I had not the best of weekends. Saturday turned up exactly how I didn’t want it with Peru losing the game against Denmark. We were the better team, we create enough chances not even to tie, but to win, but none of the players were precise and effective. We couldn’t score. We even missed a penalty at the end of the first half. It was very lucky for Denmark to get the result, but that’s footie. We made a mistake and we paid it. One counterattack, our defense not  being positioned rightly and they scored. Then we created chances, one after the other and it was their keeper and our anxious players who didn’t let us celebrate. Now, need to wait for Thursday, so we can beat France. I won’t be calm until that day arrives.

But there is good news. According to DHL the Salt Lake Alley 7″s arrive today home after taking the longest at the pressing plant of any of my previous releases. I’ll take some pics and announce it rightly when I have the records in my hands. Can’t really wait to go home today after work!!

And that’s it for now, hope you are happy with your teams in the World Cup. I know my Mexican friends are really thrilled and hopeful now!!

Dumb Things: the Brisbane band has a new video/song out now and I will tell you that it is worth checking it out. “Crash Barrier” is a pretty pretty song, with light and luminous guitars and female vocals. I had in the past recommended this band and I’m very happy to see they continue putting out top music. Now, I do need them to release some CD or vinyl so I can have their music at home!

The King in Mirrors: another band I follow is the Swindon based King of Mirrors. I know little about them but I do know they make some great jangle pop and their latest release, a digital EP titled “So Long Serenade” is no exception. The solo project by Rich May has now 5 more songs in their repertoire, “Fall into Place”, “Big Tomorrow”, “When Love Takes Hold of You”, “The Wrong Turn” and “Sleep in the Day”, and they are thoroughly enjoyable.

The Salient Braves: “Delusions of Grandeur”, the debut album by this Barnsley band is now available on vinyl. From what I gather there are only 10 songs on the record, but you get three extra ones with the digital download code. The 13 songs are also available to stream on Bandcamp at the moment. It was released last September but I’ve only stumbled upon it. Worth checking out!

L-Kan: I’ve been a fan of the Madrid, Spain, band for years now, maybe around 15 or so years. Maybe more. I met Belén from L-Kan briefly at Madrid Popfest this year and was kind of bummed that she didn’t have a clue what Cloudberry Records was. Not that I mentioned it to her, but my crazy friend Miguel Stamp did. But doesn’t matter, I didn’t expect her to. But what is something cool is that the band have just published a new video for the song “Animal en Extinción”. And I’m really digging it. And of course the came of Putochinomaricón was quite a surprise.

En Attendant Ana: Margaux, Romain, Camille, Antoine and Adrien form this French band who were unknown to me until now. I discovered thanks to who else, the great David Cano. The band has released an album on the Parisian label Buddy Records and it is titled “Lost and Found’ and as soon as I start playing the song “(Not) So Hard” I know I’m going to enjoy it. The female vocals and the guitars are exactly what I like. The album is available now on vinyl and it has 10 songs. Definitely would be good for next year’s Paris Popfest? I would try to go to that.

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Who were The Steelchain?

I can’t say for sure. I remember discovering them through a blog many years ago. One of those blogs that don’t exist anymore. They had shared one of their songs, and I believe it was the same one I’ll share with you, “The Restless”. Until now I haven’t got around in acquiring a copy of their one and only record, a 1988 12″ EP. But today, when I started writing the post I saw a fair priced copy on eBay which I’m duly bidding. Will I win? Hope so!

“The Restless EP” came out on Nigthshift Records (NISHI 207T) in 1988 and it included 4 songs. The A side had “Life in a Zoo (Wonder Why)” and “The Children” while the B side had “The Restless” and “Where the Heart Is”. This label has been mentioned before on the blog as they had released the superb This Scarlet Train 12″. It was a label based in Grangemouth, Scotland. It was created by the original Cocteau Twins bassist Will Heggie and the ex-Dead Neighbours vocalist Craig Lorentson. They mostly released records by Lowlife. But according to This Scarlet Train’s Robert Polson, when I interviewed him, Nightshift were a local label, run by Brain Guthrie who managed Lowlife.

On Discogs there are no other releases by the band nor compilation appearances. That’s really not good for me when I’m looking for information about the band.

The Steelchain record has some credits on the back cover. We see that all songs were composed by the band and that they were recorded at Palladium Studios. This Edinburgh studio was used quite a lot by many important Scottish bands like Cocteau Twins or Friends Again among others. Kieth Mitchell produced and engineered the record. The sleeve design is credited to S. An S within a circle. Maybe it was the designer’s logo? The illustration on the back cover was done by Michelle Butler. But no, no band member names. That is not good for this investigation for sure.

I did find something interesting on a page I found from The List. The List is a paper that has many listings of what’s going on in town and is still going in the UK as far as I know. The page I found actually dates from September 13th 1991 (issue 158). Here I find that there was going to be a gig on Saturday September 21st, in Glasgow, a gig by Better Ways at Traders. The thing is, Better Ways is described as a slinky danceable pop band from ex members of Savana Lamar and The Steelchain. There is also another gig listed for Better Ways the day before, Friday 20th, in the city of Penicuik at the Complex. This time it mentions that the sound of the band was a composite of the two groups, The Steelchain and Savana Lamar, upfront acoustic guitar and some hummable melodies, with perhaps a dose of slinky Botany-5 style dance grooves into the bargain. I couldn’t find much more about these bands, not about The Steelchain nor Savana Lamar. Well, one thing, there was another offshoot band from the latter, Buy Me an Umbrella. If I could find some music by them, I’d be very interested in listening.

Though I could find out that Better Ways continued the relationship The Steelchain had started with Nightshift Records. Better Ways was to release the “Standing in the Middle” 12″ with them in 1992. Happily here I could find some band members names: Steve Vantsis on bass, Daniel Dodds on vocals, Ross Cockburn on guitars, Brian Gibb on keys, Larry Magrina on guitar and Stuart McLean on drums and percussion. It also confirms that they hailed from Edinburgh. Now we know the city they were from. But we don’t know which of these members were in The Steelchain and which in Savana Lamar.

That is the last question, my last doubt. If I could only connect the dots. Which band members were in The Steelchain, maybe I could find out more about this obscure Scottish band! Anyone remember them?

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Listen
The Steelchain – The Restless

World Cup is on! Not much more to say today. Tomorrow my dear Peru plays Denmark and I can only think about that!

Pocket Knife: I saw my friend Jörg post about this band on Facebook, and me, thinking it was a new band, went to check them out. Well, it turned out they had released their album back in 2014, in August of that year. “Dying to Pretend” is the album I found on Bandcamp, and thought it sounded great. Where did this come from? Why wasn’t this in anyone’s radar? It does seem that the LP is still available and that’s a good thing. Would love to get a copy soon of this album by this Portland, US, band. Great boy/girl vocals and melodies!

Sound and Fury: the superb Chengdu dreampop band is back with a 7″ on the best Chinese indiepop label ever, Boring Productions. The 7″ was released on June 9th and include two great songs, “Coming Down” and “Heaven Song”. I have raved about this band in the past and I will have to tell you once again that this one is a record not to be missed!

Thin City: another release on the Boring Productions label was the lathe cut 7″ by this Glaswegian band. This is pretty impressive, a Scottish band on a Chinese label. If someone would have told me this was going to happen 5 years ago I wouldn’t have imagined it. But Jovi and Boring Productions keep surprising us. Two fun songs, “Rock City Baishizhou” and “The Loop”, by this band with ex members of Bricolage and The Sexual Objects.

Alpaca Sports: I was recommending the video for “Nobody Cares But Me” the other day but now I am aware that this song is also being promoted as a digital single. And a digital single with a B side which I’m listening now. It is called “Baby Pop” and it is really lovely, and thinking I may like it a bit better than the first song. A hard decision to make. But this one is brilliant! Hope it gets included in the album “From Paris with Love” that will be released later this year.

Ring Snuten: and perhaps my favourite find this week, because of the people involved, is the song “Natur/Natur” by Patrik Lindgren’s alter ego Ring Snuten. This song, co-written by the brilliant Roger Gunnarsson and Patrik, two of the most important figures in Swedish indiepop in the noughties, is such a cool synth-pop track. I can only hope they continue collaborating, because I want to hear more by them!!

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A beekeeper is a person who keeps honey bees. Honey bees produce commodities such as honey, beeswax, pollen, propolis, and royal jelly, while some beekeepers also raise queens and bees to sell to other farmers and to satisfy scientific curiosity. Beekeepers also use honeybees to provide pollination services to fruit and vegetable growers. Many people keep bees as a hobby. Others do it for income either as a sideline to other work or as a commercial operator. These factors affect the number of colonies maintained by the beekeeper.

Perth, Western Australia. 1989. Perhaps earlier. A band under the name The Beekeepers is formed by Mick Sim, Shaun Lohoar, Mal Secourable, Darren Leitch and Bernice Smith. They were going to release 2 records, 1 single and 1 EP,  and then disappear into oblivion.

That could resume the life of The Beekeepers, but I’m going to try to find more about them. Maybe find myself a copy of their records if I’m lucky. If not, listening to some new songs would make me happy. Let’s see what there is in that huge mess of information that is the world wide web.

