Thanks so much to Dermot Lambert for the interview! I wrote about Empty Shell on the blog a long time ago and Dermot was kind enough to get in touch and to answer my questions! Empty Shell released one 7″ back in the 80s. Afterwards Dermot formed Rex & Dino and later Blink who are well known in Ireland! But the story starts here! Time to discover Empty Shell.

++ Hi Dermot! Thanks so much for getting in touch and being up for answering questions about your music and your bands. As I know you’ve been in a few bands, wanted to ask if Empty Shell was your first one ever? Or had you been involved with other bands before?

My first ever band was a band called Point Blank, which was myself and a few friends, most of us couldn’t really play, and there’s probably a whole book in that band, I built a shed for rehearsing in the drummers back garden – really, made it myself out of bricks and concrete and the whole lot, it took a fucking year of my life when I could have been out chasing girls, although I was terrified of girls anyway, so that might explain why I spent a year building a shed. Anyway, just as I had finished building the thing, the drummer told me he was not really into the ‘music thing’ and that I should consider going off and getting a bird (our word for girl). Somewhere in between all that building, we played two shows, one in a school hall, and one in a local pub. I remember both equally well, and both had unfortunate outcomes – I managed to alienate myself from the local community of nuns at the school show, by sticking my two fingers up through the curtains at the assembled gathering of a few hundred local families, before going onstage to play our two songs. Apart from my poor display of manners – for which I must say, I have never been proud, one of those things that seemed hilarious but in actual fact was just not – our two song set also managed to squeeze in another unforgettable lifetime memory. Halfway through our second song, I noticed the audience (for ‘audience’ read, confused, bemused onlookers) begin to laugh and point behind me. Not knowing what was going on, I turned to see the drummer Colm had stopped playing altogether, and indeed had gotten up from behind the kit and was casually strolling across the stage in pursuit of his snare drum, which had evidently decided the best thing to do was get off the stage. I have a feeling that I made some feeble comment about the band sounding better without drums anyway, but I’m sure my mind has done everything it can to erase that moment, although Colm was such a funny guy that in retrospect it was worth doing the gig just so that this could have happened, he just strolled after the rolling snare, as cool as a breeze, you can’t become that cool in life, you either are or you aren’t – Here’s to you Gonno Kane!
On the second show I managed to insult a family friend who went to a lot of trouble to get me a lend of his brand new H&H amp, as my Wimbledon valve amp had died on gig day…..come to think of it, this was the school gig again! Oh dear, I would love to go back to that day and give myself a well earned slap on the head! I couldn’t use this amazing piece of equipment, and decided instead that it was ‘a piece of shit’, which of course it wasn’t, but in actual fact I was. I did later apologise to all involved, and I made many efforts to absolve myself over the following years, although it’s still embarrassing to revisit that day / month /
year! If it’s still possible to apologise, the Ronan I apologise, and Tom I apologise to you also – although Tom you did label me Two-Pricks in later life, so I think you got me back already!
We recorded two songs in four hours with two hippy guys who clearly didn’t like us and who smoked grass all the way through the sessions. The songs were called Faraway Illusions and Almost Sure You Know, and someday when I die, I look forward to hearing those recordings in the room where all the odd socks go. That was Point Blank.

++ What are your first music memories?

My brothers and sisters all had records, I’m from a large family of 11 kids, and I’m in the middle. So I grew up with music ranging from The Beatles and T Rex to Val Doonican and Jim Reeves – I didn’t really like any of it in any real sense (I’ve only recently listened to The Beatles White Album for the first time in my life properly ) – my first actual moment that I
realised the power of music was when I saw The Sex Pistols on Top Of The Pops in 1977, that changed everything for me.

++ What kind of music was heard at home?

What was your first instrument? Guitar. I bought my first guitar for 50 pounds off a guy in 1979. It was a Gibson SG but I hadn’t a clue about the value of guitars, I just wanted to be able to own one of my own, nobody I knew had one. I don’t remember how I met the guy, must have been an ad in the papers, that’s how everything was done then. That guitar must have either been worth a fortune, or else I was robbed, I suspect the latter, anyway I lost it and bought a brand new Westbury thing, which I loved because it was purple. I’ve never had a ‘nice’ guitar, but I have had guitars I’ve loved, especially a red Aria Pro 11 copy of a Gibson 323 semi – amazing feedback, and really light. Oh, sorry, my main guitar is my acoustic, a Yamaha that everybody tells me is shit, but which I love, and which I’ve written almost my entire life’s work on – I bought it in 1983 when it was new, and recently somebody told me it was a vintage, I laughed. I’m a f**king vintage.
My friends in Blink bought me two nice guitars for my 50 th a few years ago. Whereabouts in Dublin were you based? Nutgrove,Southside – harder than anywhere on the North Side ha ha ha

++ How was it back then?

Very exciting, tons of bands, I was young, life is exciting when you’re young – it stays pretty exciting too later.

++ Were there any venues or places you liked to hang out?

The Baggot Inn and The Underground were the best known ones – but my starting out venue was really The Ivy Rooms – all the big bands in 1983 played there – someday I’ll get to relay just how exciting a time that was. Don’t let anybody tell you how grim the 80’s were, we might have struggled, but the world was new, and even though there was always the threat of nuclear war, and we were buried underneath a catholic veil with no real job prospects, people like me thought they could escape through music, and there was enough of us to support each other, just by competing with each other even maybe – it took everything we had to be ourselves – even being in a band was considered ridiculous then, but my family were a great support, and that’s all that ever really mattered in the end. I had my 21 st birthday party in the Ivy Rooms, and my 50th in Whelans – that says it all really I suppose.

++ Any bands that you followed?

Aslan, The Blades, Auto Da Fe, Toy With Rhythym, and of course U2.

++ So how did Empty Shell start?

Started in a scout hall in Raheny, me, Neil and a drummer called Redser, his real name was Dave.

++ What year was it?

1982

++ How did you know the rest of the band members?

We met through Hot Press magazine musicians wanted section – it was a pretty terrifying ordeal for me meeting these lads for yet another audition – I was brutal at auditions – so trhis time round I convinced the lads they were auditioning for me, and that’s how it got started. I remember the feeling of playing with the band, the power of the noise we made, holy shit that was a highlight right there! I still have rehearsal room cassettes from those rehearsals – the scout hall got burnt down at one point, and we had to start rehearsing in Dublin City centre, Alan Furlong’s place, and that was where we entered into a ‘scene’ of sorts, where you’d see other ‘real’ bands rehearsing, and you’d realise you had a lot of work to do!

++ Why the name Empty Shell? 

Nuclear Shell

++ Your only release came out in 1986. At the time in the British isles there was an explosion of guitar pop. Did you feel at any point part of a scene?

We don’t say British Isles in my house, but the culture is still very much there, bands like The Cure, Sex Pistols, Stranglers, Souixsy all started around end 70’s and affected me greatly Who would you say were your influences in Empty Shell?

++ What do you remember for the recording session for this 7″?

The recording was after the band had actually split up and I was sick waiting for other musicians to get my life started, so I booked myself and Ellen in to record that song, I ended up playing bass, and we used the other guys images etc on the sleeve, but in truth that band had dissolved into a holding pattern while I worked on Rex & Dino.

++ Where was it? Did it take long?

We recorded it in Paul Thomas’s house, he had engineered U2’s first 2 albums, and in fairness to him he was a good guy in the end.

++ I’ve always been curious about the photo on the 7″ sleeve. Where did that come from?

That guy on the sleeve is a legendary figure in Irish culture, his name is Arthur Fields and you should google him – in 1986 he was locally known, but nobody realised how important he was to so many lives – he agreed to be in the shot if we agreed to let hoim shoot us, unfortunately I’ve no idea where that photo might be.

++ At that time did you have a big repertoire? Perhaps you had already put out some demo tapes?

Not a big repertoire, although the band was in it’s second life-cycle with half new members – the earlier cycle to be fair was a better band I think – that version of Empty Shell had a different singer Declan, who was a great vocalist, and we recorded a few demos, good ones like – I’m tryinmg to get my hands on these – we also did a Fanning Sesssion in Jan 1985 which was very exciting, and RTE say it’s in ‘Deep Archive’.

++ Tell me about gigs, I found that you played at the Roundstown Town Hall in Galway only, but I’m sure you played many more! Did you remember any in particular? Any fun anecdotes you could share?

Yep, three hours beyond Galway in the summer of 1986 we played that date you mentioned, about a six hour drive, no roads in Ireland in the 80’s – when we tried selling 7’ singles after the show, well actually my two younger brothers Terree and Ken were the sales division that day – we were greeted by much laughter, as the locals said they didn’t have record players, the funny thing is though, that nobody has record players now either!
What would you say was your best and your worst gig?

++ What about press or radio in general? Did Empty Shell get much attention? TV? 

We got bits and bobs, we did a few TV things and I don’t know if they exist in ‘Deep Arcxhive’ anywhere, but every paragraph was hard earned, and that single actually got slated on it’s first Hot Press review, I was heart broken!

++ Are you still in touch with the rest of Empty Shell?

Alas not. If so, what are you guys up to these days?

++ If you had to look back in time, what would you say would be the biggest highlight for Empty Shell?

Empty Shell had some highlights that none of my other bands had, we were in the first wave of dreaming, and the dream seemed always close – I will always remember my brother Aiden, and Ellen, Kevin Power, Declan, Neil, Ricky, a flat in Booterstown, The Trinity Ball of 1985, a mad night in Mason’s Laboratory on Crane lane where we rehearsed after the scientist had gone home (true story), trying to decide how we’d look by looking through Face Magazine in Aiden’s house, hand-painting posters that we would then paste up all over Dublin on a midnight poster run (ask any band about this, these were truly fun times) and it always seemed possible, everything was possible.

++ And you are still in Dublin, right? I’ve never been, so wondering if you’d recommend any guitar pop tourists some cool places to check out? What would be the traditional food not to miss? Or up and coming bands that you like?

Well if you want recommendations on new music, I’m probably the
bestr person to talk to, I run Garageland, a National project for emerging Irish Artists,
and it endlessly excites me how some new musicians have exactly the lust for life that
music always gave me. Check it all out on www.garageland.ie

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Listen
Emtpy Shell – If Heavens Waiting

So for the past month Monday, Wednesday and Friday have become the busiest days of the week for me. I’m publishing a blog post on these days, five or so new bands or indiepop news featured plus a whole archaeology work on a band from the past. But also before doing that, early in the morning I’ve been swimming. I’ve taken again swimming after almost 20 years. And I feel knackered!

Now, here a few new finds on the web and continuing the reviews from Wales Goes Pop!

Ta Toy Boy: there’s a very fine album called “This Town” by this Thessaloniki, Greece, band available from the Make Me Happy label. I was shared more than a month ago the tracks and thought it sounded great, but the band didn’t have an online presence so couldn’t really share with all of you! Anyhow, now they have a Bandcamp and you can stream the 9 songs from the CD. The band is formed by George Begas and Elias Smilios. Now, I need to get a copy of this lovely record that takes the best influences from the 80s guitar pop. And you should too!

Golden Teardrops: some very good news by the Mexican label Emma’s House. They will be releasing a new album by the California band Golden Teardrops that is actually Ryan and Leo Marquez! Remember Ryan from Apple Orchard? Yes, yes, the same one! This new album is titled “Promises & Smiles” and it sounds lovely, reminding me a lot of The Charade or The Shermans. It is going to be released on May 23rd and will include 12 songs. At the moment you can only stream two of the songs to be included, “For a Rainy Day” and “You’re Keeping Me Waiting”. I urge you to do so.

Jaggy Nettles: Actually was playing The Felt Tips first album the other day and was wondering what the band members were up to now and suddenly I get a Facebook invite from Andrew to the fanpage of Jaggy Nettles. So it seems this is his new alter ego, his new solo project. And it seems he is planning to record seven fairy tale songs for an upcoming album. The first one is “The Gingerbread Man”, which you can listen if you click on the link!

Soft Science: found a bunch of great sounding recordings by this band on the SoundCloud of their own label, Test Pattern Records. I especially fell under the spell of their cover of Northern Picture Library’s “Paris”. It is gorgeous! It seems this song is part of a single, where “Sooner” is the A side. It is important to notice that this band has members of classic Californian bands like California Oranges or the underrated Holiday Flyer. Really good stuff! I want a copy of it!

