Wednesday. All pre-orders have been posted and we are only a few days away of our official release date. I do want to tell our Japanese friends that Stone Records will be getting a batch of The BV’s 7″s in the next few days too.

Our next release will be a retrospective compilation by a Scottish band. Who will that be? Keep tuned on our blog as sooner than later I will be announcing it.

Now, here are some good finds for you to enjoy!

Day & Dream: Abby and Peter form this Asheville, North Carolina, band. They have a Bandcamp where they upload their demos. Their latest ones are four, “First in Flight”, “We’re Gonna Need Some More Coffee”, “Outside” and “Chrysalis”. Plus there is another one called “Nocturnal Creatures”.

Various Artists – Some Sort of Secret Sign: a tribute to Sarah Records by an Italian label? If you’d told me I wouldn’t have believed it. Now that I’m seeing it I am pretty curious. Italy does have indiepop fans, but it is not a country that has produced many indiepop bands. On this compilation, 8 bands cover classic Sarah Records songs. At the time only one of them is available to stream, True Sleeper covering Gentle Despite’s “Bittersweet Kiss”. It will be released on CD.

The Catherines: a new track by them always deserves to appear on the blog. Heiko’s new song for his bedroom project based in Hamburg is called “The More We Kept Moving the Farther Away We Got From Us” and it is lovely. As usual with the band we get a long and verbose title for the song and catchy melodies to sing along.

Art Sick: some 90s American indiepop sounding songs are available to stream thanks to Christina (aka) Riley who used to be in the band Burnt Palms. “Going Down” and “No Clue” reminds me of Cub, Tiger Trap, and especially Bunnygrunt. Joining her are two well known musicians from the Bay area, Mario from Kids on a Crime Spree and Donna from Lunchbox.

Boyracer: here we find the classic band covering The Style Council’s “Walls Come Tumbling Down” as we are in difficult times indeed in the US and the whole world. Lyrics are posted to sing along, and there’s a video too.

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When I feel I’m running out of ideas of Australian bands that need to be featured on the blog, I end up discovering new ones. That makes me happy of course. New songs to listen to, new stories to read.

Don’t confuse this Grooveyard with The Grooveyard from the mid/late 80s UK band that I featured and interviewed many years ago. These are the Australian Grooveyard, a mod revival band who as far as I know released two records in the 80s. At least that’s what Discogs tells me upfront.

Their first single dates from 1984 and it was a two song 7″ released by Geren Records (BTS 1246). This label was based in Sydney and was active in the 80s. I must say I don’t know many of the bands on their catalog but I will try to explore them in the coming weeks. Anyways, the 7″ had two songs. On the A side there was “Avalanche of Love” and “I Told You So” appears on the B side. The tracks were produced by Chris Masuak and engineered at Emerald City Studios on September 1983 by Brett Copeland and Nick Mainsbridge. The art for the single was created by Peter Simpson with photography by Outer Limit Photography.

We do get to know the band members here too. Robert Hood played bass and vocals, Ian Little guitar and vocals, Jonn Schofield guitar and vocals, Sean Maguire drums. Other credits included are that of Richard Lawson for bookings, Christopher M. Dunn as management and Geoff Rhoe as dedicated to the band.

Something interesting that I see on this record is that it was distributed by EMI (and Big Time Records). So they got some big label support. That’s not that common, right? Also it is important to mention that the A side is credited to Jonn while the B side to Robert.

That same year they would appear on a tape compilation called “Drown or Swim” that was released by 48 Crash (Tape No. 3). On this tape they contribute the song “I Don’t Remember”. This song was recorded at The Creative space and was written by Jonn Schofield.

Two years later, in 1986, they contributed the song “Avalanche of Love” to “Countdownunder – Party at Hanging Rock” a UK compilation released by Countdown (DREW 2). This label, whose parent label was Stiff, released a bunch of classic mod revival records like those of Makin’ Time or The Prisoners. This compilation was to be re-released later on, in 1988, by Re-Elect the President label that was run by Eddie Piller.

Their last proper release, their 12″, was released in 1989 by the classic Sydney label Waterfront Records (DAMP 110). It included 5 songs. Three on the A side: “Tenku Town”, “Days of the Week”, “Mean to You”, and three on the B side: “Sea of Hate” and “Mess in Distress”.

Peter Simpson is again credited for the art of the record, but I couldn’t find how the art looked for it. Only the classic Waterfront labels are scanned in Discogs. The songs were recorded at Central Recorders and EMI Studios between October and November 1985. It was mixed at EMI Studios in April 1988 by Steve Clark. The record was engineered by Tony Espie.