As usual I stop at Discogs first. Here the two records are listed. The first one, which was self-released but did have a catalog number (BK001) had two songs, “Take Me Back” which was composed by Mick and “Why” which is credited to Mark Ghirardi and Mick Sim. Who is Mark Ghirardi? It seems he was the band’s manager. Strange, no? A manager that could write songs. Both songs were recorded at Planet Recording Studios and they were produced by Greg Dear and John Vilani, who also was the engineer. Greg Dear of course is a well known name in the Australian scene having being part of The Holy Rollers and The Beautiful Losers.

Something I don’t know about this first single is if the record had any art, if it had a sleeve or not. I couldn’t find any information about it.

It does seem like this first 7″ got some radio play and it caught the attention of a proper indie label in Australia, Zero Hour Records. The same label that released my beloved Pearly Gatecrashers. This label was going to put out, in 1991, a 12″ EP titled “Beefarm Road” (ZERO 401). The songs were once again recorded at Planet Studios with James Hegwill as the engineer and co-producer alongside the band. Here we know what each member played:
Darren Leitch – bass,  vocals
Shaun Lohoar – drums, percussion
Mick Sim – guitar, vocals
Mal Secourable – guitar, vocals
Bernice Smith – violin, vocals

According to a comment on the Discogs listing, a comment coming from the label itself, Zero Hour Records, 500 copies of the record were pressed. But here comes the sad part. More than 300 of them were destroyed by the label’s distributor Shock Records. Why? How did this happen? Why would anyone do this? Now of course my hopes of finding one become slimmer and slimmer.

Aside from these 2 records there is nothing else listed. No compilation appearances. That is odd I think as there was quite a healthy scene of tape compilations at that time. They must have been on one or two. Though it seems like they weren’t.

The band members do seem to have been part of other bands. For example Mal Secourable and Mick Sim had been part of a band called The Fate who released one album. Also Mick was involved in a band called Holocene that was based not in Perth but in Melbourne. This band released a string of EPs and two albums in the 90s and had also among their members people from Autohaze and Ripe, two great Summershine Records bands. And lastly I know that Shaun Lohoar was in The Favourite Game, Blueline Medic and Saidaside.

I keep looking for more information. It is said that the band did one national tour before disbanding just after releasing the 12″. But on Youtube I was to find a bunch of live footage of the band! Sometimes you just hit the jackpot! There are a bunch of songs of them when they played at Appealathon 1991, there is “Forever”, “There’s a Way“, “When You Smile“, “This City“, “Winter’s Gone“, “Forever“, “Take Me Back“, “The Zoo” and “Why?“.

Then there is a list of musical acts from Western Australia Wiki page where it details the years the band was active, 1987 to 1993. On this list The Beekeepers have a few more band members listed, Nick Tweedie, Alannah Hunt and Astrid Peterson. When did they join?

I keep looking for any other mentions of the band. There are not many. I see someone on a forum crediting Mal for introducing him to the Pixies. And then a comment on Youtube that is actually pretty interesting. It seems there was some news about the Beekeepers earlier this year! On January 5th the band did a one off show at the Monks Brew. Wow, there was a reunion! Was it the first reunion gig since the band split? How was it? Did anyone reading this went and saw them?

And that’s all I could find. It is clear that the band had more songs in their repertoire, not just the ones released on the records. Did they record them properly? Would love to hear any unreleased tracks. And when and why did they split? Had they been involved in bands before being in the Beekeepers? And what about that national tour? Whereabouts in Australia did they play. Perth at that time had a great scene, one that is covered in the book “Way Out West” by George Matzkov.

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Listen
Beekeepers – That Girl

Not many news this Wednesday, just preparing myself for the World Cup, to start tomorrow with what may be one of the most uninteresting games, Russia vs. Saudi Arabia. But as it is the WC, one has to try to watch them all, right?

Alpaca Sports: this September our very good friends from Gothenburg, Sweden, are releasing their second album, “From Paris With Love”. To start promoting it the band has unveiled a video for the song “Nobody Cares But Me”. And it is lovely, and brilliant, and cute, and all things Alpaca Sports. According to the description the song explores the disillusionment of discovering life doesn’t always turn out the way you expect it to, and the struggles of trying to reclaim our youthful idealism. The video was directed by the great Calle Jirestedt.

The Legendary Hearts: the classic Scottish band has released a new CD EP titled “The Caledonian Scars ‘n Bars” and one of the songs, “Ten Thousand Miles Away”, is available to stream on SoundCloud. The EP has 4 songs, the aforementioned “Ten Thousand Miles Away”, “Blue Eyed Soul”, “Shouting at the Sea” and “Into the Woods” and it is released by the band’s own Surfin’ Pict label. It is great to know that this legendary Edinburgh band continues making music!

Linda Guilala: a very cool video by the Vigo band where on the background we see LPs falling and falling, LPs that I assume come from their collection, LPs that are influences for the band. That is the new video for the song “Mucho Mejor” which is the newest digital single by the band. Don’t know much more about this track, which sounds great, though I do hope it gets released in physical format soon!

Red Red Eyes: I believe I’ve recommended the “Horology” album before on the blog, but it was only a few days ago that I stumbled upon a video for “Low Light”, one of the songs on that album. Maybe I thought you also missed it, so thought sharing it with everyone. Why not?

The Essex Green: the classic US band is back with a new album out later this month that will be titled “Electronic”. It will be released by Merge Records and of course there’s a video for one of the songs. The chosen song, to be the first single out of this album is “Don’t Leave It In Our Hands”, and hey, it sounds great. You know I’m a sucker for boy/girl vocals. And here there’s a song that does it very well!

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Time to return to Sweden and try to dig any information I can find about one of the many fantastic bands that country has given us. This time around I wanted to find who were Pleasurehouse, a band whose records I don’t own yet but I’m trying to catch up now, having ordered their CDEP from eBay just a few hours ago. Now I’m missing the mini-album and their split flexi but maybe that will take some time, I can’t just buy all the records in the world. Not enough money, not enough space at home!

The first release was actually the mini-album “Marseille” (WeCD042) that was released by the legendary A West Side Fabrication label in 1992. Remember that this label was based in the northern city of Skellefteå and that it was founded in 1987. They had released so many classic bands, from This Perfect Day or The Wannadies to Mary-Go-Round who have been interviewed on the blog. It is interesting that they named the album after that French city. I wonder why?

Marseille, is the second-largest city of France and the largest city of the Provence historical region. The capital of the Bouches-du-Rhône department and Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur administrative region, it is located on France’s south coast and had a population of 852,516 in 2012, and an area of 241 km2 , the third-largest metropolitan area in France after Paris and Lyon. Known to the ancient Greeks and Romans as Massalia, Marseille was the most important trading centre in the region and the main commercial port of the French Republic. Marseille is now France’s largest city on the Mediterranean coast and the largest port for commerce, freight and cruise ships. The city was European Capital of Culture, together with Košice, Slovakia, in 2013. It hosted the 1998 FIFA World Cup and the UEFA Euro 2016, and it was the European Capital of Sport in 2017. The city is home to several campuses of Aix-Marseille University and part of one of the largest metropolitan conurbations in France, the Metropolis of Aix-Marseille-Provence.

The CD had 6 songs, “Breathe”, “Summer”, “Blind”, “Happy When You Leave”, “Regrets” and “This is How it Feels”.

That last song, “This is How it Feels”, was to give name to their next release, a CDEP on Snap Records. This was released the next year, 1993 by this label that in the year 1994 had to change names to Soap Records because some legal complaints from a German disco band called Snap!. The label had only been around for a year when they put this CDEP out. They had started in 1992 when Lars Tengroth and Jonas Sjöström, who were part of the label MNW Records, decided to start a new label to put out indiepop. They signed Pleasurehouse of course but also had Eggstone, Easy and more. Something that was interesting about this label was the very particular graphic design and look of the releases thanks to designer Lars Sundh. Though in the case of this CDEP I believe the art is credited to Camilla Blom who also was a musician and released records on Soap Records under the name Cam. Anyways, “This is How it Feels” (SNAPC 19) EP had 4 songs, “Cindy”, “This is How it Feels”, “Perfect Summer” and “Happy When You Leave”.

The CDEP was recorded by Stefan Pettersson at KM Studio in Norrköping in Sweden. Did the band hail from that city?

Norrköping is a city in the province of Östergötland in eastern Sweden and the seat of Norrköping Municipality, Östergötland County, about 160 km southwest of the national capital Stockholm. The city has a population of 95,618 inhabitants in 2016,[2] out of a municipal total of 130,050, making it Sweden’s tenth largest city and eighth largest municipality. The city is situated by the mouth of the river Motala ström, at Bråviken, an inlet of the Baltic Sea. Water power from the Motala ström and the good harbour were factors that facilitated the rapid growth of this once industrial city, known for its textile industry. It has several nicknames such as: “Sweden’s Manchester”, “Peking” and “Surbullestan” (Surbulle [sour bun] was a local nickname for the textile workers, and stan is short for Staden, which means The City or The Town in Swedish).

“This is How it Feels” and “Perfect Summer” were mixed by Daniel Gese while the other two were mixed by Michael J. Herrström.

Lastly, there was a split flexi released that year. Not on a label and not for sale. It  came for free with the legendary Sound Affects Music Magazine, on its 19th volume. It was only available for subscribers. This flexi had catalog number SAFPD 012 and Pleasurehouse appears second on this single sided flexi with the song “Cindy”. The band that shares the flexi and appears first was the classic band Easy (who have reformed and have a reissue on A Turntable Friend – I need to get that) who contributed the song “Marinelove (Demo)”.