—-  Discovering Wales Goes Pop 2018 bands reviews —–

Bad Parents: one from the Wales Goes Pop. Still going through all the bands, and I know there are many many left. Most of them I must say are unknown to me, and so far, sadly, I haven’t found any pop. I’ll do two bands today, maybe there’s some luck with my poppy cravings! Bad Parents are a duo formed by Misty Miller and Tom Shelton. From London. They have recorded a 4-song EP and they have self-titled it. The sons on it are “Room To Grow”, “Sailing”, “You Can’t Date a Model” and “Peckham”. The first one being the poppiest, and my favourite. The EP was released a year ago. Not sure where you can buy it now.

Think Pretty: this Cardiff band terrorized me. Honestly. Screaming, and way too much distortion. So far, 5 bands. And not seeing yet where Wales went pop! Will the next bands I listen change my idea of the festival? Sure, there were Colour Me Wednesday and Shonen Knife in that same lineup for the Sunday gig, but two out 9 seems too little for me! Or maybe the Saturday gig was the poppiest one? Maybe those who attended can tell me which were your favourite bands?

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I finally finished my collection of 7″s by The Imaginary Friend a week ago. I was missing their first ever 7″, the 1996 “Leaves” 7″ that was released by Bad Jazz (BEBOP 6) and thought, these were very fine songs, how come not many remember them today? Also, how come I know nothing really about the people involved in this band? It was time to do some detective work. See what I can find about them on the web.

As mentioned, “Leaves” was their first 7″. I notice that the band 7″ single titles aren’t the same as the songs included in them. For example, in this 7″, the A side was “On Satsuma Road (A Song For Dan)” and on the B side there is a beautiful cover of Rodney Allen’s “Glastonbury”. Speaking of Rodney Allen, how come there hasn’t been a compilation of all of his recorded output yet? That is truly a mystery to me!

This record on the back sleeve has “nineteen ninety-nine” written. Now I start to be confused. Discogs lists the 7″ as a 1996 release. But it would make more sense if this was released in 1999. Which is correct? It makes more sense to me as this is an English label, and the band was American. The other two releases by the band were in an American label. Logically it would have been first an American label and then an English one. Right?

All the songs on this 7″ were recorded on a four-track at their home. There is not much more information on this record sadly.

The band was mostly associated with the Grand Rapids, Michigan, label Drive-In Records. On Mike Babb’s label they put out two 7″s in the 90s. The first one was the 1997 “Letters Home” (Drive 17) that had a very nice blue, white and yellow artwork. There were two songs on this record, on the A side the beautiful “Brighton Beach Postcard” and a cover version of Lucinda Williams’ “Side of the Road”. These songs were also recorded and mixed at their home on a four track.

Lastly their 7″ “Whimsy” (Drive 06) was also released in 1997 and had two songs, on the A side we find “Marigold” and on the B side a superb cover of The Magick Heads’ “Hear From You”. Gosh, how underrated are The Magick Heads! Robert Scott, why not a reunion tour for that band?

Here on the credits it is mentioned that the songs were recorded during the spring of 1996 at The Institute Benjamentos which I feel might as well be their home and named after the “Institute Benjamenta” 1996 movie by the Brothers Quay which was based on the novel “Jakob Von Gunten” by Robert Walser. The artwork textures are credited to John Conley while the photography to Pat Phipps.

I feel I went through the records in reverse order. My bad. The two compilation appearances listed won’t have any problems as both are from 1998.

On the Cowly Owl compilation “Pop Machine” which was featured on the blog some months ago thanks that it was uploaded to Bandcamp. On this tape comp released by this Paris/Sacramento label the band contributed “Brighton Beach Postcard”. And then their song “Don’t Shout at Me” appears on another compilation I was talking about just some days ago, “The Family Twee”, which was a double CD comp that was made by participating members of the indiepop-list.

I don’t know much more. Yet.

I am going to be terribly lucky when I hit on Buddha on the Moon’s Bandcamp the upload of “Letters Home (Plus)”. Here there are the two songs from the “Letters Home” 7″ plus two more: “Brighton Beach Postcard (Sonar Ping Mix)” and “I Was Born on Christmas Day”. The first was actually the mix that was released on the “Pop Machine” compilation. The second is a cover of the Saint Etienne original which the band sent to their friends as part of a Seasons Greetings card. It had a cheery intro and outro included in that Greetings cassette where their friend Pat impersonated an MTV VJ. Thanks to this Bandcamp link I find out that the band was formed by Nan & HK. Who were Nan and HK? Well, HK seems to be an obvious answer, it was HK Kahng from the band Buddha on the Moon. What about Nan? Could it be Nancy Novotny who used to appear on Buddha on the Moon recordings doing additional vocals?

On this same Bandcamp I find a “Plus” version too for the “Leaves” 7″. Aside from the two songs from the 7″, there is “Glastonbury (Alternate Mix)” and “Theme from Boxville”. The first song of the 7″, “On Satsuma Road (A Song for Dan)”, is said to have been through multiple mixes. The Dan the song is about is said to be the fellow who brought HK and Nan together and who also runs a record store. The alternate mix of “Glastonbury” is one with much more guitar, ping pong delay and reverb. Then the “Theme from Boxville” is a cover of The Sugargliders.

Sadly there is no “Whimsy (Plus)” version.

Something interesting here is that I see that these releases on Bandcamp are tagged as if the band hailed from Portland. As far as I know the band used to be from Houston even though I’ve seen them listed on blogs as Australian or even British.

Then another interesting find is that of the band Spectral Lines. Here we see HK and Nan together making music, and there is just one song called “Tempus Venit Placide” available to stream.

It seems they were more of a bedroom project. I wonder if the band played live at all. What about other compilation appearances? It seems they had more recordings other than the ones that appear on 7″s. Why weren’t there more releases? And what happened in between The Imaginary Friend and Spectral Lines? Would be good to know more about them!

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Listen
The Imaginary Friend – Brighton Beach Postcard

Thanks so much to Yvette Haynes for the interview! I wrote about A Strange Desire some time ago and just a week or so ago Yvette’s sister, Julie, got in touch with me. Happily she helped me get in touch with Yvette, who was up for answering my questions, and in the end we got to make this great interview! A Strange Desire only released one flexi back in the 80s, and it is a classic for any C86 fans!  If you haven’t heard about them before, today’s a good opportunity! Also Yvette was kind enough to share three photos from back in the day which I’m sharing with everyone here: 1, 2, 3. Enjoy!

++ Hi Yvette! Thanks so much for getting in touch! How are you? Where are you at now? I hear in Cornwall?

I moved to Cornwall about 15 years ago as I was fed up of the aggression in London. Too many people, too much hassle. It’s great being near the coast, and there’s so much beautiful wildlife here.

++ Are you all from A Strange Desire still in touch to this day? What are you all up to? Are you still involved with music?

Me and Tony Simmons have been in touch for the last few years, thanks to being able to track him down on the net! Nick has lived in Australia for some time, but I don’t really know where – with that and Tony moving to Sweden, we’re dotted all over the globe! I believe Nick is successfully writing soundtracks now, which doesn’t surprise me as he was always a phenomenal guitarist. Tony is still producing music on a personal level, as I am with my drumming. I did give up playing for about 20 years as I was so disillusioned with music, but fell back in love with the drums a couple of years ago.

++ Let’s start from the beginning. Like what are your first musical memories? What was the first instrument did you get and how? 

It was always the drums for me, I wanted to play them from the age of about 7. My family couldn’t afford lessons, and school was of no help whatsoever (I took music with a view to being taught, but they never bothered. Ordinary secondary schools in England are like that!) So I just did what a lot of people do, bashed around teaching myself. Luckily, my sister was learning bass and my brother the guitar, so we all made a racket together – I was about 11 at this point! Our parents were fantastic, always supportive and putting up with the noise. I didn’t have a proper kit for years, just made do with odd drums I picked up secondhand.

++ Had any of you been involved with other bands prior to A Strange Desire?

Yeah, we all had come from other bands. Tony and Nick both grew up in Camden and went to school together in Kings Cross, which is why they had such a good understanding of each other and a great songwriting partnership. Their band Seven Colours split around the same time as the band I was in with my sister Julie, The Joy of Living, who’d had a collaborative EP with the Apostles released by Mortarhate.

++ So you all were from London, from the Camden area. How was around there back then? Were there any bands that you liked? What were the good record stores? Or what about the pubs or venues to go check out up and coming bands?

Tony and Nick were from Camden, I was from Harrow (a town in the suburbs), but I spent a lot of time in the Camden area as there was a lot more going on. It wasn’t the gentrified area it is now, it was pretty rough and ready. We really liked My Bloody Valentine, top people and such an exciting band. We rehearsed in the same studios as them, so used to chat to them quite a bit. It was great to see them get successful. We also really liked A Riot of Colour, I thought they never got  the acclaim they deserved. The best venues in the area from what I remember was The Timebox and The Enterprise.

++ When and how did the band start? What was the recruiting process like?

put an ad in the NME in the summer of 1985, Tony was one of the responders. We got on really well and I loved the demo of Seven Colours he played me and that was that. Working with nice people was always at least as important to me as the music!

++ Why the name A Strange Desire?

We wanted to get away from being called ‘The’ …… as it was used so much at the time. I believe we looked through a book of film titles and just chose a few things that seemed to go nicely together.

++ How was the creative process for you? Where did you usually practice?

Tony and Nick lived in the same block of flats, so would go through ideas together, then we’d rehearse at Salem Studios in Euston. I’d get a basic understanding of the songs, record them and go and get my drum patterns worked out before the next rehearsal. We really needed more studio time, but had zero money, so had to make do with just a couple of hours a week. It was rather frustrating!

++ And who would you say were influences in the sound of the band?

We all loved The Smiths, Nick and Tony were into The Soft Boys too. I adored The Close Lobsters (still do), and we were all into punk – the music and the ideals. REM were another favourite.

++ Your one and only release was the “Promise To Lie/Until Tomorrow” flexi. I suppose it was self-released and the ASD in the catalog means A Strange Desire. Is that right? 

Yes, we just kept it nice and simple. A flexi was much cheaper than a ‘proper’ vinyl release!

++ And how was the experience of self-releasing? Did you enjoy doing the distribution and promotion part?

It was a slog, to be honest. We really had no idea what to do, no one to advise us, we were clueless! We took some to the Rough Trade shop on a sale or return basis, that was very helpful being able to do that. The best promotion we could have was when John Peel played it several times. A friend of Tony’s lived not far from Peelie and hand delivered it for us.

++ These two songs are terribly good, wondering if you could tell me in a sentence or two what they are about?

Tony wrote the lyrics, but I always understood them generally to be about being let down in love. Tales of heartbreak!

++ Both were recorded at BB Studios in Kingston, Surrey. How was that experience? What do you remember about the place? How long did it take to record them? Did you only record these two songs that time?

We did the 2 tracks over 2 days, which included all the mixing etc. In retrospect, it would’ve been better to record several more tracks live, then just do overdubs as necessary. I think it would’ve suited our style more. I personally never liked the traditional way of recording, it just never seemed natural to me.

++ There were different paper sleeves for the flexi, different colors. Why was that? And how many different color sleeves did you use?

I think there were 3 or 4 different colours we used for the sleeves, basically just to add some variations to it. There are only a few of the red and gold ones, we gave them to people that had helped us out on the record as a thank you.

++ And who is the girl that appears on the sleeve of the flexi?

It’s Faye Dunaway, in a shot from Bonnie and Clyde. It’s a striking image, and just felt right.

++ Another song, “On Another Day”, appeared on the compilation “The Timebox”. I read that this compilation was put together by the people that ran The Timebox club at the Bull and Gate pub in Kentish Town. Did you play this club? How did you end up in the compilation? How was your relationship with them?

We played the Timebox many times, it was a fantastic venue. There is a shot of us playing there in Mick Mercer’s book on the place, that was a lovely surprise to see it. We supported the likes of Brilliant Corners, Blue Aeroplanes and My Bloody Valentine (we played lots of gigs with them). It was very sad that the promoter there, John Beast, passed away a few years ago, he did a lot for the indie scene of the time. It’s because we were regularly playing there that we got on the album, which was a real thrill.

++ Aside from that compilation and then much later on the Sound of Leamington Spa, where there any other compilation appearances that you remember of?

Yeah, Especially Yellow fanzine, run by the legendary Johnny Dee did a cassette compilation in 86 called Goodnight Miffy, he included a couple of tracks from the first demo.

++ And what about unreleased songs? From your Myspace I see a few like “Insanely Jealous (live 1986)”, “Sometimes”, “Wait Until Tomorrow (1986)” and “It Has to End (1986)”. Where do these come from? And are there more?