The photography for this record is credited to Larry McGrath, David Stead, Louise Sykes and Shemp Murphy.

I do see a new name on the credits. “Rev” Ian Paisley played guitar and vocals in this record too.

Lastly, in 1995, possibly after the band had already split, their song “Avalanche of Love” appeared on a CD comp called “The Bam Balam Explosion Vol. II-Australian Power Pop Compilation” that was released by the Spanish label Bam Balam (B.B.R. 001).

Looking at other bands the Grooveyard may have been involved with I see that Sean Maguire played in Minuteman and Coup de Ville. That Robert Hood played in Razar, Buddies and Screaming Tribesmen, Ian Kelly in the Bam Balams, Richard Lawson in the Lime Spiders and Jonn Schofield in Chinless Elite and Paul Kelly & The Coloured Girls. A cool detail I found too was that Schofield produced the wonderful “Lupe Velez” record by The Mexican Spitfires that one upon a time, in the early stages of this blog, I featured.

In the end I found a great resource, Whammo.com.au. Here there is an “encyclopedia” entry for the Grooveyard. I find that they formed in 1982. That Ian Little was actually “Rev” Ian Paisley. That Robert Hood used the name Bob Wackley as well. And that Geoff Rhoe had also been in the Minuteman.

As expected they were formed in Sydney. Rhoe left early the band to pursue an acting career, appearing for example in Bruce Beresford’s 1981 film “Puberty Blues”. There were some more lineup changes, Maguire being replaced by Lawson on drums. Then in 1984, around September, the band split.

In 1985 they band would reconvene for a bunch of gigs in Sydney. They recorded a mini-album. It is that mini-album on Waterfront. It would take 4 years for it to be released. In 1994, three of the members of the Grooveyard, Schofield, Little and Maguire, formed Deep End and released an album.

Quite some information. I wonder if the other bands they had sounded jangly as well. I wonder what are they doing now? Why did it take so long for their mini-album to be released? If they have had any reunions again? Who remembers them? I know David Nichols, who wrote the Go-Betweens book and the “Dig:Australian Rock and Pop Music 1960-1985″ book said that the Grooveyard 7″ is about as perfect as a 7” can be.

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Listen
Grooveyard – Avalanche of Love

I continue mailing BV’s records. And in the meantime I must say that among these orders I found out that the Je Suis Animal 7″ is sold out. I can’t seem to find any more copies of the vinyl among all the boxes. So, lucky those that got a copy as it is a fantastic record.

The BV’s 7″s have traveled to a few stores these past days for the people that have been asking for this. Jigsaw Records and Rough Trade should have their copies soon. Rough Trade will also be getting a batch of Okama Flannel Boy 7″s.

Again, because of shipping costs get in touch with your mailorder or favourite shops and ask to carry the record. I try to reach out many but I suppose if fans show their interest, the shops will also show theirs. This is the situation with records these days with crazy shipping prices.

Anyways, weekend finds, right?

Various Artists – Stars: this is a new Christmas compilation that will be released as a vinyl LP by WIAIWYA on November 30th and it includes a bunch of great bands. At this point we can only listen to one of the songs though, “Christmas Tree (Burn Burn Burn)” by The Catenary Wires which sounds pretty good to me. Looking forward to the rest!

Various Artists – This Concerns Everyone: another compilation by WIAWYA (and Gare du Nord). This one is released on CD and includes 14 tracks. On Bandcamp you can stream half of them by the likes of Famous Problems, Red Red Eyes or The Leaf Library. This one is out now!

The Sappers: this just showed up on Bandcamp even though it dates from 2016. Never heard this guitar pop band, armed with Rickenbackers, from Sheffield. This short album consisting of 8 songs chimes and chimes, with heartfelt vocals. Are they still going? Playing gigs? Who were behind this band?

Neurotic Fiction: so many records to buy, so little money. Here is a new pre-order, for a vinyl LP that is coming out on November 16. “Pulp! Music” is the debut album by this Bristol band formed by Jess, Livi, Rory and Sean. 10 indiepop with post-punk vibes. Two songs are available to stream right now, “Collateral” and “Loose End”. Check them out!

Rose Ette: one of my favourite bands from the US at the moment is Rose Ette from Houston. They just released their album “Ignore the Feeling” as a limited vinyl LP. 9 tracks of pure indiepop with female vocals and lovely melodies. You can check it out on Bandcamp, stream it and enjoy it. I guess I need to place an order soon.