The band has a few compilation appearances listed. The first one dating from 1990 and these might as well be the first recordings by the band. It would be good to find out if that was the case. Also on this compilation titled “SND Records Vol. 1” released by SND Records (SND 009) the band’s name appears as Pleasure House. The band had the first song on the A side which was “Fall On Me” and the last song on the B side “She’s All I Want”. Again all songs were recorded at KM in Norrköping.  A familiar name appears on this compilation too, the brilliant Saturday Kids who have been interviewed in the blog many years ago. This compilation was released in 1990.

Next was the “Pet Sounds Vol. 4” compilation tape that was released by the Pet Sounds Fanzine in 1991. This was the 4th volume out of 5 that was issued by the people behind the Gothenburg based zine. From what I know these tapes are very rare, only 80 to 100 copies were usually made and these tapes didn’t come as a bundle with the fanzine normally, you had to acquire them separately. On this compilation the band contributes “Fall On Me” and at this time the band’s name appears now as Pleasurehouse. No space.

A West Side Fabrication was to include them on a compilation named “West Side. Strikes Back Vol IV” (WeCD 46) in 1993. On this comp the band has the song “You Will Never Know”. This comp was a collection of previously unreleased songs.

There was one more compilation on A West Side Fabrication in 1994 that saw Pleasurehouse having a song. Their track “Candyfloss Summer” appears on the CD compilation “We’re All Part of a Family” (WeCD 073) alongside other classic Swedish bands as Puffin, Cod Lovers (interviewed on the blog), Popundret and more.

Something that surprised me was that I was going to find information about the band on another label’s website, another legendary Swedish label, Ceilidh Productions. Why? I don’t know. Maybe someone can explain me the connection between labels? That I don’t know. In any case the band was actually formed in 1986 (!) by Niklas Larsson on guitar and Joakim Nordqvist on vocals and guitar. Are there any recordings from this period? When they were a duo?

In 1989 the band expanded and added Björn Brunnberg on bass and vocals, Torbjörn Gustavsson on keyboards and Stefan Nilsson on drums. In 1990 Torbjörn leaves and the band adds a second guitar player with Johan Skaneby. In 1993 Skaneby leaves and Per Sparf replaces him.

Some of these names are familiar. For example, from the top of my head, I remember Johan Skaneby had been involved in Cod Lovers. I believe Torbjörn had been involved in a punk band in the 80s called Klunk’s Klan. And hen Bjorn had been in a band called Tivoli who released  a couple of 7″s. Not sure about the rest of the band members. Maybe someone can help me with that?

Afterwards I find an interview on the mailing list Scandinavian Indie conducted by Erik Söderström. The interview seems to have happened in Linköping at a venue called Herrgårn after a gig they played in that city. What do I learn from it? Well that one of the guitar players, probably Skaneby or Sparf, played before in a band called My Favorite Martian. Then that some of the songs on “Marseille” were kind of old, like “This is How it Feels” and “Happy When You Leave”, that date from the first period of the band, 1986.

The album “Marseille” was to be released in October 1991 but was released in March 1992. The band had some more songs that weren’t included in the records like “Vals”, “September” and “Six Eyes”. These were played live, but who knows if they were ever recorded.

And at last we get confirmation that the band hailed from Norrköping. All of them were originally from there but the drummer who was from Småland. And their favourite drink were Carlsberg beer and gin/tonic. That is important information indeed.

Another good find is the one article from Sound Affects I stumbled upon. Here it mentions that early on the band was mostly influenced by The Cure and later they were more into the Go-Betweens. If you understand Swedish you can check out this profile the zine did with the band at what was then the only Indian restaurant in Norrköping. if not, well, you can use Google Translate?

But that’s all I really could find. I start to wonder how many pop bands have come from Norrköping. I think quite a few. I do wonder if the band members continued involved in music, and in which projects? And if so, did they continue making indiepop? And why no more releases? Why no album? Also what about more recordings? I mean they were around as a band for many years but we only know a few songs. Does anyone remember them?

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Listen
Pleasurehouse – Cindy

I’ll start this week’s post telling you a bit about my latest indiepop adventure, that happened last Thursday. I went to see the brilliant Brisbane band The Goon Sax at the Knitting Factory in Brooklyn.

They were actually opening the night for two other acts, Shana Falana and Lou Barlow. I honestly didn’t care about these two, so even though it was pricey, I thought of just going, see The Goon Sax, and then leave. Just call it early, go back home while the subway is still running continuously and not waiting 30 minutes to transfer to another line. I thought that it wouldn’t matter much paying 25 bucks just to see them as it was the first time the band was coming to America and because I didn’t expect them to come again in the near future. It seems I was wrong, they would later tell me that they are planning to come around September or October this year. Oh well…

The crowd was odd, I didn’t see any of the casual indiepop faces. None of them. Maybe they went to Union Pool the day before as The Goon Sax played there. I just don’t like Union Pool that much myself so I chose the Knitting Factory gig instead. But before checking the crowd, we went for pizza at the pizza parlour that faces The Knitting Factory on the other side of the street. Guess what, the band was already having pizza there. So, I said hello of course and talked a bit with them. They were really friendly.

The gig was lovely though it run into some hiccups. Louis’ guitar string broke and no one could lend him another guitar. So he had to change strings and that took a bit of time. That happened just at the start, after the first song. The lady Shana Falana, who seemed to be the organizer of the gig, went onstage and tried to entertain the crowd. Anyways, after that break, the band started playing again and they did it in full form. It was terrific. Energetic, fun, and with great attitude. To my surprise they didn’t play their first single, “Boyfriend”, and I was to ask them later why. It seems they haven’t played it in a year! They are a bit bored by it. But they did end the gig with their new single, “She Knows”, that has that delicious chorus of girl/boy vocals.

The gig was kind of short sadly. They were the openers. For me of course they should have been headliners. But, that’s how the world is. It doesn’t know a thing.

After it we had a good chat, took a photo, and met the people behind Chapter Music. Talked with Louis about The Particles and other obscure Australian bands. Then mentioned that that same day I had published an interview on the blog with an Australian band, The Mars Bastards. The Chapter Music people, knew about the band of course, and even knew about the blog. He mentioned that they had plans to do at some point sort of a compilation of guitar pop bands from the time. The same idea I’ve had for years. Maybe it would be good if they do it. Who knows. It would be good for it to happen sooner or later.

It was a great conversation with the band, knowing they preferred NYC over Chicago, and that they were heading to Los Angeles the next day to play 3 shows. That they hadn’t had much time to do touristy stuff but had been around Manhattan and Brooklyn for few days, even visiting the MOMA. It was great to meet them and I had a good time talking to them. Maybe next time they are here they have a bigger crowd and more fans, and photo requests, that I won’t have the chance to meet and talk with them. So was happy for this opportunity.

And here are some of my latest finds:

Tracyanne & Danny: I believe next week Tracyanne & Danny are playing in NYC and I haven’t got around into buying tickets. Hmm. I want to go for sure, but are there tickets available? Do I want to go to Brooklyn? Small decisions. And how much are the tickets? I need to find out that too. But I must say I didn’t need to hear or watch this beautiful video for the song “It Can’t Be Love Unless it Hurts” to know that I would love to be there. And that I would like to get a copy of the album. Gorgeous really.

Samt: the latest release by the brilliant Augsburg label Kleine Untergrund Schallplatten is a 7″ by this Austrian band. It is not strictly indiepop but the one song I’ve heard so far, “I Wü Di”, is catchy and quirky. The label underlines that the band has an Upper Austrian dialect. As I don’t understand much of what they are saying, can’t say if that’s important, but for sure it is a great detail to know about. The band is described as post punk meets Austropop. That’s another term I’m not familiar with! What is Austropop? Are there more good Austrian pop bands? A release that opens many doors is for sure a good one. The record is available through the label and was released on May 29th.

Foundlings: Amber, Bry, Matty and Ol form his punky pop band from London. They have just two songs in their Bandcamp, “Misery” and “Tragedy”, and they are catchy and filled with energy. I haven’t been to London in ages, but I wonder if they are part of an indiepop scene? Or probably not. If they will be releasing a record soon? Or not. If they will be invited to Indietracks? Or not. I need to go back to the UK and find out how things are going there!

Simmer: another British band, this time from Manchester. And this latest song of theirs called “Juno” is terrific. A great introduction to their music. The band has been going since January 2017 and is formed by Bonnie, Julius, Jake, Gary and Adam. I must say though that I listened to their previous effort, an album “Paper Prisms”, but it wasn’t something I liked. I definitely like their new direction, the poppy “Juno” is a winner.

акульи слёзы: from Ufa, Russia. 4 songs in Russian. Three girls with cool haircuts and cool dresses. Don’t ask me more about them, I don’t understand Russian. But their digital EP “в музее моей памяти” is great. There are 4 songs to stream and I hope they get a proper release. Anyone know any details about them?

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My friend David, who I’ve mentioned many times in the blog before, just made me remember of a wonderful song after he shared it on Youtube, Hitch’s “You Should Stay Inside”. Now, the problem is who were Hitch and if there are any more songs by them?

That is a big problem. I only know that song. I don’t know where the band was from, or who the members were. I know them thanks to a French tape, a compilation tape that was released by Nessie (NESS587) called “Superqualifragilistic”.