Insanely Jealous was a Soft Boys cover we used to do, it’s from a Timebox gig which was recorded from the mixing desk. It’s nice to have a decent quality recording! The rest of that gig is on a compilation CD I had made, there are only 3 in existence. It was just to ensure we have some copies before various cassettes disintegrated with age! Until Tomorrow is from the Flexi, and the other tracks were from our second demo.

++ Why do you think there were no more releases by the band? Was there any interest from other labels perhaps?

Playroom Discs from Brighton were going to release a single, but we split just as talks had started. I wasn’t working, and Tony and Nick only had part time jobs, so we just couldn’t have afforded to self finance another record.

++ What about gigs? Did you play many? Any in particular that you remember?

We played heaps of gigs, pretty much all in London. Basically, they had to be somewhere near public transport, as we had no van or anything, none of us could drive! Most bands lended each other equipment at gigs, there was generally a cooperative attitude. One of my favourite gigs was at the Enterprise supporting A Riot of Colour – we went down really well, it was the first time we’d been asked back for an encore. And a review of the gig appeared in NME, which was really nice. Another memorable one was at the Timebox one Christmas Eve – the band who’d agreed to lend their drum kit didn’t show up, so we miked up some dustbins and I used them instead. It turned out surprisingly well! We also played a few squatted venues alongside some anarcho bands; these gigs were really good, it would’ve been great to have been involved with more of these events.

++ You also crossed the channel and played Paris. Did you play any other cities in France? Or any other countries other than France? Any anecdotes about that trip?

We just played the one gig, at a university in Paris. We were lucky in that one of the organisers happened to be at one of our Timebox gigs and liked us, so invited us over. He even let us stay at his flat, which was kind (thank you, Maxime!) It was the biggest gig we played, hundreds of students there, and quite a big stage, so it was a bit daunting when you’re used to tiny venues. We started really badly because of this, but got better and ended up going down very well, which was a relief! It was an odd experience seeing posters around the place with our picture on! We were very naïve, and were always surprised whenever anyone showed much of an interest!

++ I read that a bunch of flexis were in a safe during that gig in Paris and you couldn’t find the key. In the end could you salvage them?

I don’t think we did! I certainly remember the frustration of quite a lot of the crowd wanting them, and we just couldn’t get to them (I think it was a locked room rather than a safe). Hopefully they ended up being distributed at a later date, I’ve seen a few being sold on auction sites from various European countries, so you never know!

++ And were there any bad gigs at all? Any anecdotes you could share?

Oh, there were lots of bad gigs! I think our debut was at an outdoor festival in Camden one afternoon – we played to all of 3 people for a while, then it started raining and we had to leg it with our gear! Equipment would break down quite regularly, I think most bands on that level have to deal with that happening! One pub in Dalston (east London) we played had what looked like a bullet hole in the window, that was a bit scary!

++ When and why did you split? Did you all continue making music afterwards?

We split around the summer of 87 as we felt we were just getting nowhere. Lack of funds for basics, and the effects of that, killed us. Tony and Nick couldn’t even afford landlines at the time, so even getting in touch with promoters, venues etc was a struggle. We had no contacts, and were totally unprepared for the stuff outside actually playing. This isn’t a whine, it’s just saying how things were. I have a lot of respect for bands that are in a similar situation and keep from being demoralised by it, there are plenty that go on regardless. I joined A Riot of Colour very briefly afterwards, they were very sweet people, but my heart wasn’t in it anymore. It’s fair to say I was devastated by ASD breaking up, it was everything to me at the time.

++ Something that caught my attention was that in the bio that appears in the Leamington Spa compilation you say that you never fitted in the indie scene of the time because of your unwillingness to crawl to the “important” people. May I ask now who these important people were, or is it still better not to name them? 

I think it was journalists from certain papers and record label people in general. Tony wrote that piece, and I can guess a few of the people he’s talking about, but I’m keeping schtum!! 😂

++ Was there ever a reunion gig or talks of a reunion gig?

No, it was never on the cards. We all went our separate ways and that was that.

++ Did you get much attention from the radio or press?

John Peel playing the flexi those times was just awesome, he generated a lot of interest (I’ve still got the letters we got off the back of it asking for copies). The only mainstream press we received were live reviews in the NME and Melody Maker, which were great to see! We never took any of that for granted.

++ What about from fanzines?

Fanzines were very supportive, I’ve always thought of them as integral to any music scene. I used to write one with my sister Julie when we were teenagers, so I know how much hard work and passion goes into them. They the same ideals as bands like us, the whole DIY, rough and ready thing. We sent demos to quite a few, and got some really nice reviews. Time’s Up did an interview with us, I believe, I think I’ve still got it somewhere.

++ And today, aside from music, what other hobbies do you have?

West Cornwall has a great artistic community, and lots of great galleries. I love a lot of modern art and being able to see works by the likes of Tim Shaw or Barbara Hepworth locally is a real privilege. Wildlife watching is another love of mine, we get some astonishing rare birds down here.

++ How do you feel about the C86 genre, do you feel like you fit there or you’d say you were something else?

I’d say we fitted in fairly well to that, although our sound was a bit rockier, especially live. I loved the C86 thing, it was such an exciting time for music, so many great bands about. It was a breath of fresh air, the best thing since punk to my mind.

++ Looking back in retrospective, what would you say was the biggest highlight for the band?

It’d have to be being played by Peelie. I’d listened to him since I was 13, notebook and pen at the ready to scribble down new bands and records he played. Back then, he was the only national DJ that would give unknown and unpolished bands a chance. To be played on his show was exhilarating and gave us an audience in other parts of the country, and, indeed, Europe. We’ll always be grateful for that.

++ Never visited Cornwall, but would love to go one day, maybe I can ask for some suggestions? Like what are the sights I shouldn’t miss? Or the traditional food or drinks I should try?

Dolphin watching is an absolute joy here, there’s always a lot of sightings during the summer. There’s heaps of beautiful beaches and headlands. Virginia Woolf was inspired to write To The Lighthouse by the lighthouse near me at Godrevy. It’s a quiet county, a great place to chill with some phenomenal scenery. St Ives is well known for its art galleries, and Falmouth has a great music scene. Penzance has some great pagan festivals, paganism features heavily in Cornwall’s past – and present. As for food, pasties are the thing here. They were traditionally the meal for miners, but are constantly evolving!

++ Thanks again Yvette! Is there anything else you’d like to add?

I would like to say a huge thank you to you, Roque, for your interest in the band and wanting to do this interview. It’s been an absolute pleasure to be involved in your blog. Big thanks must go to my sister Julie for getting in touch with you and organising this interview – and her support back in the day (she wrote the sleeve notes for the flexi). Thank you also to anyone that has put any of our tracks up on YouTube or written stuff about us – I’m delighted people are enjoying our music after all this time. Cheers!!

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Listen
A Strange Desire – Promise to Lie

My friend Eric from Belgium pointed me out to a new batch of Peruvian bands I had no clue they existed. They are to be playing a sort of festival called Transmisión Emocional on Saturday April 21st in Lima. In total there are 8 bands playing, two of them, Animal Desenfocado and Levi Japhet, don’t have a website, but the other 6 does.

Two of those 6 I have already featured on the blog, Niños Vudú and Blackthony Startano. But what about the other 4? They are a mystery to me. I should have a listen!

Aeropod: dreampop band from Lima formed in 2017. That’s how they present themselves. They are formed by Alexander Correa, Gian Franco Perez, Luis Reginaldo, Alberto de la Fuente and Luis Arévalo. There are two releases on their Bandcamp, “Los Jardines/Vuelas” and “Obsequio”. I’ll have a listen then. Wow, the guitars chime beautifully! Who are these people? I think if there is a new Lima Popfest they should be invited. Pretty good stuff. Definitely check them out. I’ve made myself already a fan on Facebook.

Dormir en Luces: 4 demo songs, lofi style, also from Lima. These are not as good as the previous band, definitely not. I can’t say I hate them, but can’t say I love them. I just wish they are better recorded and I’ll try to judge then.

Adrían Vacío: What is this? Their best song, “Juntos”, sounds kind a bit like Dar Ful Ful or Family, in a lofi way, or something like that. Very interesting. Who is it? Is it really just one person behind it called Adrían? There are two releases on Bandcamp, “Sin Título” which is just one song and “Naufragio Inconcluso” EP with four songs of lo-fi indiepop, “Juntos”, “Mutatio”, “Días Tristes” and “Ego Te Requiret”.

Rü: this must be the most eclectic band of the lot. I’m listening to their album “Terodesu” that was uploaded to Bandcamp on January. It starts a bit blah for me, but then track number three, “Ruido”, picks up with some superb guitarwork. Then again, slows down and becomes a bit boring. It is actually a mix of genres and styles this album. You could find some good guitar pop songs but you need to skip a bunch of songs. Would be nicer to just make an EP proper with the better songs and scrap the rest.

So that’s 4 bands, and I like featuring at least 5 on every post. Let’s check out some more of the Wales Goes Pop that we are missing then?

—-  Discovering Wales Goes Pop 2018 bands reviews —–

Perfect Body: found two songs by this Cardiff band on SoundCloud: “Round the Bend” and “Getting Cold”. They are more indierock than indiepop I believe. They are not bad by any means. But I start to wonder, after three bands reviewed where is the pop from Wales Goes Pop? I hope I find it on the next band I check out! There are many many more!! Wonder if I’ll ever be able to feature them all!

Goat Girl: they have a SoundCloud but you can barely hear any songs if you don’t pay for a pro subscription. No fun. Well, the band does have some videos on Youtube. It seems they are signed to Rough Trade, so that might be a big deal for many. Anyways, I’m linking to a video for a song called “The Man”. It is ok I suppose. But not for me. Rock-ish, and I don’t see anything special in them. Sure the lyrics might be interesting, singing about these topics, but the music sound like any other band out there.

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Been a while since I did some archaeology work on a Spanish band. It may be a surprise to you, but for me Spanish bands were my entry to the world of indiepop back in the early 2000s. I have a good memory of many small bands from that time period, bands that only released demos, CD-Rs in very limited quantities. Many of these bands’ recordings I have lost. Some others I never managed to get their proper releases. It was a time when there was no Discogs, and eBay for these sort of bands wasn’t common. I suppose you had to go to the gigs to buy the records or a record store in Spain. Then, I wasn’t in Spain. My first time in Spain was more than a decade later, in 2012.

Galáctica was one of these bands from the early 2000s that made an impact on me. I loved their style then, a mix of classic indiepop and electronic arrangements. Kind of looking to have a “futuristic” kind of sound. Makes sense then why they named the band Galáctica. During the years I have been able to find records by some of the bands from that period, it hasn’t been easy mind you. But one of the bands I still don’t own any of their recordings happens to be Galáctica. So their story to me is kind of untold. You know, when you own the record you kind of understand the band better. Right? Without it is hard even though back in the day I remember playing time and time again their album, mini-album and CD single that I burned altogether on a CDR and had it on my discman. Those were the days!

Galáctica was originally formed in the city of León, in the northwest of Spain. I have the feeling that before releasing their first mini-album “Lujo Estelar”, they had already recorded some demos that used to be available on Soulseek. Or maybe not. Someone remembers that? Anyhow, “Lujo Estelar” came out in 2001 on the then small label Mushroom Pillow (MP005). Now this label is quite big in Spain, but back then it was just starting and wasn’t making much of a noise. The songs on this mini-album were “Lujo en la Riviera”, “Vida en un Cometa”, “Chica Invisible”, “Anticanción de Verano”, “Ya Sales en Rockdelux” and “Gracita en el Espacio”. The sound of the band at this time was more guitar based and reminds me quite a bit to Juniper Moon with its punky attitude.

The year after the band released their debut album, “El Fotógrafo del Más Allá”, on Mushroom Pillow (MP017) again. The sound now had added an electronic flavour. There were 12 songs all recorded at Estudios Feedback: “Vampiras”, “Electrónica”, “Superdisco”, “Pasados Encuentros”, “#5”, “Mejor Berlín”, “Sin Estrellas”, “Dinastía”, “Bela Lugosi Affaire”, “Novela Rosa”, “Fiesta Contra Ti” and “Suspiria”. On Discogs the band is listed finally:
Roberto Castán – guitars
Sergio Calvo – bass
Amado Pellitero – drums
Eva López – keyboards
Lucía Pérez – vocals

Lastly, to promote the album there was a CD single in 2002. The chosen song was the most electronic one of all, the aptly named “Electrónica”. The accompanying songs on the single were “Mi Verdad” and “Electrónica (… En Una Tarde Otoñal)”. This was released by Mushroom Pillow (MP013) again and El Diablo! Important to mention that there was a promo video made for this song which you can watch on Youtube.