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Always been a fan of whatever Graham Fellows has put out. Of course his album Love at The Hacienda is a true favourite for me. But there are many other records he had been involved with which are not as well known. One of them is a 1983 7″ by a band called The Pop Guns, that I must say, I have only discovered a few months ago. And of course it has proven impossible to find a copy of it!

Of course we all know of The Popguns who had amazing songs like “Waiting for the Winter” or “Landslide” who are back now releasing records on Matinée. But this is a different sort of Pop Guns. One that sounds closer to The Chefs or Sarah Goes Shopping. A lovely female fronted early 80s indiepop band. One that deserves to be rediscovered!

Graham Fellows, best known for creating the characters of John Shuttleworth and Jilted John made a splash when he was a drama student at Manchester Polytechnic. There with the “Jilted John” record, with it’s classic “Gordon is a moron” line he made himself a well known name. Since that moment in 1978 on he has released many records and even this year he released a new album which is available at his Bandcamp. I wonder what spot does The Pop Guns have in his heart. How important were they.

The Pop Guns only released one 7″. It came out on Toadstool Records (Toadstool 2) which had previously released the “Through the Line” 7″ by Graham Fellows. The Pop Guns record included just two songs, all written and produced by Graham Fellows, “My Mother’s Been Reading My Diary Again” on the A side and “Don’t Finish With Me” on the B side.

The band was a duo of course. It was Graham Fellows playing the instruments and Gemma Wilson the vocals. The viola on the record was played by Beverly aintree and the sleeve, that illustration of the cover, was created by Carol Pendlebury.

There are no compilation appearances listed for the band.

What else there is about them on the web. Nothing really. I know it is very little information but that’s all there is. Perhaps one day I could interview Graham and ask him about this band. That’d be fantastic. I would love to have a copy of this record, these are the sort of songs I love. But I know that is going to be complicated too.

In any case I wanted to share this wonderful song. Let you know that this record exists. And maybe, just maybe, you can share any details about The Pop Guns that you might remember. For example, did they ever play live?

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Listen
The Pop Guns – Don’t Finish With Me

Another week goes by. This week has been busy for me. I’ve visited the post office every single day and I still haven’t finished posting all packages I have. I hope by next Tuesday I should be done unless there are more orders over the weekend. And that, actually, would be great!

As usual there are a few finds I have stumbled upon the past few days!

Fashion Brigade: Elia Einhorn, who used to be in the excellent Scotland Yard Gospel Choir, has a new cassette out under the name Fashion Brigade. There are four songs on it, “Fvck the Heartache”, “Kissyface”, “Kissyface x Tyler Pope” and “Kissyface x Thor Harris”. The songs were recorded in Olympia at Dub Narcotic Studios. And well, the two songs available to stream sound pretty good.

Lazy Eye: “Monday” is the only song on this Palembang, Indonesia, band’s Bandcamp. But I still thought it was worth recommending it as it is a lovely slice of jangle pop with female vocals. I hope to hear more music by them soon!

Ciggie Witch: this Aussie band have released a tape album called “Mad Music” just a few weeks ago on Lost and Lonesome Records. It is actually the third album the band releases, but it is the first I’m listening! The band is formed by Ashley Bundang, Mitch Clemens, Lachlan Denton, Zach Denton, Liam Halliwell, Lauren Huynh and Joe Foley. Good jangly stuff!

Melbourne Cans: another album on Lost and Lonesome is “Heat of the Night” by this Melbourne ensemble that loves Orange Juice as well as 50s pop. There are 11 songs of catchy pop available on vinyl since June 8th. The band is formed by Rob Andrews, Ash Buscombe, Nina Renee and Ian Wallace.

Très Oui: from the ashes of the band Literature comes this new Austin band who have already put out a superb album called “Poised to Flourish”  earlier this year. There are 10 top tracks in total and it is hard to choose a favourite track. Now, I just need to get myself a copy…

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When I heard for the first time Blue Light’s “Take Me Away” I thought they sounded a lot like The Chills. But reading through some comments on Youtube, not sure if they are reliable and all, I read that Blue Light played their first gig in 1984 (at Pegasus), two years before the release of the first Chills album. At this gig the band had played most of their songs from their self-titled album and of course “Take Me Away”. Is this really true?

I stumbled upon the Greek band Blue Light last year when I was doing my sort of “around the world” series on the blog. In the end I wrote a post about The Jaywalkers as it made quite a lot of sense to do that, them being one of the most legendary indiepop bands from that country. But today I thought I’d revisit that project of a post I had, see what I could find about Blue Light whose song “Take Me Away” impressed me.