Supercalifragilistic: The Oxford English Dictionary estimates that the word “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious” was first attested in the 1940s. The roots of the word have been defined as follows: super- “above”, cali- “beauty”, fragilistic- “delicate”, expiali- “to atone”, and -docious “educable”, with the sum of these parts signifying roughly “Atoning for educability through delicate beauty.” According to the film, in which the word gained its popularity, it is defined as “something to say when you have nothing to say”. However, it is commonly defined as “extraordinarily good” or “wonderful” as all references to the word in the film “Mary Poppins” can be perceived as positive. Dictionary.com also notes that the word is “used as a nonsense word by children to express approval or to represent the longest word in English.”

This label had released in 1994 one of my favourite 7″s by any French bands, Evergreen’s “Longer Lasting Beauty”. I know, I know, I should dedicate a post to Evergreen. I will try to do it soon. But today I’m checking this compilation, see if there’s any chance to find anything about Hitch.

According to Michaël from Watoo Watoo on a comment he posted back in 2010 on the blog Heaven is Above: “Nessie was a small label in the southern suburbs of Paris. They released this comp that you mention, a couple of eps & then got bored, less interested in tracking small indie bands.”

Well, before they got bored they put out this tape and the two 7″s (aside from the Evergreen one, there’s a 7″ Christmas comp). This tape sadly doesn’t have a release year. It may have been also from 1994, as the other two releases on the label. On this tape compilation, which I mentioned before when I wrote about the French bands Nothing Else and Les Poissons Solubles, Hitch appears on the A side, with the eighth track. Other bands on this compilation were The Penguins, Caramel, Pillows, Meek, Lollypops, Newell and more.

One of the few credits that appear on this tape is that it was mixed by Jean-François Marvaud. Marvaud had been part of the band Meek, where he played guitar. That’s another band that deserves a post on the blog. Aside from this band he had been involved doing technical work for many bands, including Evergreen or Spring.

The tape came with a booklet, 8 pages long. I don’t own the tape, but I hope someone does and can maybe find out if there’s any information about the band. After you hear the beauty of the song you’ll understand my interest.

Maybe someone out there can help me. At least let me know if they were French? I assume they were as all the bands on the tape are French as far as I know. I think that is a fair guess. But where in France? If they had any releases? Any other songs recorded? Would be great to know!

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Listen
Hitch – You Should Stay Inside

Happy to end the week after booking a flight to Mexico City next month. Just around the time for the World Cup finals. I will have to watch it there. Hopefully it is fun. I remember watching some games from the last World Cup in Montreal, the Colombia vs Uruguay and some others that I can’t recall now. But there wasn’t much of a good vibe and wasn’t easy to find places to watch it. I’m sure Mexicans are more football-crazy than Canadians.

I will just be for around 10 days and I believe I will be doing a little tour visiting some new towns I’ve never been to like Queretaro, San Miguel de Allende, Peña del Bernal and Guanajuato. Any tips will be appreciated. If not my Lonely Planet guide will be used for the third time in Mexico(!).

Then I still have just 7 days left for more vacations later this year. Was looking for flights in August, but everything seems complicated. For example, when I find a cheap flight, I can’t find good deals for places to stay.

Anyways, according to Mobineko they are sending the records for Salt Lake Alley next week… should I trust them? When they arrive home I’ll let everyone know.

In the meantime, here is some new indiepop items worth checking out!

Sobs: seems to be a new crop of pop bands from Singapore. The latest one I’ve discovered is called Sobs which is formed by Celine Autumn, Jared Lim and Raphael Ong. They have put out a tape album with 8 songs that has lovely artwork by Mich Cervantes. I don’t know if the whole album sounds great, I have only been able to stream one of the songs, the last one, “Telltale Signs” which I recommend to everyone who loves female vocals and pop melodies. Even better, this song has a video on Youtube. The only bad news here is that the tape is sold out. Hope there’s a CD version soon. Or vinyl.

El Sonido del Río Hablador: Impermeable Records from Peru is doing their sort of Leamington Spa compilation. Yes, they are doing a retrospective compilation of indiepop bands from that country for the period of 2000 to 2009. And there are 20 songs in total! It is definitely a fantastic compendium of the sounds and bands that were part of the fractured scene of Lima and other Peruvian cities. The CD comes with a booklet with information about every single band on it. And you’ll learn that barely a few of these bands really have proper releases, most of these songs are demos in true DIY spirit. So giving a new life to these songs is a superb job by Joel, who compiled this soon to be cult object.

Davey Woodward: I wasn’t aware Davey from The Brilliant Corners has a Bandcamp page. On it he has many things available for one to order and also to have a listen. There are records by The Experimental Pop Band, there’s a download EP by the band Karen, the single by Davey Woodward and The Winter Orphans (which I believe will soon be releasing an album), and also Davey’s solo album from 2010.

Masonieria: Sonia from the Barcelona band Papa Topo, who had contributed a few songs to a soundtrack some months ago, now has uploaded 5 great demo tracks to Bandcamp. There are 5 catchy and fun songs for everyone to stream: “El Mal Hermano”, “Tengo Tu Número Apuntado en un Folio”, “Pin de Arquero”, “Cançó per a Tu (plata i forma)” and “Falloppio”. Lovely bedroom casio pop.

Rik Rak: those of us who love great jangle pop can rejoice because Firestation will be releasing a retrospective compilation by the Blackpool band Rik Rak this August 3rd. The album will be titled “Illuminated” and I can’t wait for it to be out. An interview with the band would be nice too as I don’t know much about them. I hope so! For the time being, for those who don’t know them check out their video for the song “It’s Not Easy”.

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Killing time, the act of being idle
The Killing Time, a period in late 17th century Scottish history

I wonder how to start a blog post about a band that there is nothing at all written on the web. That has only one known song in their repertoire. That their band name is not easy to search on the web and that there are many bands sharing the same name. It is indeed complicated. But I hope, that by writing this post someone will remember them or maybe the band itself will get in touch, and maybe, we will learn their story. That would be the ideal scenario, right?

As many indiepop fans know, the “Corrupt Postman” tape is one of the most famous cassette compilations from the 80s. I have in the past featured more than a few bands that appeared on it like Nine Steps to Ugly, The Felicitys, The Apple Moths, Steamtown and more. I sadly don’t own this tape comp, but I believe there wasn’t much information about the bands on the sleeve. I do have MP3s for all the songs on the tape, and Killing Time’s “Perishing Flowers” has always been a favourite. I wonder why? Perhaps it starts sounding a bit like “Teenage Kicks”, and then it has a very simple structure, it is direct, and has a catchy chorus. I don’t think there’s much mystery why one would like this song. It is 3 minutes and a half of pop effervescence, with a punk attitude.

The “Corrupt Postman” tape was released by Windmill Records in 1988 and had no catalog number. It had 28 songs in total, 14 on each side. Most of it is proper indiepop though there are some strange tracks. Killing Time appears halfway on the B side. It is the 7th song there.

Windmill Records was based in Cheshire and released another tape compilation that is quite legendary, the “Are You Ready?” one also in 1998. Aside from these two there were two flexis, both of them compilations as well, “Four Bands Four Songs” that included The Fat Tulips, The Applicants, The Haywains and Paintbox and “Three Bands Three Songs” that had “They Go Boom!!, The Dreamscape and Strawberry Story. The people behind this label were called Chris and Neil. I don’t know their last names, but I figure that it would be super interesting to do a Windmill Records interview at some point. Learn the story of the label, how they worked, if there were more releases, etc, etc. Someone can put me in touch? And maybe they remember who Killing Time were!

I have the suspicion though that Chris was Chris Mabbs who did Popstar Records. And that Neil was the person behind Caramel Records who released the first Bouquet 7”. Could someone confirm this?

Killing Time contributed the same song to the Elefant Records tape “Hacia la Luz” (ER-5) in 1990. Two years later. This tape includes many of the bands that were on “Corrupt Postman” and I was surprised to see a comment on Discogs calling the tape as a cheap rip-off of “Corrupt Postman”. Don’t know why the animosity! On this tape Killing Time also appear on the B side, but now they are the tenth song. This tape actually had one more song, there were 29 songs in total. But again, I don’t own this tape, so there might be a chance that Elefant had some info about the bands on the tape artwork. Anyone would know?

But that’s all there is really. I’m just curious about this one little song and would love to know more. And in general, would also learn more about Windmill Records. And even if it is not the same Neil or Chris, it would also be great to do a Bouquet interview on the blog, right? So any help is much appreciated.

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Listen
Killing Time – Perishing Flowers

I’ve discovered a bunch of new songs and releases the past few days. Why not share them with you?

Red Sleeping Beauty: our friends from Sweden have recorded the unofficial Swedish World Cup song “Dressed in Yellow and Blue” and it will be included in the Official Matinée World Cup EP. A World Cup EP! That is really exciting! Who else will be participating in it? Also, when will this EP be released? I can’t wait. I love indiepop, I love football. There’s no better combination. And to be honest, there aren’t that many footie songs that I can’t think of! This song, if you remember was originally released by The Charade back in the day for 2006 World Cup.

Tulip: thanks to a recommendation by Iván from Juniper Moon/Linda Guilala I ended up on Tulip’s Bandcamp and listening to their self-titled debut EP. There is very little information about the band, so can’t say much. But they do hail from Vigo, in Galicia, Spain, and this EP has 5 terrific pop songs!! Songs that are dreamy, lo-fi, jangly, and so fragile that it is impossible not to love them. The 5 songs on the EP are “On The Sidelines”, “Wax & Wine”, “Cous-Cous”, “Arrecife” and “Nada Nuevo”. It is truly interesting to see a band that can make great songs both in Spanish and English. I hope these songs get a proper physical release.