Thanks to that Youtube link I learn that this was actually the 2nd video by the band. Which one was the first? It was actually Superdisco, which I was able to find also on Youtube. Both videos were directed by Juan Marigorta.

I find an interview with the band on the website Indyrock.es dating from November 2002. From it I learn that Alex Díez from Los Flechazos and Cooper collaborated with them on the song “Pasados Encuentros” Then that “Mi Verdad” from the CD single is actually a cover of the Spanish band Luna from the 80s. And that live they used to do covers of Los Flechazos, Magnapop, Le Mans and The Ramones. They hoped to release something new by 2003 and they were part of a festival called Purple Weekend in 2002. Originally the band was formed by Lucía, Eva and Roberto and later Chinea and Amado joined them. I suppose Chinea is Sergio?

El Diario de León has an article about the Purple Weekend but the one from 2003. It mentions that the band was to headline a bunch of bands at the disco Oh! León, were the gig was to be held. Later Eva Galáctica was to DJ too.

Calzada News also mentions them. We learn that Roberto had a label called Miss Lucifer Records. With this label it seems that Galáctica released probably in 2004 a remixes CD. The band also played Madrid on July 3rd, 2004, at the legendary Siroco venue.

Murcia Rock also has an interview with the band, where they say Galactica is B-52s meets the Revillos. Could be? Also we learn that the band used to do a fanzine called Galaxina. I would love to see that! Maybe it should be released as a book as they did with the Stamp! or Tremolina fanzines? It is not a bad idea I would say. This interview was mostly done to promote a gig in that city, Murcia, on April 5th, 2002, where they had the support of Vacaciones at the Garaje Tía María venue.

Another gig I found by the band was one that happened on March 25th, 2003, in the Centro Cultural Provincial of the city of Málaga. Also they played in León’s Layla club on November 9th, 2002.

Then I come to notice that Roberto and Eva organized a festival called Otros Mundos Pop for many years in León. This festival was born thanks to a radio show both of them had in León’s 40 Principales station. They were indeed very involved with the music scene!

My last find dates from 2008 on the 20Minutos.es website. Here they talk about a reunion gig. It also mentions “RMX”, which was the remixes CD. For the reunion, only the three core members were part of it. They played on February 28th of that year at La Pequeña Betty in Madrid and it was said that the band was working on a new EP that was supposed to be released on vinyl that year. I don’t think that ever happened.

I don’t know much about what the band members are doing now, but it seems that if you were in León on April 5th you could have seen Eva Galáctica perform, supporting Taiacore. It doesn’t say much about her on the Facebook event page. But at least it is nice to know she is still making music.

I don’t know in which other bands they were involved with, if there were many or not at all. I do know that at least Roberto Castán was part of a band called Lofi that released an album on Elefant called “Low Fidelity Sound Systems”. Another band he was part of was called Trigger.

Then of course there is a Facebook page, that was last updated in 2013 (!). A quick look tells me the band was active in 2009, playing at a venue called La Pequeña Betty on February of that year. That’s not all, also they played Madrid at the Suite Festival in May of that same year. Here we know that the band continued playing live in 2010, in their hometown at Sala Studio 54 in January or at the Costello in June for example. Again a new mention of new songs. Now for an EP to be recorded in 2010.  It was to have 3 songs. Whatever happened to them? Not released, were they? We see many DJ gigs by the girls as well. Keep scrolling. I find some photos of them recording in 2013. More songs? Where are these songs? I would love to listen to them. And lastly a link of Lucía’s other passion, art. She showcases some of her pieces in the Kapu gallery in Linz, Austria.

At the time they were said to be one of the important bands of the new pop scene in Spain. I wonder what happened with them. Why they never got to release a second album. Or whatever happened to those songs they were working on in 2008-2009. If the girls end up playing in any other bands afterwards? It is for me very strange how this band kind of fizzled down. I really enjoyed their music, and now many years after not listening it, playing it again, I’m enjoying it once again.

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Listen
Galáctica – Mejor Berlín

Last post this week and I believe I can’t go back to two posts a week after covering all Indietracks this week. It was quite a lot of bands to review, most of them new ones for me. Now it is possible for me to concentrate on news, but also on other festivals that had many new names in their lineup. Like Wales Goes Pop and Cologne Popfest. From now on there will be a mix, new and some from these “pop” festivals. So let me start!

Axolotes Mexicanos: a favourite band of ours has a new album coming out on May 11th in 2018. It will be called “Salu2”. To promote that album the band has put together a video for the song “Doble Check”. I am not sure though how to react to the song, I like it but I’m not sure if I like it. It is a departure of the classic sound of the band. The label says this is pop of the twenty first century. Maybe. It does sound much more produced, much more ambitious, but also a bit plastic if you know what I mean. Maybe I just need to educate my ears to love this. Or maybe not.

Azure Blue: I think an Azure Blue song was recommended on the blog just a week ago. Well, this week the band and Matinée Recordings announced a new CDEP called “Whatever ’18”. There are 6 songs on this CD which are “Whatever ’18”, “Every Ending Story”, “Reflections of Light”, “Tragedy and Changes”, “Justice” and “747”. The opening song will actually be part of the forthcoming new album “Fast Falls the Eventide” which is due in June. On the link you can check out “Whatever ’18” and “Reflections of Light”. As always this is fantastic electronic indie pop!

Río Arga: Met Caballito Records’ founder Santi at Madrid Popfest and told me about this upcoming release. I was very excited already as I had recommended this band a couple of times on the blog as I thought they were brilliant. Sadly when I recommended them there was only a tape, and I’m no fan of tapes. This time around there will be a 10″ with 6 songs! That is definitely very very exciting! The songs on the record are “No Te Puedo Aguantar”, “Desde Que Tú Ya No Estás”, “Clip Con Forma de Corazón”, “Vente Conmigo”, “El Gigante” and “Tienes Tanto Por Hacer”. One of them, “Clip Con Forma de Corazón”, is an adaptation of “Plastic Bird” by Galaxie 500. I was quite surprised earlier today when I saw a photo of the band and noticed one of the members was actually the drummer of the fantastic Melenas. It is indeed a small family that of the Pamplona scene. And it makes sense!

—-  Discovering Wales Goes Pop 2018 bands reviews —–

Adwaith: I said that I was going to look at some of the bands I didn’t know that played Wales Goes Pop some weeks ago. This is the first one, and every time I mention one of them, I’ll make sure I also mention Wales Goes Pop! So you know it is not really a piece of news, but more of me discovering new bands thanks to festivals. Anyways. This is some folksy pop, right? Made in Carmarthen, Wales, by two girls and a boy, Heledd Owen, Hollie Singer and Gwenllian Anthony. There are three songs on their SoundCloud and I would say skip the first two, they are a bit too slow for my taste, but their last one “Osian”, is quite enjoyable though not particularly indiepop.

El Goodo: another band from the Wales Goes Pop festival. This time the band hails from Resolven in Wales. The band’s name gives me a bit of annoyance I must say, don’t like much when Spanish is made fun. Might be because of me living in the US (?). Aside from that, the music is very 60s influenced. Garagey sometimes, Beatles-esque some other times. I’m not really interested in this sort of music I have to admit. Hopefully the next batch of Wales Goes Pop bands that I’ll check out will be more of my taste.

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I only became aware of the “From Quebec to Oswego” 7″ by The Autumn Teen Sound a few weeks ago. The name of the band sounded familiar to me, but couldn’t pinpoint where and when I’ve heard them. Or if I actually had heard them before. I thought perhaps I had listened to them on a compilation and then perhaps I had forgotten them.

Well, I just ordered a copy of this record and thought, it is time to investigate. My first question is where is Oswego. I know where Quebec is. I was in Montreal and Quebec City, both located in that Canadian province. But Oswego?

Oswego is a city in Oswego County, New York, United States. The population was 18,142 at the 2010 census. Oswego is located on Lake Ontario in north-central New York and promotes itself as “The Port City of Central New York”. It is the county seat of Oswego County. The city of Oswego is bordered by the towns of Oswego, Minetto, and Scriba to the west, south, and east, respectively, and by Lake Ontario to the north. Oswego Speedway is a nationally known automobile racing facility. The State University of New York at Oswego is located just outside the city on the lake. Oswego is the namesake for communities in Montana, Oregon, Illinois, and Kansas.

I see. It is here in New York state. But I must be honest and say I have never heard about it. Maybe one day I’ll visit? Who knows. The 7″ was released by the very fine label Paris Caramel (Pariscaramel 005) back in 1999. It is important to mention that this label had released the first album by The Fairways. A very important album indeed.

The songs on the record were “Say Something” on the A side and “Talk Dirty to Me” on the B side. The B side is actually a cover of the band Poison. Yes. Really. And it actually is a very good cover. And even though this is not exactly a jangle pop band, it is indiepop thru and thru. It is electropop of course, a style not many are doing these days but by the end of the 90s and the early 2000s there were many bands playing this sort of catchy pop.

Discogs has a bunch of compilation appearances listed. And I see where I must have heard them for the first time, on the “Seven Summers International Pop Volume 2” CD compilation that Tweenet and Kindercore (Tweenettwo & KC023) released in 1998. In that classic comp the band appears with the song “Number One”. ‘

But their first compilation appearances date from 1997. Remember the legendary comp “Pop American Style”? Well, I didn’t know, but it seems there was a Japanese version with extra songs that was released by Flavour of Sound. On it, and not in the American version, the band appears with the song “Sagittarius”. Oddly enough on the notes section on Discogs it says that: Track 23 is listed on the sleeves as “Orange Cake Mix / Feel Your Love”, but it was changed to “The Autumn Teen Sound / Sagittarius” in the final stage of manufacturing.

The other compilation from 1997 was the “Christmas in Stereo” comp that was released by Kindercore in the US and Philter Records (PRPH-2012) in Japan (this one in 1999). It is The Autumn Teen Sound who open the CD with the song “Christmas Wish”.

1998 will see them appear with the song “What Can I Do?” on the CD compilation “Dreams Are Free (With Purchase) (Sympathy for Count Pococurante, Vol. 3)” released by Dark Beloved Cloud (DBC 214). Also they would show up on “The Family Twee” double CD compilation. This compilation was actually not for sale. It was a compilation made by participating members of the indiepop-list. So you can see bands like for example Zapato who was Mario from Shoestrings or Laura Watling, among others. Those were the times when the indiepop-list was really relevant.

In 2000 the band was to appear on 3 compilations. The first was on “Millefeuille” that was released by the Japanese Beikoku-Ongaku (BDBO-E0014). The song they contributed for this one was “Submarine”. Also on another Japanese label, Motorway, the band appears with the song “My Computer Dream”. That on the 7″ compilation “Thru Spray Colored Glasses”(MOTOR-046)  that was part of the “Carafate Roads” series. This was volume 8. Lastly they had the song “Winter” on the “Paris Caramel 2000” CD maxi .

Lastly, in 2001, on Shelflife Records compilation of OMD covers called “Pretending to See the Future: A Tribute to OMD” (LIFE 030), the band did a fine cover of “Telegraph”.

So who were The Autumn Teen Sound? Twee.net immediately clears the mystery. It was Skippy McFadden, just him. Who was he? Maybe the name sounds familiar. He ran the label March Records. Thanks to that I start finding some more information about the band on the web.

First an interview with him in an unknown site. Here when asked about the band name he says: It didn’t occur rather it allured. It was taken from a collection of psych pop records in the 60’s. Apparently, there was a ‘scene’ and a ‘sound’ called the autumn teen sound. If I ever figure out what it is, I’ll let you know. I like autumn. I like sounds. I guess I don’t care much for teens. (ed. HEY!) At least that’s what I’m told to say here. I’m a big fan of really long band names as opposed to monosyllabic ones.

Then when asked when he sees the band in 5 years time: The Autumn Teen Sound will be franchised out and there will be a 4 piece (2 boys & 2 girls or maybe a boy, a girl, and 2 robots) synthesizer only group in every major U.S. town playing Silicon Teens inspired pop songs, for your enjoyment. The ‘sound’ will sweep the nation and there will be a dance called the Autumn Teen Dance. Of course, all the fans will be drinking March brand red wine.

Funny. I keep looking and find a review of the 7″ on the website Furia. It is a good review, saying “A far more ambitious cover, however, is the b-side of this single by March Records operator Skippy McFadden’s own recording project The Autumn Teen Sound (which I will insist on believing is named after the Slingbacks’ song), who turn Poison’s “Talk Dirty to Me” into spiky synth-pop on the order of “Electric Avenue” performed by the Dead Milkmen. After playing it twice I feel like I’ve extracted all the humor I’m going to, but the a-side is proving more durable, a self-effacing synth-collector’s soliloquy called “Say Something” that’s about equidistant from Barcelona and Wolfie.”