The band only has one record under their belt. An album with 10 songs. It was released locally in Greece by Di Di Music (Di Di 117) in 1988. This was an independent label founded in Greece by Nikos Loris in Athens that not only released local bands but licensed bigger names like Dead Kennedys, A Witness, Membranes and more.

As mentioned the record had 10 songs, 5 on each side. The A side had “Teens”, “Take Me Away”, “Lighthouse”, “Let Her Pass” and “About Lunch Time”. The B side had “You Pretended, I Surrendered”, “Havensmile”, “I Saw You Laughing”, “Menuet I” and “No Play”. All songs were recorded at Sierra Studio in Athens. The sound engineer was Kostas Kalimeris and was produced by the band.

The band being:
Dimitris Karystinos (guitar)
Aris Avgerinos (bass)
Vagelis Vekios (drums)
Socratis Papahatzis aka. Oannes (vocals and keyboards)

Also we know that

Aside of this album, which you can find it entirely on Youtube, the band appeared on two compilations. The first dates from 1985 and it was a tape called “Λύκος Μαύρος Και Ισχνός” (which translates as Black Wolf and Loneliness) were the band contributed the song “I Saw You Laughing”. This tape came alongside a fanzine called “Λύκος Άσπρος Και Ισχνός” (Lizard White and Lack) which was very limited. Just 23 copies and of those 23, only the first 5 came with this tape. The Blue Light song was recorded live on March 14th 1985. Where at? I am not sure.

“Cicadas (An Electric Guide To The Greek Underground)” was an LP compilation released in 1987 by Pegasus Records (PEG 003). This of course was another independent label from Athens. On this record Blue Light appears first with the song “About Lunch Time”.

I look at other bands the Blue Light members were involved with. Socratis Papahatzis has been involved in Thirty Ντέρτι and lately on the MK-O band, a duo with his wife Marina Kavanaki. Aris Avegerinos had played in 667, Σταμάτης Μάζαρης and Δημήτρης Κοργιαλάς. Vagelis Vekios has played in many bands, too many too list really like Vavoura Band, Μουσικές Ταξιαρχίες, Γιώργος Σταυριανός and Ελελεύ. He is also a radio producer. Lastly Dimitris has played in Sunny Μπαλτζή & Santa Fila. Discogs also lists three other members which I’m not sure at what point they were in Blue Light, Yannis Maniatis, Akis Perdikis and Spyros Soukis.

I look on Youtube for some Blue Light footage. And I find it immediately. There’s a complete gig from 1989 at the Rodon in Athens filmed by ET2 (Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation) where the band plays the songs “You Pretended, I Surrendered”, “About Lunch Time”, “Puppets”, “Magical Moment”, “Dressed in White Lady” and “I Saw You Laughing”.

I keep looking for answers to my questions. I find an article written on April 30th 2008 on RadioBubble. Here I will learn that Oannes first instrument was a mandolin and he begins to write music at the age of 12. Then he is self-taught guitar and attend 28 or so piano lessons at the Athens Conservatory. Around that time he starts Blue Light with friends Alexis Kalofolias and Giorgios Karanikolas form Last Drive and Yannis Maniatis from Metro Decay. There would be many lineup changes afterwards it says. So I find out when Yannis Maniatis was part of the band. At the start.

Following that trail I stop at Rateyourmusic where I notice there are dates for each of the band members listed. At last. So:
Aris Avegerinos (bass)
Vagelios Vekios (drums 1987-1989)
Dimitris Karystinos (guitar 1987-1989)
Socratis Papachatzis (keyboards, vocals)
Spiros Soukis (guitar 1985-1987)
Akis Perdikis (drums 1985-19879)
Dimitros Kavakapoulos (saxophone 1986)

Also this site has a bunch of related artists listed: 4 Εποχές [4 Epohes], Annabouboula, MK-O (Marina Kanavaki – Oannes), That’s Why, Vavoura Band, Μουσικές Ταξιαρχίες [Mousikes Taxiarhies], Ελελεύ [Elelef], Σπυριδούλα [Spyridoula], Σελάνα.

It is kind of hard for me to find more information about Blue Light especially when most of the websites are written in Greek. I would love to know why only one release by this band. And why so many years after the band had formed. Why so many lineup changes. Are there more compilation appearances? Was there any interest by any big label? What about this comparison with The Chills? Were they aware of the Dunedin sound? How popular were they in Greece? Did they have any contact at any point with the indiepop bands that came after in Athens? Who remembers them?

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Listen
Blue Light – Take Me Away