Distant Shore: the new project by Ben Sidall is Distant Shore. And he has uploaded three lovely songs, three jangly classics: “Moving Up North”, “Former Life” and “A Quick Goodbye”. He hasn’t shared much information about these songs, so I can’t say much about them, only that I really enjoy them and I hope they get a release. Or maybe I can also ask that Distant Shore be booked at Indietracks? Or another good indiepop festival?

Saturday Night: this one came through the indiepop-list. Saturday Night is a band from Washington D.C. formed by Cash Langdon who used to be in the very fine Catholic Easter Colors, Luke Reddick, Jesse Sattler and Nora Button. The self-titled album will have ten songs and so far only one of the songs is available to stream, “Fish in the Pond”. It sounds great, especially when female backing vocals kick in. That works so so well! the album will be released on August 17th as a limited edition tape.

The Catherines: a new tune by Heiko Schneider and Sandra Ost. Actually a digital single, with an A side and a B side. If you like jangly, if you like good indiepop, look no further. Check out “Every time You Say Its Okay I Know Its Okay” and “Yes You’re Beautiful To Look At But So Ugly Inside” and fall in love with them.

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Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System. It is a giant planet with a mass one-thousandth that of the Sun, but two-and-a-half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined. Jupiter and Saturn are gas giants; the other two giant planets, Uranus and Neptune are ice giants. Jupiter has been known to astronomers since antiquity. The Romans named it after their god Jupiter. When viewed from Earth, Jupiter can reach an apparent magnitude of −2.94, bright enough for its reflected light to cast shadows, and making it on average the third-brightest object in the night sky after the Moon and Venus.

Just ordered the “Leave the Ground” 7″ by the Sydney, Australia, band Jupiter. I thought I had some of their releases in my collection but I noticed I didn’t. So now I’m missing two other records, a 12″ maxi single and an album. All of them released on Summershine Records, the Australian indiepop label par excellence. Time to find out more about them then.

On Discogs it says that the band was short-lived. It may be true, their releases span two years, 1991 and 1992. They were a trio formed by Simon McLean on bass and vocals, Chris Stephens on guitar and Alison Galloway on drums. And as I said before, they put out 3 records.

The first of these records was a 12″ single called “‘3′” (Shine 011t) that was released by Summershine in 1991. As mentioned before on the blog, many times actually, Summershine was a Melbourne based label that was founded in 1989 by Jason Reynolds, a label that would release many classic records, from the Rainyard to The Earthmen, and who would later move to America. Maybe the only indiepop label that has moved to a different country and continued releasing records. The “‘3′” 12″ had four songs, two on each side. The A side had “Sense” and “Glow” while the B side had “New” and “Day1”.

The second 7″ is the one I bought just now. The “Leave the Ground” 7″ (Shine 015) was released in 1992 and had the title song on the A side and “T” on the B side. I start to notice a trend in their song titles. They are simple, very simple. They don’t tell much at all. This 7″ was limited to 500 copies.

Lastly the band was going to release their debut album that same year, 1992. “Arum” (ShineCD003) is a fantastic dreampop/shoegaze album, and that was a very good year indeed to release it. I was to read on the Wilfuly Obscure blog some comments from the vocalist of the band, Chris, were he mentions that they were big fans of Ride and that shows in the songs. He also says that they supported Ride once and that it was the pinnacle of his music career. That now he is a web developer.

Interesting. I wonder what does Arum means. It seems it is a genus of flowering plants in the family Araceae, native to Europe, northern Africa, and western and central Asia, with the highest species diversity in the Mediterranean region. Frequently called “arum lilies”, they are not closely related to the true lilies Lilium. Plants in closely related Zantedeschia are also called “arum lilies”. Was that the reason of the album name?

The CD had 11 songs. The 6 songs released on the singles are included. So 5 songs were brand new for the album, though two of them titled “@” are just instrumentals. The tracklist was as follows: “Leave the Ground”, “T”, “Carefully”, “Lost”, “@”, “Sense”, “Glow”, “New”, “Day 1”, “@” and “Meltdown”. Some of the songs (1-5 and 10-11) were recorded at Troy Horse Studios in Sydney. The rest were recorded “somewhere else”. It was engineered and produced by Michael Levis (tracks 1 to 4) and Steve Wilson (tracks 6 to 9). Song 11 is credited to have been included thanks to the courtesy of Half a Cow label. Wilson had been part of the band Sneeze that released on the Half a Cow label. Lastly the photography for hte album is credited to Jason Fisher.

There are four compilation appearances listed on Discogs. In 1991 they contributed the song “Meltdown” to the 7″ comp “Slice: A Half a Cow Compilation” (MOO-03) released by Half a Cow of course. There were four songs on the record, two on each side. The A side had Swirl and Smude, while the B side had Jupiter’s “Meltdown” and a track by Studley Lush and his Teenyboppers from Hell.

The second appearance was once again on a Half a Cow compilation. I start to wonder why didn’t they release a record on this label. The compilation “Slice Two: A Half a Cow Compilation” (HAC CD09) included again the song “Meltdown”. Actually it includes the 4 songs that had appeared before in the 7″ comp.

Next for them was the 1994 compilation “Tomorrow’s Hits Today”, released by Summershine on CD both in Australia and in the US. I believe it was 1994 when Jason Reynolds moved to the US. The band appears on this compilation with the song “T”. This compilation is a very good entry point, a sampler, for the music and artists on this label. You’ll find the Tender Engines, Autohaze, The Sugargliders and more.

Lastly on the classic compilation “Just a Taste” (Slumberland 008) that Slumberland Records released in 1995 celebrating the Summershine label they have 2 songs, “Lost” and “Leave the Ground”

There is an old website by the band with very little information but very nice goodies! Firstly all songs are uploaded and you can stream them. That is a treat for any music lover. You can even download them. But even better there are live video clips! 3 of them. The first one is of them playing the song “Ride” when they supported Ride in Sydney 1992. There is also another one of “T” at the same gig. And once again, at the same gig, them playing “Sense” and “Leave the Ground”. I suppose now that this website was created before Youtube?

I keep looking, and see that last year Fensepost dedicated a post to the band’s “Leave the Ground” 7″. Seems they haven’t been truly forgotten.

Are they listed as having played in other bands? Alison seems to have been involved in a few actually, 51 Monday, Carton, Godstar, Seventeen and Smudge. Quite a CV. But there’s not much for Simon or Chris. I did notice though that Simon’s photography was used on the Bughouse self-titled album art and Chris had worked as engineer and editor in records by Kaktus Mantras, Edrenalin, The Catholics and The Necks.

Then I find a very curious article on the Washington City Paper written by Leonard Roberge who I interviewed in the past about his band Bella Vista. He mentions that Simon McLean grew up to be a cowboy with the band January. Here he reviews the album “I Heard Myself In You”. Here he joined forces with ex-Seefeel vocalist Sarah Peacock and alongside Jon Wood and Jonny Mathers the band released two albums and four singles in the early 2000s. This means then that Simon moved to the UK at some point in the 90s, right?

Then there’s a Sydney Morning Herald page dating from May 17, 1991 available but it asks for my credit card so I could see it. That sucks.

Aside from all of this, there’s not much more on the web. The band disappeared. I wonder if they had more songs. Someone on the Wilfuly Obscure blog asks for a song called “What a Blast”. This one doesn’t appear in any of their releases. Was it recorded? Was it released somewhere? Why was the band short-lived? Why didn’t they continue making music? Had they been involved in any other bands? Why did Simon move to the UK? What are they up to these days? Would be great to find out!

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Listen
Jupiter – Leave the Ground

Starting a new week, now it is June and the World Cup will start in less than two weeks. Probably there will be less posts on the blog during the weeks it lasts. One can’t help it. Especially as it is a World Cup that is very important to me as Peru is going to be in it for the first time since Spain 1982 and it will be the first time I will see them participate since I’m alive. So this means a lot. I’m very happy, very excited, and I look forward to June 16th for the first game against Denmark.

Also this month I should be receiving the Salt Lake Alley 7″. I can’t wait any longer!! And hopefully will be able to announce one or two forthcoming releases. I hope this will be a good month for everyone!

Now onto some new indiepop finds!

Nubes en mi Casa: the Buenos Aires, Argentina, have a new video for their song “¿Qué viene después?” which will be part of the album “Duelos” that Plastilina Records will be releasing this August. It seems the band has shrinked, now from what I understand from the press release only Josefina Mac Loughlin and Hernán Dadamo are left. But that doesn’t mean the band has changed their sound much. “Duelos” will be their third album and as soon as there is more info about it, I’ll be happy to share with you all.

Japanese Summer Orange: I got this recommendation through an email from Minasamaz from Japan. The band is Japanese and from what I was told the person behind it is a 23-year old boy who seems to like the band Fazerdaze.  “Let Me Get You Some Beers” is the song that was shared with me. It actually has a video. I was told in the email that I was going to like the sweet and bitter sounds like marmalade. But I’m not totally hooked. I think it is okay. What do you think?

The Caraway: another recommendation from Japan. This one came from Twitter. And I this is much more my style. It sounds really great if I must say so. I was shared this beautiful song “Apple of My Eye”, though it is just a teaser on Soundcloud. Now I’m looking for more. It sounds fantastic! But, are there any releases by this band? I had to find them on Youtube where I got to listen to “The Rainy Day”. Now, I’m curious. On Discogs only a compilation appearance from 2005. Maybe I should interview them and find out more?

