Day 336
Ruth Po!: on Po!’s Bandcamp there are two new tapes from back in the day that have been digitized. That’s fantastic news! These tapes are “Bedroom Tapes 1” from 1989 and “Bedroom Tapes 2” from 1990. They are wonderful, as everything Ruth has been involved with. Yeah, I am still wondering why we haven’t done an interview for the blog yet…
Mister Baby: I discover this band and release a bit late. The cassette mini-album “Sidewalk Pop” is already sold out at the band’s label Paisley Shirt Records from San Francisco. The mini-album is a nice lo-fi pop effort by Katiana Mashikian. Very enjoyable. 8 songs including a cover of “Dr. Jones” by Aqua!
Pleasure Pill: not much info about this project from San Diego, California. They have a few songs on their Soundcloud, the latest called “You Can’t Put Your Arms Around a Memory (But Baby I’ve Tried)” which is great. Lo-fi crashpop like no many do these days. Also surprised to see a cover of “La Tentación” by legendary Spanish band Kaka de Luxe.
Racketgirl!: another band from California that doesn’t tell us anything about them! So little info! This one hails from Chula Vista and in the last few weeks have put out a few demos on Bandcamp, “Flowers for Eyes”, “Broken Glass” and “On the Floor”. They are great popsongs influenced by Tiger Trap, Talulah Gosh, Shop Assistants and on and on!
Alexanderplatz: last January the Spanish label Jabalina Música released a new album by Alexanderplatz. Available in vinyl, the 11 song album is called “Parques Nacionales Españoles”. The band as you know is the project of Alejandro Martínez who once was part of the great combo Klaus & Kinski. Recommended.
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Another discovery on the blog Calgary Cassette Preservation Society is the Edmonton, Canada, band Foes of Respiration. Seems I should dig here more often. But in due honesty the Youtube channel stoneeyedkiller is the one on top of this blog helping me find these bands. So thanks to both!
Anyways, the tape that is shared from this band is called “Avoid Inhaling”. This tape looks like an album, a demo of an album? or maybe a proper release that was sold at gigs. It doesn’t specify. What we know is that the tape had 12 songs, which were “In Place”, “Not the Same”, “I Don’t Understand”, “Extra Body”, “It’s Always Winter” and “Hot Babe” on the A side and “And You Don’t Care”, “The Gift”, “No Longer Young”, “Someplace”, “Promised Land” and “832 Juxtaposition Rifles” on the B side.
One thing that mentions the blog is that this band was the precursor to the Minstrels on Speed. I don’t actually know the Minstrels on Speed, but did find that two of the members were there, Bob Kross and Kelly Service. So that doesn’t help. In any case, right now I am focusing on the Foes of Respiration.
Luckily there are scans of the sleeve of the tape and that way we find the band member’s names:
Ken Hartig – bass, vocals
Bob Kross – guitar, vocals
Scott Lingley – drums
Kelly Service – guitar, vocals, harmonica
Other people that participated in the record were Johwanna Alleyne and Kelly McPhillamey doing vocals on a song.
All the songs were recorded in Bob’s and Kelly’s basements on December of 1988 and were produced by the band. The songs were engineered by Bob and Kelly too. They were mixed by Ian Armostrong and the band on January of 1989. The artwork was made by The Tim Okamura Experience.
Then there’s an address, so the band hailed from Sherwood Park in Alberta, if we want to be more exact.
Sherwood Park was founded as Campbelltown by John Hook Campbell and John Mitchell in 1953 when the Municipal District of Strathcona No. 83 approved their proposed development of a bedroom community east of Edmonton. The first homes within the community were marketed to the public in 1955. Canada Post intervened on the name of Campbelltown due to the existence of several other communities in Canada with the same name, so the community’s name was changed to Sherwood Park in 1956.
On Discogs I found that the band actually had one song properly released. The song was “Take Another Dream” and came out on a compilation LP called “Don’t Let the Fruit Rot on the Tree” that was released by Nine-B South in 1988. This compilation came with a booklet with information about each band on it. Would be great if anyone has it and can share any information. I am not familiar with any of the bands on this record either.
Right, Canadian bands, I don’t know that much. There are great ones, and have covered only a few on the blog. The last ones might have been The Grain and Cannon Heath Down.
I stumble upon an article from January 26, 1990, on the Calgary Herald. Sadly I can’t access it as you need an account. I wonder what it says about the band.
Then I find a cool poster of a gig of the band from October 27, 1989, at The Sunset Club. The band is playing alongside Hambone Headcheese. Then anothe rposter, this time of a gig at The Ambassador on November 11, 1989, with Pop Crisis, Rex Morgan B.C., A-Okay and Things That Wouldn’t Leave.
And that’s it. I did find that Bob Kross had been in another band, The Loved One, releasing a cassette and CD album in the early 90s. I couldn’t find information about the other band members. I think Scott Lingley may be working at the University of Alberta, that backing vocalist Kelly McPhillamey has a hair studio, and the other backing vocalist Johwanna Alleyne has an online store of pickles and preserves. Cool!
Who remembers them?
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