And that’s about it about the band. Not much more. I have only heard a few of the songs the band released. I am mostly missing the ones on different compilations. I know the band played in an Athens Summer Music Extravaganza festival back in 1998 alongside The Push Kings, Bunnygrunt, Tullycraft and more. But then, I can’t seem to find much more about them even though the band was around during internet times. What do you remember about The Autumn Teen Sound?

Edit: the 7″ arrived home and noticed that Skippy credits himself on the 7″ as Lord Butterscotch. He played vocals, green farfisa compact combo, behemoth farfisa professional 88, roland jx3p +pg200, elka rhapsody 490, roland tr505, dr. sample sp202, korg delta, siel or400, casiotone 310, the egg, sequential circuits tom, wurlitzer student piano, alesis sr16 and casio sk5.
Other people credited are:
Queen Josephine – backing vocals, yamaha portasound, synsonic drums, tambourine
Leo Con Brio – yamaha cs-5, korg poly 800, speak & spell, casio pt30, magnus chord organ
DJ French Toast – loops, samples & beats, iMac bondi blue
The songs were recorded at The Tiger Trap on the DMT8 unit.

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Listen
The Autumn Teen Sound – Say Something

Well here are the few more Indietracks announcements that needed a review!

Navina: I grin when I see some musician called singer-songwriter. I kind of know what to expect. The folksy, smartsy lyrics, and sometimes cutesy, sort of music. Will Navina change my stereotype? No. Sadly, no. The Cambridge based artist is not for me. It is not bad music by any means, but not the kind I’m interested in at all. Doesn’t say anything to me about my life.

Rafa Skam: not sure what to link for Rafa. I decided linking him to The Yellow Melodies BandCamp as he leads the Murcia band. Rafa has been around in the indiepop scene for many years, and we all remember his band Vacaciones with lots of nostalgia. This time around for Indietracks he will be playing solo. He has in the past done impromptu gigs at the merch stall of Indietracks, but can’t remember if I was around when that happened. I suppose though that he will be playing songs from his bands, or does he have his own songs for when he plays solo? I don’t know. Not sure really what to expect!

All Ashore!: definitely one of the few bands playing Indietracks that I’m interesting in checking out. First because they have some very fine and fun songs. Second because members of the band had been in top bands, favourite bands of mine, like The Parallelograms, Bouquet or Velodrome 2000. Do I need to say more? I’m happy that they are playing. And if it was me, I would put them in bigger letters on the bill, make them headline instead of British Sea Power or Dream Wife for example?

Now the DJs.

Asking for a Friend DJs: these are Tim Hall from Belfast and Trev from Oddbox Records. Both regulars at Indietracks for years. I’m happy Tim gets a chance to DJ, in general I like what he likes and that would probably make him my favourite DJ for this year.

Bum Notes Karaoke with Ruby Waters: no clue what this is. But from what I’m reading Ruby Waters hosts this Bum Notes at the Flying Duck in Glasgow. I was at that venue once. It was a great night I must say and loved hanging with a few of The Orchids that time. Those were the days. From the Indietracks bio it says there will be karaoke but no prizes, that it is not a drag show but there will be queens. It seems a bit all over the place, but I do like the idea of karaoke at Indietracks. Not sure though if this looks like an indiepop karaoke at all?

Des Was a Bowie Fan DJs: doesn’t say much about this DJ other than it is a London clubnight that plays indiepop, post-punk, new wave, northern soul and rock’n’roll. Meaning? they play the same as many other clubs in London. Hoping then, they do it better?

Passionate Necking: another club from London that happened for three years at The Montague Arms. It looks a bit mainstream from the bio as they mention they play Cher or Grimes. Well, doesn’t sound like the disco I want to dance to.

Recordsville Social DJs: this is Kev and Linda who I’ve met many times at Indietracks. Lovely couple. I remember them DJing before mostly girl groups but now they are going to be playing Pop, Punk, PostPunk, etc, etc. I do trust them to play good music. They always have photos with the good bands, like Saint Etienne, or The Primitives. So I believe this is a good option for dancing. Don’t you agree?

Time Machine Disco DJs: Katy from The Just Joans. No more information. I’m no fan of Just Joans, but I do believe the people behind the band had good taste in music. Could be good?

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Here’s a band that had enough songs for an album on different compilations throughout the nineties. Why they never released an album is a mystery to me.

I never knew much about them. The first time I heard Nothing Else’s music was on a compilation called “25 – A Silver Jubilee” (MEL 25) released by Meller Welle Produkte in 1999. Only now, after seeing that my friend Heinz has uploaded a couple of their tracks on Youtube that I decided to pay closer attention to their music, see what I can find about them. Maybe there’s some luck in my investigation.

I do own that CD compilation I mentioned, “25 – A Silver Jubilee”, after I traded some records with the German label. Thanks to that trade I discovered lots of music I must say. I really enjoy trading records. On this simply designed CD compilation Nothing Else appears with two songs, “Beast Inside” and “On The Way”. Here I find the first details about the band. There is an address. It happens the band hailed from France, from a town called Les Mureaux.

Les Mureaux is a commune in the Yvelines department in the Île-de-France region in north-central France. It is located in the north-western suburbs of Paris, 35.9 km (22.3 mi) from the centre of Paris.

A suburb of Paris then. That’s a bit strange, isn’t it?

That wasn’t their first compilation appearance. Actually the first one listed on Discogs dates from 1993. On the tape “Cerulean Sky!” that was released by Grapefruit (GRAPEFRUIT 7) and Bliss Aquamarine (BLISS 005) the band has one song, “Kiss Me After the Rain”. I must say I’m not familiar with this compilation, but I do see many familiar names in it like The Pristines, Die Busfahrer or Doloras Haze among others. I want to add that I really like the art for this tape.

The second compilation where they are listed on is the one called “Cherries and Sunny Days” released by the Italian label Shiny Sunset (Sunset 11). I was briefly in touch with the person who ran this label on Facebook and sent him questions for an interview. Sadly never heard back. Would have been nice to know more about it. But well, at least we have some tracklists and I can come up with some facts. In this case, Nothing Else contributes “To Play it Fair”, and other superb bands that appear are The Shining Hour, Pencil Tin or Watoo Watoo.

On the 1997 German compilation “Hopping Hobgoblin”, also a cassette, the band appears with two songs, “Beast Inside” and “Norma Jean Died Tonight”. This tape was released in 1997 by the Refuse Collection label (hobo 2). I have no clue about this tape. most of the bands on it, aside The Celestial Daffodils, Blochin 81 and They Go Boom!!, are unknown to me!

Two more songs were to be included on yet another tape in 1999: “On The Way” and “Flat Days”. This time on a French tape called “Love Song” that was released by the A Secret Song (019) label. It is the first time I hear of this label and of this tape. Again many bands on it are unknown to me. There is a scan of the insert on Discogs but it is very hard to read, but it does seem like some band members are listed for each of the bands. Maybe someone who owns this tape could help find out who were behind Nothing Else!

2001 would see them appear on yet another tape, “Suspend Your Disbelief”, released by the underrated Best Kept Secret (LIE 030) label from Italy. Just one song by them was included in this comp, “Beautiful and Lost”.

There are two more tape compilations were they appear though they are undated on Discogs. The first is on the Nessie label from France. This a very very fine label that released the amazing Evergreen 7″. The tape “Superqualifragilistic” (NESS587) included their song “The Darkside of the World”. Again, many obscure bands were included though I’m familiar with a few like Caramel, Poissons Solubles or Newell.

Lastly, again on Meller Welle Produkte, on a tape called “Fairy Tales” (MEL 23), they had 2 songs, “Lightness” and “Blackberry and Apple”.

Then I find that on Shiny Sunset they were involved in a split tape with the Japanese band Sunshower. I did write about Sunshower before. That’s interesting. This tape called “Pop Hits – Sunshower & Nothing Else” (Sunset 12) had 8 songs on the A side by the Japanese band and 7 songs by Nothing Else on the B side. The songs by Nothing else were “Flat Days”, “To Play it Fair”, “Passerby”, “House of Madness”, “The Dark Side of the World”, “Kiss Me After the Rain” and “Tuesday Afternoon”. This was the closest to a proper release by the band.

So making a count, there were in total how many original songs? “Kiss Me After the Rain”, “To Play it Fair”, “Norma Jean Died Tonight”, “Beast Inside”, “On the Way”, “Flat Days”, “Beautiful and Lost”, “The Darkside of the World”, “Passerby”, “House of Madness”, “Tuesday Afternoon” “Lightness” and “Blackberry Apple”. That’s 13 songs. And there are no proper releases by the band. Just these compilations. Why?

Anyone have a clue who Nothing Else were? What other bands were they involved with? And if there were any other songs by them? It just looks like a big mystery to me! Their jangly indiepop is a treat to me, so I would love to know more!

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Listen
Nothing Else – To Play It Fair

It is a new week, but need to keep these reviews coming. So continuing with the Indietracks latest batch of announcements….

Mighty Kids: I read on the Indietracks page that this was a band that played electro-pop. I couldn’t find much about this band though it seems it is led by a girl named Shelley Jane. Indietracks says there’s a Bandcamp with the EP “Won’t You Reconsider”, but couldn’t find it. I did find this Soundcloud by the Derby band and found a mix of ukulele songs, which weren’t really exciting, and some electropop like “Dust”, which are much more enjoyable. Not sure what they do more, the ukulele or the bedroom electropop. I do hope it is the latter.

Happy Spendy: a Glasgow band. That sounds promising already. Also there is a very good photo of the band on their SoundCloud page. Let’s see, let’s try the first song “I Was Just Trying To Have a Good Time”. A bit too slow for me. But not bad. Next seems to be a 3 song EP titled “You Look Lovely” that was released in 2017. “Candy” is the first song. It is nice lo-fi casiotone pop with female vocals. Yeah, the photo looked like they were going to be a very jangly band, especially as one had a very cool bowl haircut. But no, a good electropop lo-fi band.

Worst Place: yeah lots of electropop it seems, not what I love the most, but much better than all the folksy and screamy stuff Indietracks was getting us used to. But now a true discovery by team Indietracks, a very very good one I think. Because I listen to the song “The Sun Changed Everything” and it is a jangly explosion! Just what I needed!! And great female vocals, and good melodies. Nothing I can complain! I really like this! A quartet from London, who doesn’t seem to have any releases so far, just a few songs online. And the last one, the one I mentioned, is the best. One of the bands one shouldn’t miss at Indietracks I believe.

Marlaena Moore: it doesn’t start good when I read her bio on Bandcamp. It tells me she is a rare talent. Don’t know how to take that. Well, I’ll let the music speak I suppose. The Edmonton, Canada, artist’s last album “Gaze” is what I start playing. Hmm. Just not for me I suppose, middle of the road indie. Doesn’t tell me much. I wonder, where’s the p!o!p!?

Tim the Mute: this is Tim Clapp’s alter ego. Tim runs the label Kingfisher Bluez who collaborated with Cloudberry once releasing the Parcel Post 7″ (I still have a few copies if anyone is interested). I figured I  have never reviewed his music on the blog. So what’s fair is fair. His latest was the album “Take My Life Please!” which you can still find on Bandcamp. It is hard to pinpoint, say what what sort of music this is. There’s a bit of everything, though I’m sure calling it pop is fine. In debt of 80s pop too is a good description as well. But there are all kinds, for example “Draining”, is a terrific song. That could have been recorded by many of our favourite bands. Then there are others not as accessible like “A Girl You Don’t Like”. It is a bit of a rare bird, but when at its best, it is really interesting.

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When did I first listen to The Originals? Was it through Soulseek, downloading MP3s for their “Chocolate Box” 7″ or was it through Javi’s old blog where I remember him writing about them. I can’t seem to remember exactly. I do remember the 3 songs on it, and today I thought looking for a copy of the record on the web. Well, no luck.

At some point I’m sure I’ll find a copy, in the meantime, I want to know more about this band. Who were they? What did they release? What happened to them? They seem to be pretty obscure but it is also true that most obscure indiepop fans know them. So in a way they are among the least obscure of the obscure bands. That does make sense? It does to me.

The first ever release by the band was a shared flexi with Po! that was released on Ruth Po!’s label Rutland Records (RUT 01). It was the first release on the label and it was released on 1988. The Originals opened the single sided flexi with the song “Japan” while Po! appears with “Glass King”. I don’t own this record, so perhaps someone can help, it is said that there is an insert with information about both tracks by Larry Rutland.