Cariño: a new video for the song “Canción de Pop de Amor” that will be included in the 10″ mini-lp “Pop para la Bajona”. I had recommended the band before and now I have to do it again as the video is really great too! The band formed by Paola Rivero on guitars, Alicia Ros on bass and Maria Talaverano on keys and vocals, is definitely one of the most exciting bands to appear on Elefant in a long time. Makes me glad that the label is going back to its root and not releasing so much boring 60s sounding stuff. This is much much better. Definitely a must for me.

BMX Bandits: and there’s not one but two videos coming from the Spanish label Elefant. The legendary BMX Bandits have unveiled a video for the song “Way of the Wolf (With Dr. Cosmo’s tape Lab)” which sounds great, great, GREAT. One can only wonder how can Duglas do it again and again. This song is included in their last album, “BMX Bandits Forever”.

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Pomme Cannelle, the sugar apple, or sweetsop or Custard apple is the fruit of Annona squamosa, the most widely grown species of Annona and a native of the tropical Americas and West Indies. The Spanish traders of Manila galleons brought it to Asia where its old Mexican name ate may still be found in Bengali ata, Nepalese aati, Sinhalese mati anoda, Burmese awzar thee, and atis in the Philippines. It is also known as custard apple in India, (mainly Annona reticulata) in the Philippines and in Australia. The name is also used in Portuguese as ata.

The fruit is spherical through conical, 5–10 cm in diameter and 6–10 cm  long, and weighing 100–240 g, with a thick rind composed of knobby segments. The color is typically pale green through blue-green, with a deep pink blush in certain varieties, and typically has a bloom. It is unique among Annona fruits in being segmented, and the segments tend to separate when ripe, exposing the interior. The flesh is fragrant and sweet, creamy white through light yellow, and resembles and tastes like custard. It is found adhering to 13-to-16-millimetre-long (0.51 to 0.63 in) seeds forming individual segments arranged in a single layer around a conical core. It is soft, slightly grainy, and slippery. The hard, shiny seeds may number 20–40 or more per fruit and have a brown to black coat, although varieties exist that are almost seedless.

Is it popular in the US? I haven’t really seen this fruit at supermarkets nor at markets. I actually didn’t think it existed. When I saw the photo of it I thought it was a chirimoya, a fruit native to my home country Peru, which is really popular. It seems they are from the same family, Annona, but they are two different fruits. I wonder how it tastes.

I ask if it is popular in the USA because there was a band here once that used that fruit’s name. Well, its name in French. Maybe the band members saw the fruit while in France and tried it there? It is a possibility. If only I would know the names of these band members. They were part of the indiepop-list at some point. At the end of the 90s for sure. That’s the time when the only song I know by them was included in a compilation I’ve been going back a lot lately, “The Family Twee”.

As I mentioned on the posts about The Autumn Teen Sound, The Imaginary Friend and Boy Mouse, Girl Mouse, this double CD compilation was put together by participating members of the Eskimo indiepop list in 1998. It wasn’t released by any label, so someone in the list might have put it together. I believe it was Skippy from March Records who was the one behind The Autumn Teen Sound. I looked on the archives of the indiepop-list for any information about this compilation and there is not much. It was released around Christmas 1998 and I see on the list posts from early 1999 mentioning that listees were receiving their copies. It looks like that most people didn’t think much of the bands on it. Most seem to say that it sucked. That only a few songs were good enough. I haven’t listened to all of the songs yet. So couldn’t say.

But Pomme Cannelle’s “Paper Kisses” is a blissful little tune with female vocals. Who knows who was behind this band. I’m sure some indiepop fans might know, and I hope someone will share that information. Many of the bands that appear on this compilation had been involved with other bands and used different names to appear on this compilation.

Would be interesting to find out if there were more songs by them!

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Listen
Pomme Cannelle – Paper Kisses

Time to end the week. A lovely Friday and a good week in general. I announced the Okama Flannel Boy 7″ and now just waiting for the Salt Lake Alley 7″ to arrive soon. Also talking to some bands about the chance to do a retrospective compilation as part of the Cloudberry Cake Kitchen. So, I’m quite busy with the label and soon should be able to announce another 7″! So please keep an eye on this blog, where you get indiepop news, sometimes late, but at least I try to cover them all!

Candybomber: our friends Stewart who used to be in The Kensingtons has just released a new EP with his latest band, Candybomber. Now based in Australia and not in the UK, his new project is not canonical indiepop but a very cool  and catchy powerpop record. There are 4 songs on it, “Not Completely Sure”, “Everybody Knows”, “Industrial Strength” and “Naive” and is out now in digital and CD formats by Jigsaw Records.

Talulah Gosh: last Wednesday many of my friends started sharing this live footage of the legendary Talulah Gosh from a gig at Bay 63 in November 27th 1986. Even Amelia Fletcher shared it surprised! Where did this come from?!  I, who wasn’t around that time,  was transported to the heyday of indiepop. It gave me goosebumps even if the quality is not the best. There is no way to escape falling under the spell of Talulah Gosh, it is bewitching! I love one of the comments on the video mentioning that he spoke to the guitarist after the gig to see if they’d play at his university and he said he would only charge 50 pounds.

Megrim: another release on Jigsaw Records is the debut album titled “Megrim” by this French band that is fronted by Olivier Doreille from the classic 90s band Les Autres. There are 10 songs and as it is usual with Jigsaw releases it is available digitally and CD. The label compares the music with Lorelei and Hood and I can definitely see that. It is within the rockier side of indiepop and very 90s sounding if I may say that.

Cozy Slippers: continuing with this good review of the latest by Jigsaw Records now a Seattle trio with dual-lead female vocals. When I read that description, it caught my attention immediately. I wanted to listen to them. So I checked out their “Postcards EP” on Bandcamp. There are 5 songs on it, “Not Hard to Say Goodbye”, “En Francais”, “Cozy Love Song”, “Back and Forth” and “You Started This”, and I must say that this is great! It seems the band had self-released an EP in 2017, so I should try to track that down. This one is a winner.

Adrian Teacher and the Subs: discovered this Vancouver, Canada, band thanks to a recommendation by my friend David from Madrid. He is always discovering great music, one has to keep an eye on his Facebook shares. In this case he shared the song “Pop Medicine” and I thought that it was pretty good! It seems the album is only available digitally and that is a surprise as the band was touring the US and I would have supposed they would have some merch! But who knows! The album where this song is included is called “Anxious Love” and was released on May 9th. It is a 9 song record and the band is formed by Adrian Teacher, Amanda P and Robbie N.

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What is Peat Moss? Sphagnum is a genus of approximately 380 accepted species of mosses, commonly known as peat moss. Accumulations of Sphagnum can store water, since both living and dead plants can hold large quantities of water inside their cells; plants may hold 16–26 times as much water as their dry weight, depending on the species. The empty cells help retain water in drier conditions. Hence, as sphagnum moss grows, it can slowly spread into drier conditions, forming larger mires, both raised bogs and blanket bogs.These peat accumulations then provide habitat for a wide array of peatland plants, including sedges and ericaceous shrubs, as well as orchids and carnivorous plants. Sphagnum and the peat formed from it do not decay readily because of the phenolic compounds embedded in the moss’s cell walls. In addition, bogs, like all wetlands, develop anaerobic soil conditions, which produces slower anaerobic decay rather than aerobic microbial action. Peat moss can also acidify its surroundings by taking up cations, such as calcium and magnesium, and releasing hydrogen ions. Under the right conditions, peat can accumulate to a depth of many meters. Different species of Sphagnum have different tolerance limits for flooding and pH, so any one peatland may have a number of different Sphagnum species.

A band that named themselves after a species of moss? Sure thing. And it happened in Japan in the mid 90s. I was looking the other day for their records, see if they were available to buy here in the US as I wasn’t in the mood of paying much for shipping. Sadly there was no luck. Bu in doing so I found three songs on Youtube and some information about this obscure Japanese band that I will happily share with you all.

The band had two proper releases, both in 1996. The one that seems to be easier to find is a 7″ released by Sonorama Records (Sonorama 002). This was a Los Angeles, USA, based indie label and that’s why I’m surprised there were no copies by American sellers. I do own one of the releases from their catalog, The Jordans superb album “Katydid” from 1996. The 7″ that had a cute photo of a Japanese kid falling asleep on the cover had four songs. On the A side there was “Earl Grey Tea” and “Many Suns” while on the B side we find “To My Little Friends” and “Mad Cow Disease”. Indeed, those were the years when that disease was all over the news. Maybe the younger readers of the blog aren’t aware of it but Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), commonly known as mad cow disease, is a transmissible spongiform encephalopathy and fatal neurodegenerative disease in cattle that may be passed to humans who have eaten infected flesh. BSE causes a spongiform degeneration of the brain and spinal cord. BSE has a long incubation period, of 2.5 to 5 years, usually affecting adult cattle at a peak age onset of four to five years. BSE is caused by a misfolded protein—a prion. In the United Kingdom, more than 180,000 cattle were infected and 4.4 million slaughtered during the eradication program. According to statistical estimates made in the 2006, 44,800 French cattle were infected by BSE between 1987 and 1997.

The 7″ is said to have come with an insert. I should track a copy and find out what it said. Maybe there were credits too on the back cover.

