11 songs: “Report From the Interior”, “Pieces to Fall”, “Mexicali Marriage”, “Larrisa”, “How Obvious”, “Lonely Tuesday Night”, “Dreams Already Are”, “Nudged Along the Gangplank”, “Near Missus”, “My Request” and “Love is Like an Icicle”.

I believe there is even a third album, though not sure when it was released. It is titled “Enchantment” and had 12 songs: “Today We Are Beautiful”, “Dropping of the Veil”, “Love, So Sad”, “This Time”, “A Somewhat Lurid Night”, “Big Things Are Coming”, “Find the Hidden Faces”, “Easier to Love a Stranger”, “A Couple of Unknowns”, “To Lose an Acquired Taste”, “Enchantment” and “Big Things are Coming, Epilogue”.

After hearing a few tracks from the last two albums I must say they are less jangly and poppy than the demos, which are really fantastic. But the first album is indeed jangly and indiepop, the self-titled 1990 album. It has some great songs, clearly influenced by The Smiths. Very good!

Quite interesting to find this band, with these connections to Hollywood, to the movies. A band that looks like it could have been big. Perhaps it was popular during their time? They were on TV many times clearly. But I must be honest and say I am only discovering them now. And I am enjoying this first album and the demo of course!

Who remembers them?

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Listen
The Niagaras – Grand Dame