The “Chocolate Box” 7″ came out next, again on Rutland Records (RUT 03). This time there were three songs. On the A side there was “Chocolate Box” and “Clarence” and on the B side we find “Steven On the Radio”. This record came out in 1989 and all songs were recorded on 4 track at Solitude Studios in Leicester during the spring of 1989. I am guessing here that the band hailed from that city. Studio and label were based there.  On this record we find out also the names for the band members in the band.
Terri Lowe on bass
Yvonne Blair on drums
Kevin Young on guitar
Gary Blair on vocals

The artwork was done by Yvonne and Kevin. I notice that there are two Blairs in the band. Were they siblings? Probably, right?

In 1989 Rutland Records was going to put out a tape with the titled “They Were The Originals 1984-1989” (RUTT 13). This tape seems to be a retrospective, a compilation, of all recordings, releases and demos, by the band. I would so love to hear this tape in its entirety. There are in total a whopping 19 songs! On the A side we find “Chocolate Box”, “Clarence”, “Steven on the Radio”, “Japan”, “Cuckoo”, “Only 25”, “My Friend”, “On a Western Shore”, “Wish” and “Teddy Bears”. The B side had “Chimera”, “Flame”, “Larry”, “Mr. Jones”, “Little Tears”, “Kevin’s in Green”, “Norman”, “Blue Grass” and “My Friend”.

It does seem that a year later the band recorded a 2 song demo with new songs. This is listed on Dicogs as “2 Track Demo-Tape”. It had the songs “Number Nine” and “Listen to the Cat”. Never heard these two songs either.

There are 3 compilation appearances listed. In 1989 the band appeared with the song “Steven on the Radio” on the tape comp “My Favourite Sunday Vol. 1” released by the Japanese label Boshi (Roddy 004). This is a very cool compilation with great bands that have been featured on the blog like The Ammonites, The Candy Darlins or The Aurbisons among others.

In 1990 the band contributes the song “Mr. Jones” to the tape compilation “And They Call It Pop” that was put out by Fragrant Records. I must say I’m not familiar with this compilation that was put together by Fragrant who seems to have been based in Newton Abbot in Devon. There are many amazing bands here too like They Go Boom!, Feverfew or Strawberry Story among others.

Lastly, on the German tape compilation “Nachtsonne – The Noise and The Melodies” the band appears with the song “My Friend”. I’m curious about this tape as there are some bands I’ve never heard before like Desert Rain, Monday Post or Ostzonensuppenwürfelmachenkrebs.

I decide to check out if the band members are listed in any other bands. Well, Terri Lowe had been involved in Ruth’s Po! other band, Ruth’s Refrigerator. He played bass mostly but sometimes rhythm guitar. Also he worked with Po! playing guitar and producing! The other members don’t appear on Discogs under other bands.

I notice my friend Alex wrote a post about them back in 2007 on his Siete Pulgadas blog. There is sadly no other details aside the ones I’ve found so far. But still it is great to see friends love their music too.

Twee.net has some more tapes listed for the band. There is a “Live” and “Out-Takes” tapes on Rutland Records (RUTT02 & RUTT06). Also there’s also another tape listed that was to be released after the “They Were the Originals”.

Then I find a blog post by Ruth Po! where she mentions The Originals! First she says:
At that time, there were government grants available for people setting up their own small businesses – the Enterprise Allowance scheme. You had to prove you had £1000 in the bank and some kind of plan, and then you qualified for a weekly allowance. I didn’t have £1000, but I did know someone who agreed to transfer the money into my new Rutland Records bank account and then have it paid back again a week later. The name Rutland Records came from ‘Rutland Avenue’ in Leicester, where my friends in The Originals lived, but it also refers to England’s smallest county, which is next to Leicestershire, measuring about 20 miles across and is a symbol of English eccentricity and doing things small-style.

Then she talks about The Originals themselves!
The Originals: Rags, Yvonne, Kevin and Gary were a really well-rehearsed zany band who shared rehearsal premises with PO! This was a basement on the corner of Chatham Street and Stamford Street, underneath a clothing factory. Now, there are student flats there, but you can still see the load out bay we used when doing gigs. The Originals rehearsed every night; their sound was like a more rock version of The Smiths or Talking Heads, with childlike talk-singing from Gary. I admired their work ethic and made Julian and Jan rehearse more than they liked to. At about 10.15pm each night, we would all go into the nearby pub ‘The Black Boy’ for a drink.
The first Rutland Records release was a 1988 shared flexi-disc between PO! and The Originals. The PO! song was ‘Glass King’, recorded at Dave Davis’ home studio (credited as Wolfman De Moog III). Dave was the partner of Teri Wyncoll, from the community arts organisation Multiplex. By the time of recording, Julian and Jan had left PO! and so the musicians from The Originals acted as my backing band.
With home computers and dot matrix printers in an early stage, artwork had to be produced by hand. This involved using Letraset rub down lettering. You bought a sheet of the font that you wanted and rubbed over each letter to transfer it onto the paper. The sheets were quite expensive, and after a couple of years, the plastic letters dried up and cracked, but there was something artisan and time-consuming about Letraset that pleased me.
A recently acquired teddy bear ‘Larry Rutland’ belonging to Rags from the Originals became the boss of Rutland Records; he is pictured on the Originals’ side of the flexi and also wrote the sleeve notes. Most of the Rutland newsletters and information were printed on red paper; even then I had some idea of ‘branding’ within a supposedly amateurish tiny business.

Really interesting indeed! She also shares that inner insert from the flexi, mentioning that the song by The Originals, “Japan”, was recorded at the Bankby Road Studios in Leicester by Wayne George and engineered by Ricky Wilson in 1988.

There is yet another Ruth Miller interview on the web that dates from Fall 1995 on the Monk Mink Pink Punk fanzine. On this one Ruth says:
Terri Lowe — plays lots of guitars all the time, when he’s not doing that he’s out looking for guitars to buy. He used to play the bass with a fab band called The Originals who recorded one single for Rutland. He’s a student studying English and he’s just won a prize for poetry. He was also the bass player in Ruth’s Refrigerator and he wrote some good songs for their albums. He is a hard shell with a soft centre, and his favorite word is “no.”

And as you can imagine that’s all I could find about them. No more information. I find it strange that the band members weren’t involved with other projects. It seems at that time everyone in the Leicester scene was in every band or kind of.  Just Terri Lowe. Also would love to know the tracklist for those tapes that I found on Twee.net. There are many questions left to answer when it comes to The Originals.

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Listen
The Originals – Chocolate Box

More Indietracks announcements. Gosh, it was just a week ago that I had reviewed the first batch of bands. And now there’s more! Also DJs were announced! I will need to figure out who are the people behind these DJs names as well, maybe someone can help me with that. This is what Indietracks posted:

We’re delighted to announce that Amber Arcades, Gwenno, Spinning Coin, Tigercats, Colour Me Wednesday and Tinsel Heart are among 24 artists and DJs added to the Indietracks 2018 line up today. They’ll join artists we’ve already announced for this year’s festival, including British Sea Power, Honeyblood, The Lovely Eggs, Dream Wife, Girl Ray, Sacred Paws, Darren Hayman, Even As We Speak and Anna Burch. Other artists joining the bill today are Linda Guilala, Best Praxis, Ex-Vöid, Sugar Rush!, Mighty Kids, Happy Spendy, Worst Place, Marlaena Moore, Tim the Mute, Navina, Rafa Skam and All Ashore!. Plus we’ll have late night entertainment from Asking For A Friend DJs, Bum Notes karaoke with Ruby Waters, Des Was A Bowie Fan DJs, Passionate Necking DJs, Recordsville Social DJs and Time Machine Disco DJs.

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I just discovered The Electrosonics. Really. I must admit that I have a bunch of 7″s by their label, Drive-In Records, but not any of their CDs. It happens that The Electrosonics only released in CD format on the label during the 90s. So yes, I missed them. Now I should try to catch up, get copies of their 3 releases, sit down, play them, and enjoy.

If you are into shoegazy sounds this might be for you. Dreamy girl vocals and guitar pedals. It is very nice indeed. And I’m even more surprised as I noticed that band members were later on Paper Moon, a band I do own all of their albums!!

And yes, if I said Paper Moon, it means the band hailed from Canada, though not from Winnipeg as Paper Moon but Vancouver. It happens that after The Electrosonics split Heather Campbell moved from Vancouver to Winnipeg. But yes, not here to talk about Paper Moon, which even has a Wikipedia entry, but about The Electrosonics.

I was lucky to find a handful of songs on Youtube and discover their music, though I must say that after hearing “Roo” I wasn’t exactly hooked. But then “Triamene” played and thought, this is brilliant! I want tom hear more. But neither of these two songs appear on their first release, the CDEP “Infra-Yellow” (DRIVE03 & QUID007) that Drive-In Records and its sister label Quiddity Records released in 1996. On a cardboard sleeve, this CD only had 3 songs: “Infra-Yellow”, “Retroflex” and “Star Stream”. All of them recorded at Downtown Sound Studios in December 95 and mastered at Gold Rush Studios in April 96.

The band was formed by Eric White on bass, vocals and guitar; Curtis Hobson on drums; Heather Campbell on guitar, keyboards, backing vocals; and Clare Kenny on guitar and vocals. Heather also took care of the artwork for the CD and the photography was done by Curtis. The engineer and producer for this record was Paul Siczek. A nice feature of the CD was that it included lyrics. It seems CDs these days rarely include the lyrics.

Their next release was the CD EP “Rampion” (DRIVE19) released in 1998 by Drive-In. This one had more songs, 5 in total. They were “Lazy Maisy”, “Triamene”, “Roo”, “Unsung Engine” and “Memory Bar the Door”. This time, August 1997, the band recorded at Bullfrog Studios in Vancouver with Howard Redekopp as the engineer. The songs were mastered by Craig Waddell. The images on the record are credited to Beatrix Potter. Here the band is much more detailed on what instruments they played. For example Curtis played a Moog Rogue, korg bass pedals and Roland beat box. Eric played a Moog Taurus and a lap steel. Heather played farfisa, arp axxe, Moog Opus 3 and Jupiter 8.

The band continued releasing with the Grand Rapids, Michigan, label that Mike Babb used to run. So a third CD EP came to life in 1999 and it was titled “Neutron Lullaby” (DRIVE36). This time the CD had one more song than the previous one, 6 then. But the truth is that three of them were remixes of the first 2. So, we find “Neutron Lullaby”, “Back on the Light” and “Prodrome” and also “Neutron Lullaby (Object Remix)”, “Back on the Light (Pre-Ignition Mix)” and “Neutron Lullaby (Dream Sequence Mix)”.  As you know I’m no fan of remixes but it is understandable as it was the late 90s. The Object Remix was taken care by Kevin Bolster, the Pre-Ignition Mix by Andrew Withycombe from The Ampersands, Hydroplane, The Cat’s Miaow and many more, and the Dream Sequence Mix by the band Buddha on the Moon.

The songs on the “Neutron Lullaby” EP were recorded in September 1998 at Lemon Loaf Studios in Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada. Also on this record we see that Michaela Galloway, who would later be in Hinterland, is credited for vocals and flute. Was Michaela Galloway behind the name Clare Kenny? I see her name in different bios but for some reason it only appears on their last EP.

I find an interview to Michaela on the website Step and a Half. Here when asked about the Electrosonics she says:
I used to be in Space Cadet, and in the Electrosonics. I am a much better musician now than I ever have been before. Joining the Electrosonics was very educational. Suddenly I was playing the Starfish Room (a big jump from the Press Club) and recording on something other than a 4-track. The other members of the Electrosonics were older than me, had been on tour and in the studio before. I feel like I really cut my teeth in that band. In the Electrosonics Eric White really had primary creative
control.

There are a few compilation appearances for the band. The first dates of 1996 and was a CD compilation called “Tiddleywinks (Volume One – Fun For Kids of All Ages!)” that was released by Chester’s Funtime Record Collection (CFRC 9503-2). Here the band contributes the song “Star Scream”.

In 1998, on the US CD compilation “Losing Today Volume 1” that came with the Losing Today “The Sky Is Grey” magazine the band appears with “Roo”. And the next year, on another US CD compilation called “Installation:03” that came freely with the third issue of the magazine Masstransfer, the band shows up with “Back in the Light (Pre-Ignition Mix)”.

I check the band members and I feel there are more than one Clare Kenny (unless she played in Orange Juice and The Apartments?) and Eric White (was he in the late 70s in The Kentucky Colonels? Doubt it!). On the other hand Curtis Hobson doesn’t sound like he was in the funk band ADC Band in the late 70s either, right? The only one that seems to have the right listings is Heather Campbell, who played in Paper Moon, Bossa Nova and also lately in The Intelligence Service.