The other release listed by them on Discogs is a 4 song tape that was released in 1996 by Clover Records (C-034). Clover was a superb Japanese label by the way who had release tons of great records, from 800 Cherries to Red Go Cart. This tape came with artwork on green tracing paper and it was numbered. I’m not sure how limited this release was though. The songs on it were on the A side “Mess” and “Picnic” while on the B side there’s “D’yer Wanna Dance With Kids?” and “Out of the Room”.

There are three compilation appearances. The first, the 1997 CD comp “Pop Jingu Vol 1 – A Japanese Compilation”, was my introduction to the band. I remember I had MP3s for this CD back in the Soulseek days and used to play it a lot. Thanks to this compilation I also discovered Red Go Cart, one of my favourite Japanese bands! The compilation was actually a co-release by Sonorama (Sonorama 004) and Clover (CLCD 11101), the two labels that had previously put out stuff by the band. The songs the band contributed were the last two from the tape,”D’yer Wanna Dance With Kids?” and “Out of the Room”. The CD was compiled by Dan Goldwag, Masato Saito and Rich Stephens. The last two were involved in the band Kactus and I suppose Dan Goldwag was running Sonorama Records.

On the inner sleeve of the compilation we find the names of the band members:
Manami Kurusu: vocals
Masato Saito: guitar
Julia Mitsuyama: melodion
Kotaro Sugino: guitar
Chikako Nakata: percussion

So, Masato Saito’s name appears again. Now we know he was also part of the band. He compiled the CD. He was also part of the band Maples and Pervenche. Things start to make some sense. Also I notice that the Kactus connection wasn’t only of Masato. Julia and Kotaro were also part of that band.

The second compilation listed dates from 1998. It was called “Splash Dive – Cream Cone Compilation Vol.0” which was released by Cream Cone Records (CCCC-2000), another Japanese label.  I don’t know much about this label to be honest. On this record the band appears with a song that wasn’t previously released, “Blue Painting”.

Lastly their song “Mess” appeared on the 2001 CD compilation that accompanied the music mag Indies Magazine Vol.47 from Japan. Was the band still around in 2001 then?

I keep looking on the web and there are more compilations, for example, one called “Analogue Master”, that was released in 1996 by Clover (C-020). This was a tape too with a bunch of obscure bands that I’ve never heard before like Boosted Goners, Cherry Straw or Gum Gum Punch. On this tape the band Peatmos appears with “Earl Grey Tea”.

Also there is “Feelie Pop!” that was released in 1995 by Clover and it seems it was the first ever release as it has the catalog C-000. On this tape the band Peatmos appears with the song “Many Suns”.

But then a big surprise. The band actually had another proper release. The band released on Clover (C-003) a tape a year before the “Mess” cassette. The “Rich Time For You” tape came out in 1995 and included 5 songs. There is “Long Good Bye” and “Hey!” on the A side and “Happy Town”, “Many Suns” and “How Do You Do” on the flip.

I keep digging and find out something that was starting to become quite obvious. Masato Saito was the owner of the label Clover Records. There is even a cool chronology of the history of the label on the Clover website. Now it makes even more sense that many of his bands were being released by Clover. He was a very active indiepop fan! Being in so many bands and also running a label.

I have actually mentioned Peatmos before on the blog, on the Flower Bellcow post. I said:  This one is for Galaxy Train events. Flower Bellcow played many of them it seems. The first one they played was the 2nd event where they shared the bill with Peatmos and Smiley at the West Dart Club. 

I keep digging and actually find a Bandcamp by an Ohio band by the same name that released a tape in 1990. It is quite different to the Japanese Peatmoss.

And finally, perhaps the best find in all of this indiepop digging, a new song, one I’ve never heard before and that sounds pretty pretty. If I was wondering if the band was still around in 2001, now I know that at least they were still going until mid 2003. That’s what it says on the name of the song, that “Play the Wind” was recorded on July 13th of 2003. And I go crazy because it sounds lovely and I am sure there must be more songs from this recording session! Where are they? And how come they weren’t released?

So many questions, and not many answers. As usual it is not easy to find the proper story of Japanese bands because of the language, it makes it very hard for me to search on Google. But I found important details, and I hope that some of the Japanese readers of the blog will fill in the blanks. Where are the band members now? Had they been in other bands other than Peatmos? When did the band split? Are there more unreleased recordings? Did they hail from Tokyo? Did they play many gigs? What do you remember about them?

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Listen
Peatmos – D’yer Wanna Dance With Kids?

I can start this post with good news! And I’m very happy about it. I sent to press, earlier this week, our 44th 7″ vinyl record! Isn’t that exciting?

Also I’m very excited as it will be the first time the label is releasing a band from Mexico City. Since the label started in 2007 it was very clear our approach in supporting a worldwide scene, that it didn’t matter where a band came from. So please let me introduce you to Okama Flannel Boy!
Okama Flannel Boy is the moniker for the Mexican musician and composer Fernando Torres. Based in Tlalpan, in the south of Mexico City, he’s been writing and recording jangly guitar driven songs inspired in 60’s bubblegum pop, soul and “the sound of young Scotland” since the beginning of 2017. This will be his debut single and the record includes 4 songs: “Carolina St.”, “Low Life”, “Motivational by Default” and “Wanted Man”. It should be released later this summer (if the pressing plant doesn’t take all the time in the world) and the sleeve has original art by British illustrator Louise Logsdon.

As a taster, I’ve uploaded the opening track to the label’s Soundcloud, so check “Carolina St.” here. And also we are taking pre-orders on our website www.cloudberryrecords.com

Thanks again for your support, and hope you like it!

Now, some new finds!

The Goon Sax: I was recommending the song “She Knows” not so long ago after it was unveiled on Youtube. Now there is a video for the song also on Youtube. It makes me wonder why don’t release just the video? There must be some case study in what works well for selling songs or records that this might be the way to do it. Anyways, the song is a cracking one, and the video too. Next week I should be seeing the band for the first time her in NYC. And I’m really looking forward to it.

Charlie Big Time: these very good Cloudberry friends have just released a new song called “This is the final song” and it comes alongside a video. See, some people do it this way too. This is the first song the band has put out since 4 years ago! So it is a treat. We don’t get that many of these classy and elegant  songs by them, so every time there’s a new one we all become terribly happy. Now will the song be released in any way? I hope so. And I also wish them to record more songs!

Oddshore: this is a new Singapore band that my friend Vernon recommended me last week. I don’t know much about them but this video and song “Do You Remember” is quite a lovely pop slice. It sounds a bit Swedish, right? perhaps that is just me. There is not much info on their Facebook or on the video on who is in the band or if they have any releases available, but at least they define themselves as indiepop. That is always good in my book! Check them out!

The Golden Rail: don’t really know how “Electric Trails From Nowhere” wasn’t recommended here. I had recommended some of their previous digital singles but not this hell of an album. The Perth, Australia, band that is kind of a super band, one that includes members Jeff Baker, Dave Chadwick, Ian Freeman and Saki Garth of classic and legendary bands like The Rainyard, Summer Suns and The Palisades among others released earlier this year this album and you can even stream it on their Bandcamp. For all of us that are a bit old-school, the 10 songs are also available on CD. And if you are even more old-school, our friend Javi at Pretty Olivia Records has a vinyl LP version of it. If you like classic pop songs, jangly guitars, hooks and smart arrangements, this is a winner. If you don’t, then it is a winner too. Just have a listen!

Gentle Brontosaurus: I recommended their album “Bees of the Invisible” a couple of weeks ago and this is more of an update really. Thing is I could recommend the album by this Madison, Wisconsin, band again, because it sounds fantastic. And sure I’ll do that. But this update has to do with the album being available now in physical formats. You can order it now as CD and also as a tape! So do that now. That’s what I will do right now!

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Every time there’s little time and I’m on a computer I try to look for new music. And “new” doesn’t mean music from 2018. It means just music I’ve never heard before. Even if I had just a few minutes in my hands.

I stumbled upon the Swedish band Dream on Youtube while looking for other bands. I love how these connections happen! I was actually looking at the flexis that were given away by the legendary Swedish magazine Sound Affects. The 10th flexi (SAF 010) caught my attention.

In 1991 the split flexi with Dream and Whipped Cream was released. It came accompanying the Sound Affects Music Magazine #11 and I believe the flexi, which was limited to 100 copies, was only given to the subscribers. It wasn’t on sale. Dream opened the flexi with the song “She Bangs the Door” while Whipped Cream appears after with “Mr Green”.

The name “She Bangs the Door” of course reminds one of “She Bangs the Drums” by The Stone Roses. I wonder if that was their intention.

Dream’s only proper release happened the same year of the flexi, 1991. It was a 7″ that was released by the classic label Ceilidh Productions (CEI 021) It had two songs, on the A side there was “Love’s a Drug” and on the B side we find “Nothing’s To Say”. The first song was recorded at Music-A-Matic during June 1991 while the second song was recorded at Studio Gig in February 1991. The engineer and co-producer for “Nothing To Say” was Stefan Arningsmark (who had been in bands like Love and Noblesse Oblige) while “Love’s A Drug” was produced by the band, Jörgen Cremonese and Ulf Ekerot. Cremonese had been in many bands like Blue For Two & Co., It’s My Head and Whipped Cream who Dream had shared the flexi with.

The artwork for the single was done by Eddie Andersson with drawings by Jörgen Lundquist. The photography on the back cover is credited to Johannes Fosséus.

But we also learn the names of the band members on this record. Per Eriksson was the vocalist and guitar player, Per Liljesson played bass and vocals and Teresa Fritzson drummed and also sang.

On Discogs I find that Per Liljesson sldo played in a band called Yoni, who released a CD single in 1996. Later I would find that Teresa was also part of this band.

There are two compilation appearances. The first dates from 1992 on a double CD compilation called “Café Kristina The CD”. It seems this compilation came with a 90 page booklet. That’s huge! I wonder what this was about? Dream appears with the song “My World” and I’m curious to know if perhaps Café Kristina was a venue. I found that there was a venue with that name in the city of Växjö. Perhaps the band hailed from that town?

The other compilation they were on was the “Ceilidh 039 Singles & Vinyls” that was released in 1997,  which was a sort of a comp with songs from the past, from the back catalogue of the Ceilidh label. You see classic bands on this one like The Cardigans, Cod Lovers, Happydeadmen, Saturday Kids and more. Dream appears with their single “Love’s A Drug”.

I start digging deeper and find a review on Sound Affects, no. 11, from June/July 1991. Sadly there is not much details about the band here. Just the reviewer, Terry Ericsson, mentioning that he likes the 7″ and he emphasizes that the band has a sense of humor.

I could find more information on the Musikon website. Here I find even more bands Per Eriksson had been involved. But first here they suspect that Dream hailed from Norrköping though the website is not sure, they have a ? next to the city name. Other bands that Per was involved were Lolita Pop, The Line, Vantage, Razorblade and Paradise. The strange thing is that these bands, all of them, hail from different cities. I start to suspect that it may be that the name Per Eriksson is a bit common in Sweden, and that there might be many Per Erikssons involved in bands. Or not?

I couldn’t find much more about them. It is true that it is hard to google a band with the name Dream. It is impossible. But there must be more music by them or their members. Just one 7″ feels like too little!

Do my Swedish friends remember them? Where were they based? Why no more releases? Did they gig a lot? What are they up to today? Would be interesting to find out!

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Listen
Dream – She Bangs the Door

A new week! And I heard at last from Mobineko after many angry emails. They are telling me that the problem was that the automated shipping dates were causing them trouble (?). That the records still take around 14 weeks to press (that is 3 months and a half max) and that they had transitioned over from MPO (I don’t know what MPO means, do you?) and tried to be as open and transparent as possible and stated in the order confirmation page that orders placed at that time will take up to 14-16 weeks. FYI if we would have kept the orders at MPO there would have been 7 months minimum turn time, hence the decision to move quickly. Anyways they say that all the print parts and plates for the Salt Lake Alley 7″ are finished and they are just waiting for the sleeves. So supposedly they should be shipped out shortly. Crossing fingers.

So new finds? Yes, a few!

Ciudad Gragea: the Trujillo, Peru, band has been featured on the blog in the past with their brand of fun pop reminiscent of 80s Spanish pop. Now the band seems to be working on new songs, perhaps a new release, and they have shared a video for their song “La Noche”.

Youthcomics: I still haven’t been able to get the Sailyard Records releases. Perhaps it is my fault for trusting that I was going to trade them with the Japanese label as was agreed. But well, maybe I should just buy them on Discogs or somewhere else. In any case I will have to add one more to the list! The superb Youthcomics is releasing “April Transit”, a 6 song EP, on June 20th. The Osaka band has now shared one of the songs from this record, one called “Weekend”, which is terrific. Also I really like the artwork for this release, a bit Cloudberry-style if I may say so!

The Orchids: the Glasgow legends will be back on August 7th with two brand new songs on a lovely 7″. “I Never Learn” and “Echos (Have Hope)” will appear on the 7″ series that WIAWYA has been putting out this year. The same that included 7″s by the Catenary Wires or Birdie. At the moment of writing this post only the B side, “Echos (Have Hope)”, is available to stream and I can only say that it beautiful as usual as everything The Orchids do. The A side, I assume, would be as good if not better, as it was chosen to be an A side, right?  Looking forward to it!

The Amber List: I saw that Mick and Scrub from the 80s band Big Red Bus have a new song under the name The Amber List called “Guiding Star”. It is the first time I’m hearing their music and it is actually not their only song available on SoundCloud. There are 3 more, “Back on Board”, “Pink and Orange Sky” and “Well the Wind” which seem to be 4 months old. It is always good tom hear what the classic bands from the indiepop days are doing now! Good stuff! And a Big Red Bus interview would be good too, right? Especially after they released that retrospective on Firestation.

Blues Lawyer: one thing I have due is ordering more records from Flagstaff’s Emotional Response Records. If only I had tons of money! But hopefully next month it can happen. There are so many records I need, and I just discovered one more that I would like in my collection, Blues Lawyers’ “Guess Work”. This ten song album is out now vinyl and from listening to it on Bandcamp I can see why the label compares them to the TVPs or The Vaselines. The band hails from Oakland, California, and is formed by Rob, Elyse, Nic and Alejandra. It says that the band started when Rob and Elyse bonded over The Clean and The Bats. Well, anything that has to do with The Bats in my book is a good thing.

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A purée (or mash) is cooked food, usually vegetables or legumes, that has been ground, pressed, blended or sieved to the consistency of a creamy paste or liquid.[1] Purées of specific foods are often known by specific names, e.g., applesauce or hummus. The term is of French origin, where it meant in Old French (13th century) purified or refined.

Yes, that’s what the Spanish word Puré means in English. Not much mystery in there. I don’t know much about this Spanish band that released only one 7″ back in 1999 on Elefant Records. I don’t even own the record. Wish I had. Spanish postage prices were never friendly. Back in the day I used to complain a lot about that. Now that the US has worst prices than those of Spain, I know how annoying it is for those selling records. And for those buying too! It is a big headache!

Anyhow, their “Tanto Peor” 7″ was supposed to introduce a great band. A band that I believe Elefant had high hopes according to the small press note that appears on the Bandcamp were the label has uploaded the 4 songs by the band. It says: Another Spanish debut. Every song is a surprise: they sometimes sing in French, weird guitar bridges, toy-like jazz instrumentals… they will become huge.

Huge, they didn’t become. But they left these 4 songs, “Gérôme”, “Nana”, “B Explosion” and “Tant Pis”. Two on each side of the record. The vinyl record came out on October of 1999 and had the catalog number ER-213. It is an interesting band. They sing two songs in French, one in Spanish and there’s one instrumental. Why? I must say that the opening song, “Gérôme”, which is sung in French, is by far my favourite.

They did have another song released, but it happened 5 years later on a rarities compilation released by Elefant called “Momentos Perdidos” (ER-1115). On this compilation of unreleased tracks, B-sides and other rarities, the band appears with the song “La Vaca” which means the cow. Where does this song come from? From an earlier demo? Or perhaps a demo recorded after the 7″? It is not clear.

What else there is about this band to know? It seems to be very little, but I won’t give up and will continue my search. My first stop is a 2012 blog post on the blog Fantail Musica. It mentions that the band was formed in the town of Villaviciosa. That is around Madrid. Villaviciosa de Odón is a municipality in the western zone of the Community of Madrid in Spain. The town is located 15 km west of Madrid’s city center, in the western zone of the metro area. The Spanish Air Force Museum and the Universidad Europea de Madrid are located within the municipality. Villaviciosa’s quiet lifestyle and its proximity to Madrid propitiated rapid and extensive development during the late 1990s and early 2000s. Because of its proximity to the Universidad Europea de Madrid, it has become a university town, with well-developed residential area and amenities for students. The town contains the Castle of Villaviciosa de Odón.

It also mentions the first names of the band members, Irene, Begoña, Ana, Javi and Carlos. If only the last names were written down… perhaps it would be easier to track them down. I believe Irene was the vocalist as on the Elefant biography it mentions she is singing on “Tant Pis”. It is a good deduction I believe. So what did the other members play?

It seems there is a compilation called “Candy Box” that featured only Elefant bands that was made for the Japanese market. It was released in 2005 and it includes the song “Gérôme” by Puré. I can’t seem to find it on Discogs though.

I think on this streaming service called Deezer the band members are properly credited. The thing is I need to pay to access this website. What a stupid thing. Hate it. I can only read thanks to the metadata on Google that they were Irene Trascasa Muñoz de la Peña, Begoña Nuñez Biorrun Boluda González, Javier Herce Uralde, Carlos Carrión Martin Torres Hernández and Ana María Gómez López Morata Alvarez .

So now I have something to go on. And I find that Irene Tascasa was living in Lisbon and recording with a band called Pakita Pouco. They had a 2011 self-titled EP and you can actually listen to it on Bandcamp. There is a Javier Herce who is a writer, photographer and singer. Winner of the Premio Odisea in 2007 for his book “Desde Aquí Hasta tu Ventana”. Wonder if he is the same Javier as the Javier in Puré. Sadly the other members have very common names so it is hard to actually have any luck in searching them. There is a Carlos Carrión that lives in Madrid and works for wholesale for example, but as it is nothing to do with music it is hard to even suspect that it might be him. Ana María Gómez López, well there are many, but there is an artist, but then she was born in Minneapolis. Sounds farfetched, right?

About the band in particular I can’t find much more. Would be nice to know if they had been involved in any other bands or find out about any other recordings by them. I love their song “Gérôme” and I wonder, if Elefant was supportive of them, saying they were going to be huge, what happened to them? Why with a big indie label supporting them, they didn’t live to expectations? Does anyone remember them?

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Listen
Puré – Gérôme