A bit more of searching and I find that actually Clare Kenny was making music in 2014, I found a Bandcamp for a band called “What’s Hot!” where she was involved with. Much, much, punkier than The Electrosonics I must say. Then I stumble upon an old Myspace page where there are plenty of photos of the band.

Another find on the web is a review of a gig where The Electrosonics were support of a band called Perfume Garden on February 5th, 1998. This is what it says:
Clare Kenny is haunted by eyes. It’s fifteen minutes to showtime, and she’s starting to get a little stressed. She tries to find the beer tickets. She tries to find the rest of her band, the Electrosonics. She ponders Perfume Tree’s attempt to ‘choreograph’ the Electrosonics’ performance. And then, in front of the stage, in place of the usual disco ball, she’s confronted by the photo-mobile. It’s a the Electrosonics, gazing at their shoes zoetrope-like contraption which projects old photo portraits onto the walls. Old eyes stare blankly at Clare. In Victorian times, the London police would take pictures of the eyes of Jack the Ripper’s victims in the belief that their killer’s image would be burned into their retinae. Old eyes. Clare’s had enough of this.
Clare’s father (western Canada’s number one Jacques Cousteau lookalike) has driven all the way from Alberta to see her play; apparently he was getting a little bored. But the Electrosonics don’t disappoint. The set is tight, and with a guest appearance from Wendy Young (ex-Kaneva) on backing vocals and flute, the Electrosonics’ sound gets an extra layer of warmth and richness. The sound retains the Sinead O’Connor singing for Slowdive element it always has, but it’s a welcome thing to hear the keyboards becoming better integrated into the overall sound and the songwriting taking on more complex, suite-like arrangements. In other words, the Electrosonics are doing what all good bands should — evolving and improving by challenging their own abilities.

This is the online version of the Drop-D magazine. It actually has two more entries for The Electrosonics, but only an interesting  mention:
Look at the Electrosonics. With an independently-released CD out and a tour under their belt, but without airplay on a station that the general public isn’t afraid to listen to (face it, listening to CiTR is just too “icky” for your average Z95 fan to contemplate), the best they can do is scrape together less than ten friends here to see them. Well, it’s the public’s loss, really. Mildly sloppy though the performance is, there’s enough eau-de-Slowdive hanging in the air around them to make you realize how much you miss shoegazing. Though the pedal steel guitar is sadly absent from their setup, Claire Kenney’s Perfume Tree-style vocals and an occasional keyboard fill that quotes Zbigniew Preisner’s soundtrack work (The Double Life of Veronique, etc.) more than make up for it. The Electrosonics are just keeping the dreampop torch burning, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

I can’t find much more about The Electrosonics. I do find more information about other bands that the members were involved with. It must be that The Electrosonics were active in the 90s, when the internet wasn’t yet as popular. What I do find on the web it indeed dates from those dates on websites that look very old, antiques really. I have many questions of course, like if there are more songs recorded by the band, or if they were in any compilations at all. In Twee.net, they are listed as an American band, maybe that is a reason I never looked into them. But now I want to know more about them! Do you remember this brilliant Vancouver band?!

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Listen
The Electrosonics – Triamene

Last post of newish discoveries for now I believe. Next post, Friday hopefully, should be of the new batch of bands that have been announced at Indietracks. On top of that there were bands that played Wales Go Pop! That I’ve never heard plus should look into the bands at Cologne Popfest. There’s much going on, and even with 3 posts a week it seems that it is not enough!

Anyways, let’s start:

Cariño: where did this beauty come from? Am I back to the early 2000s where Spanish bands sounded a bit like this? I don’t know. I’m just happy to hear their song “Momento Inadecuado </3”. From the photo it looks like a trio, and have another song on Bandcamp called “Canción de Pop de Amor”, which is also ace. They hail from Madrid and they self-define themselves as a neighborhood pop band. Whatever that means. In any case this is fab, and I hope someone puts them out soon. Real soon.

Wrstlng: Anders, Patrik, Jon and Oskar are the Gothenburg based band Wrstlng. They are not very new, it seems their last release dates from December 2016 or so. I missed it. I’m only discovering it now but the thing is, that it is really enjoyable and I should share it with you, right? The EP called “Hoarse Bear”, has 7 songs of top guitar pop. I believe it was only released digitally sadly, unless someone knows better?

Boys: definitely not a big fan of linking to music websites, but if that’s the solution for me to listen to the latest song Nora Karlsson has unveiled, I will do. You can check “That Weekend” if you click on the link. This song is to be included in the album “Rest In Peace” that is coming out on May 11th. Yes, I need to pre-order it. Soon.

Tracyanne & Danny: it must be a week or two when I shared with you some of the music that Tracyanne is doing as a duo with Danny. Well, now there is a video for the song “Alabama” and it is great, not that far from Camera Obscura really. I also noticed they are both performing in NYC very soon. Seems, I will have to attend!

Two for Tea with Duglas T: a Youtube show by Duglas from BMX Bandits? Really? Yes! On this first episode we see Duglas T. Stewart sharing a good time with his friend Norman Blake from Teenage Fanclub. I would suggest subscribing as each episode will feature Duglas chatting and singing with a guest. A top initiative by the Scottish bandito!

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This is a very obscure song, and at this point it feels more of an anecdote than anything else. You see, I found it on Youtube while looking for other bands. There is a Youtube user called Robertpere2 that has a bunch of goodies, a lot of post-punk but also very good jangle pop. And I sometimes just let all videos play. See if there’s something good for me to discover. And just like that, I found out about The Harlows.

Definitely the image that was uploaded caught my attention. It is very indiepop. The guy and the girl in summer clothes, dancing. It looks like it is an “official” image. Perhaps a scan of the cover of a tape or a CD. Though it does look like a photocopy. Most probably it is a tape then. But who are they? Where they are from? Are there more songs? The only information available on this video is a line that says:  “Produce by Dan Boardman and The Harlows, mixer by Dan Boardman and Randy Duerr”.

At least it is something. A hint. Some info so I can start digging. The song itself is really good! To my ears it sounds like mid-90s American indiepop. According to the video, it was released in 1995. So in that sense I’m in the right track.

What is a Harlow? Well, there is a town in Essex, England, with that name. A town were many great jangle pop bands hail from. Then it is a last name. Some famous Harlows, for example, Jean Harlow, a Hollywood actress or George Henry Harlow, an English artist. From what I understand then, that last name, Harlow, is the transferred use of an English surname with Anglo-Saxon origins derived from a place name. The name comes from the Olde English elements “hoer” meaning a pile of rocks or stones and “hlaw” meaning a hill. So the surname essentially developed to identify a person who dwelled on or around a rocky hill area.

That doesn’t shed any lights about the band. That’s true. Well I do have two names, Dan Boardman and Randy Duerr. Maybe that could point me somewhere. I found something where both names appear together. There is a release by The Spectors called “Cockfights & Cakefights 1992-1996”, on the Get Hip Recordings Bandcamp. The Spectors being a garage rock band from Minneapolis. And here I see that Dan Boardman played guitars, drums and vocals, in this band. And that Randy Duerr helped produce some songs at Wigged Out Studios. That kind of gives away that The Harlows were from the area, from Minneapolis. But what else?

Not much more. Can’t find any other mention of the band anywhere. Who were they? Just the one song that appears on the web, which is great, but nothing else. Who were the band members? Were there any releases? Anyone remembers them?

Edit (same day, 3pm)

Just got a comment by Harley Pageot pointing me that the blog Wilfully Obscure has actually written about the band. Why didn’t it show up on Google I don’t know. But there is much information here to be shared.

Actually there are 2 posts about them. The first, is about a 1995 tape, the one that has the cover I was talking about. I learn that the vocals were taken care by a Charlton Metcalf and that they were indeed from Minneapolis. This first tape, had 9 songs: “Catch a Wave”, “February”, “4 Leaf Clover”, “Cowards Sunday Drive”, “Lookout”, “Deminers”,  “Hemingway”, “For Rent” and “Untitled”.  It is interesting though that it is mentioned that this tape, and the latter one, from 1996, sound like two different bands.

That second post on Wilfully Obscure is indeed about the 1996 tape. Here there is a female vocalist named Rachel and the band is compared to The Spinanes and her vocals to that of Sarah Shannon of Velocity Girl. The songs on this second tape were “Purposeful Heart”, “Tsunami”, “Anyway”, “Jetlag”, “Shiner”, “Lean”, “April Shakes” and “Escar Go Karts”. Something that actually got y attention was that a Michael Alan Perry says that he was in the band. Is this the same Michael Alan Perry that was behind Manic Pop Records perhaps? And that is not all. There is a 1999 article on the page Ink19 that talks about a CD by The Harlows called “Stages I” released by Monkey Poop. It was a double CD, a compilation of their four previous releases. I know of two tapes now. There were two more? Now we have more information but there are still lots of questions to be answered!

Edit: Next day, 11am.

Bernd has pointed out a CDR released by Monkey Poop Records (oo1) dating from 1998 called “The Second Contestant is Number Twenty-Three”. There is not much information about it but we do know it included 5 songs, “Fondue”, “Sass-On”, “Bidet”, “Photon Falls” and “Hombre”.

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Listen
The Harlows – Catch a Wave

Thanks so much to Chris Hughes for the interview!! I wrote about Red Hour on the blog some time ago looking for information as I loved their songs. Happily he got in touch and was up to answer all my questions. He was also very kind and has shared memorabilia of the band! Check out Sounds Review (Jan. 1991) and Melody Maker Review (Nov 1991).

++ Hi Chris! Thanks so much for getting in touch! How are you? Where are you at now? Still in Barrow-in-Furness?

Where am I. Where am I. Inside. I am fine. Itching eye brows. On a chair. In a studio attached to a farm. Outside it is vertical sleet and wind. Pervades every pore. Nearly as bad as Oymyakon. Barrow in Furness is very west UK. I swapped it years ago for very east UK. East from west. Westerly went easterly. So now I east. Not west. Sun looks different.

++ Are you all from Red Hour still in touch to this day? And when was the last time you picked up your bass? Still in a band perhaps?

Spin out slides onto the record turntable sometimes. Still like the starkness of the white label on the black vinyl test pressing. Simplicity. I listen to that sometimes as I said. So I figure I still in touch musically. We all connect up as individuals one way or another I think. A bit like a circuit in series. We not all connected together adjacent but there is a threaded connection. Like a circuit in series.

Think I picked up my bass about 6570 days ago roughly. I have a habit of leaving basses with other folk and band folk. Think I picked it up when I passed through a while back visiting one of them folks a while back. About 6570 days approximately.

Still in a band? No. Not really. No. An ongoing musical artistic distant collaboration with son palace is about close as I get.

++ Let’s start from the beginning. Like what are your first musical memories? What was the first instrument did you get and how? And how did you learn to play bass?

I cut my dance moves and learnt the tune and words to ‘The Banana Split Show’ in my early youth and if you segue that with some of Sidney Bechet’s ‘Summertime’ and a bit of ‘Black Beauty’ soundtrack well that be the start of my musical education as a youngster. Although I did quite like the quietness of the moon landings on the black and white television we had. And I mean The Clangers were pretty musical too. And I quite liked Bagpuss in a calming quiet way.

I used to hawk around junk shops and second hand stalls in my home town as a teenager. I remember seeing a cheap nasty bass with flat wound strings on it. I bought it. It was cheap. It was a bit nasty. Flat wound strings and the feel of the bass got me hooked.

I tried to sell it 6 months later at a shop near where I bought it from. I told the stall holder I wanted to sell my bass and I handed it to him. He said ‘I don’t want to buy a cricket bat’.

++ Had any of you been involved with other bands prior to Red Hour?

No. This band was the first expedition out into band territory. Prior bands. No. None. No.

++ How was Barrow-in-Furness back then? Were there any bands that you liked? What were the good record stores? Or what about the pubs or venues to go check out up and coming bands?

There was ‘The White Lion’. And then there was ‘The White Lion’ and I guess if you were stuck . . there was ‘The White Lion’. The White Lion pub was the place to be. The musicians hang out. About the size of a small small, small terrace house. Barrow lies on a western peninsula of the U.K. It has a few satellite islands connected to it. Piel island. Sheep island. Tiny islands with stretching dunes of sand hills and natural reservoirs. You could sleep in the dunes and see shooting stars. Lakes and meres filled with char and pike and also mountains lay just outside Barrow.

Record emporiums. Well there was one. Earthquake Records. Genius place. An education. An education and two thirds. And in size much smaller than a small, small terrace hose. Tiny. Almost dog kennel sized shop. Diminutive. But smelt amazing.

++ When and how did the band start? What was the recruiting process like?

Guy turns up at my parents.

With a cassette.

Plays. See no evil.

Plays. Do it clean.

Plays. Read it in books.

Best job interview ever.

No words said.

Didn’t pay too well.

But best job ever. That was the recruiting process.

++ Why the name Red Hour?

The term is used by some employers to describe a one hour slot that is relatively less productive than the other more productive hours in a productive working day. That is where the name came from. Seriously.

++ How was the creative process for you? Where did you usually practice?

Creative process. We did more takes and repeats than Stanley Kubrick.

School halls. Basements. Cellars. Church halls. Factory outhouses. Working men’s clubs. Scout huts. Tin sheds. Bowling green huts. Living rooms. Flats. Occasional stairwells. Sometimes outside.

++ And who would you say were influences in the sound of the band?

Throw together Tom Verlaine, The Mighty Lemon Drops, the Bunnymen, the Fall, the Wedding Present, REM, Captain Beefheart, the Family Cat, Cocteau Twins, Gary Cook, the Pixies, Stravinsky, the Smiths, John Peel, Husker Du. These were pretty much the vinyls and music that were getting spun around that time at the flats and parties that were going on in the Furness Peninsula.

++ I discovered your music through the compilation “I Might Walk Home Alone” that was released by Wilde Club Records. On it, you appear with the song “Treat”. Wondering then two things, if you can tell me the story behind this song and how did you end up appearing on this compilation? I suppose you played the Wilde Club?

‘Treat’ on this compilation was Barry’s (Wilde club) choice as I remember. I seem to recollect we wish a different track had been used but it was pressed and complete. And so it remained.

Story behind Treat. One of the few songs to collapse on stage due to too many cold ales before a gig. No excuse your Honour.

++ Your first release was a 7″ on a label called Cogent Records who mostly released stuff by The Tier Garden. Who were behind this label and what was your relationship with them?

Cogent was ran by ‘The Tier Garden’. They were close to ‘Grown Up Strange’ who I know you have mentioned previously. When we put out ‘5Qs’ as it seemed to make sense to use and grow that label. They kindly let us jump onto it ( a thanking you and salut Cogent). Cogent also put out records by ‘Perfect Circle’. Cogent and The Tier Garden were basically the same team. They were also responsible for getting bands like ‘The Weather Prophets’, ‘The Stone Roses’ and ‘James’ to play the legendary ‘Bluebird club’ in Barrow in the 80s. And yes, Cogent bunch – they frequented The White Lion.

++ The two songs on this record are “Five Questions” and “Films About Me”. Both were recorded at Out of the Blue Studios in Manchester. How was that experience?

I remember the engineer having underpants hanging from his sock. I remember 50 takes at trying to get drum sounds and speeds right (with a hangover). I remember having to travel back weeks later because the master tapes screwed up. I remember folk from the Inspiral Carpets turning up during recording. I remember the cramped travelling down to Manchester in a Hyundai. Recording one day. Mixing the next. Partying and not sleeping.

++ Both being fantastic songs, can I ask, in a sentence or two, what are they about?

‘Films about me’. Well you did ask. I remember Dave telling me this was a about a young man who took his own life by jumping in front of a train – I think because of bullying. And 5Qs is simply about 5 questions – I would be vaguer if I could. I always try to think what this track is about but always get side tracked by the pretty nice bass line.

++ What inspired you for the artwork, for the design, of the sleeve for this record?

A big thanks to graphics and sleeve designer Jonah F who helped with this. Jonah sorted all the Cogent label decals out and pretty much ran the whole cover himself. The ear shapes used to be a way of telling if you had criminal traits. Black, white and 1 colour due to cost. Also Jonah was not involved in the ‘spin out’ cover and does it show. Yes. My ear is not on the cover.

++ After this release Barry Newman from Wilde Club was to release your 12″ on his label. On it there were four songs and I notice one of them was “Five Questions”. Was it the same version or a re-recorded version of the one that appears on the 7″? And why did you decide to include it again?

I think we all thought 5 Qs might be the song that would get airplay and create a wide wider audience. The recording is exactly the same mix. So including it with ‘Spin Out’ made sense. The wider wider audience never quite happened.

++ I’ve actually worked and been in touch with a few bands that released on the Wilde Club like The Suncharms or Shine! How was your relationship with Barry and with the bands he released? Did you like any?

We gigged at least twice with ‘The Suncharms’. I was at a gig several years ago and I starting talking to the guy next to me. Turned out he was from The Suncharms. We talked about travelling the length and length of the country in a cramped Hyundai to play a gig to one person who was normally the person behind the bar.

I only communicated with Barry via letter as I remember. Records got released. Press releases got sent. I think Barry was waiting for the wider audience to occur also. I know Barry initially wondered if our singer was from ‘The Wolfhounds’. David Canavan compared to David Cavanagh. Our singer was ‘Canavan’.

++ Were there more compilation appearances by the band other than the one on Wilde Club?

No more compilations that I am aware of.

++ Was there any interest from other labels? Perhaps big labels?

The hazy memories of sending out press releases, boxing records, phoning radio stations and phoning record companies and the waiting for the phone to ring and letter box to squeak. Why we never got an agent I don’t know. Proper old school diy approach – the perfect way to make sure you always keep a nice, small, very small niche audience. The Cogent team were much better prepared and business like. Red Hour were not not not business minded.

++ You recorded a Peel Session in 1992. That must have been amazing. How was that? Did you meet Peel or not? How long did it take to record it? Who worked with you? And why did you choose the four songs (“All I Need”, “William Jailor”, “Free Fall”, “Almost There”) for this session?

The Peel session. Got aired twice. Down to Maida Vale studio 3 to record the songs in a day. All sardined into the old Hyundai and straight to London. Was a bit like a kids day out at the Wonka factory. I remember being told to go and have some food at the canteen and there was the whole of the London Philharmonic striking up in the adjacent studio and there was us wondering if we had to pay for our beans on toast as we held our trays looking like something from a Dickens film. We took no photos of that day. Our lack of visual documentation is commendable in general. The songs sound so fast because the situation was so surreal. I think our bodies and coordination were just lost in the strangeness and madness of where we found ourselves.

The 4 songs were pretty much the latest tracks we had done. Rather than rely on 2 or 3 tried and tested older tracks that we knew were solid – we opted for 4 new ones. Another case of not really maximising your search for a wider audience. I don’t think these tracks had what ‘Spin Out’ and ‘5Qs’ had. Would have been nice to hear them recorded at Maida Vale.

I talked to John Peel the night the session went out. I listened to the show live at home and had to dash out to the red phone box one hundred yards from my flat to give him some gig details. Got back in time to hear him announce them. Nice use of technology. Nice surreal phone call.

++ And by the way who is “William Jailor”?

I believe ‘William J Leptimane’ is mentioned in the first line. An oblique nod to Mel Brooks in Blazing Saddles.

++ There are no more releases by the band, that’s kind of a bummer. But I did find on YouTube a bunch of unreleased songs by the band. Where do these come from?

Including the singles released there was probably about an album worth of material that would cut it. In my opinion ‘5Qs’, ‘Spin Out’ and ‘Films about me’ were probably the most accomplished of them. They had a certain spark to them. Some of the unreleased tracks would be from live tapes from the many gigs we played around this time and would not have made it too a next recording. There was a beautiful close knit crowd so many gigs were recorded and passed around.

++ Are there any more unreleased songs aside from the ones I found on Richard Attwood’s YouTube account?

I seem to remember after ‘Spin Out’ we kept looking to put out a new release as quick as we could but ‘Wilde Club’ were booked up with releases and time just seemed to run away. I think those singles and the Peel session were a natural end. Considering when some of us started in the band we could not even string two notes together – I think we did alright. When I say us. I mean mostly me.

We had a few songs that were recorded after Spin Out that definitely started to list towards PJ Harvey and Steve Albini loud and quiet sound dynamics. They be on someone’s dusty tape somewhere.

++ And if you were to choose your favourite Red Hour song, which would it be and why?

Spin out. Films about me. They just have a bit of something. Simple raw pop charm punk.

++ What about gigs? Did you play many? Any in particular that you remember?

Many? Yes. Many. No diary of where we played but we did cover some ground. I did not drive at the time. I got to sleep and slumber whilst others drove. I remember the gigs with ‘The Wedding Present’ vaguely. I remember sitting backstage at the Edinburgh gig. It was incredibly quiet – you could hear a pin drop (don’t call me cliché man). I went from backstage to front stage to check turnings of all the equipment. The place was lifting. Rammed. Electric. Full. Walked back stage again in shock. That was a fun time. I think we sold one t shirt.

Another legendary trip in the Hyundai with guitars on our laps was to play ‘The Arts and Anarchy Festival’ in Lille. (Thanks to being aired on Peel). Great bunch over there looked after us over there. I miss the old Hyundai.

++ And were there any bad gigs at all? Any anecdotes you could share?

Bad gigs. Just the ones where you travelled back in the early hours after playing only to the bar tender for £25 in a pub the size of a dog kennel, where the A&E folk never turned up and the record company folk could not be bothered to turn up either and that was after travelling 300 miles each way. Yes. And breaking down in the snow on the way home. With no food. No drink. In the wilds. With no phones. No money. Yes. That happened loads.

++ When and why did you split? Did you continue making music afterwards?

Right time. Peel session. 2 decent records from a bunch of no hopers. (Well, mainly me). Gigs across Europe. 3 or 4 T shirts sold. That big enough for me. And I think we got tired of being stuck in snow in the Hyundai together.

++ Was there ever a reunion gig or talks of a reunion gig?

No. And. No. No. And. No.

++ How do you feel about the C86 genre, do you feel like you fit there or you’d say you were something else?

I loved the feel of the C86 era. Sarah records. Pastels. Orange Juice. Postcard records. These groups certainly padded out my record collection. I do not think we were part of that particular genre but it did feature a lot within the scene in Furness. The Peach Thieves were very much a perfect fit for that. Another rather cute Furness outfit.

++ Did you get much attention from the radio or press?

I remember the interview with Mark Radcliffe for BBC Radio that Geoff and I did in Carlisle. We turned up feeling a touch anxious or maybe a massively amount anxious. We were not exactly outgoing Shakespearean types. It was about as comfortable as Theresa May meeting Mark E Smith. Another long, long, very, very quiet 150 mile journey home. But at least we got home that time.

I think after that we gave up on radio.

++ What about from fanzines?

We were too busy sending out press releases and phoning record companies and partying and organising gigs and rehearsing and working and waiting for the letter box to open and packaging records and mailing them out to think about involving fanzines. (Now that would have given us a wider audience wouldn’t it. Why did we not get an agent again?)

++ I hear Geoff Cook continues making music to this day. Anywhere you could point us where to listen or check out his music?

Son Palace. Fine recordings by this reclusive outfit. Never play live. Very C86 in the recording philosophy. Think there will be a new album later this year. Was well received by BBC Radio 6 and Gideon Coe. Son Palace – Accumulations is available now through bandcamp.

Also Castles in Space records released Gary Cook recordings a couple years back. Stunning stuff from the C86 era. Also available on bandcamp also and pressed on some pretty good vinyl. To avoid confusion. Gary Cook and Geoff Cooke are not related other than they have the same surname but spelt differently. Both from the Furness Peninsula and both with fine fine recordings to their respective names.

++ And today, aside from music, what other hobbies do you have?

I have a studio I sit in. It is incredibly quiet. There is a chair. Some paper. A few other things. There is rain outside. Cold. I have a chair to sit on. On which I am sitting.

++ Looking back in retrospective, what would you say was the biggest highlight for the band?

That bit were the drumsticks go ‘click’ ‘click’ ‘click’ ‘click’ and you hit the strings and the amps are turned on.

++ How is Barrow-in-Furness today? Has it changed much? If I was to visit one day, what would you say are the sights I shouldn’t miss? Or the traditional food or drinks I should try?

The sights you should not miss in Barrow.

Well. The White Lion has gone.

So.

Well I would say go to either Piel Island or Sheep Island.

Yes. Sheep Island or Piel Island.

If I were you though…. I would opt for Piel Island. It has a pub and a castle and 3 houses.

Sheep Island has no houses, no pub and used to be used as a smallpox isolation quarantine.

++ Thanks again Chris! Is there anything else you’d like to add?

As far as I know. This is true. Salut.

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Listen
Red Hour – Five Questions