Day 357.
Ring Snuten: when theree’s a new song by Patrik I get very happy. This time around the ex-Hormones in Abundance and ex-Garlands has released “Mitt Livs Biljard”. But even better, the same song is also available in English as “The Pool of My Life”. Pool as in billiards of course. It’s great that last January he released a song, then now one in February… will we get one in March? I hope so!
A Young Persons Guide to Blue Very: Japanese friends and also friends from around the world. Here is a cool compilation on CDR released by the fine Blue-Very label from Tokyo. Kei’s label is great, he releases amazing bands, picking them with great taste. In this latest release, he has exclusive songs from bands like 101 Dalmatians, Sloppy Joe, Foreign Correspondent and more.
The Telephone Numbers: we head to San Francisco and I discover this lovely band! Thomas Rubenstein is the person behind the band who has just released a 7″ on the Fruits & Flowers label. The two songs included are “Leviathan” and “I Took a Walk (BZC version)”. The opening track reminds me a lot of Alpaca Sports. That’s definitely good, right?!
Toledo: now let’s discover this New York band that has just released theeir album “Hot Stuff” on vinyl. There are 10 songs here of fine dream pop, sometimes mixed with folky sounds. It is an interesting sound for sure.
Balloon Maker: wow! what a nice discovery! I owe this one to my friend David from Barcelona. The latest song by this Göteborg band is called “M.Boy” and it sounds really good! The band started back in 2014 with another name. In 2019 the band was already Balloon Maker with the lineup of Filip Orrhult, Jacob Andén, Arvid Lundén and Anton Örarbäck. The band is now looking forward to record their debut album this year.
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Here we are again discovering music thanks to the Wilfully Obscure blog. Sometimes I wonder if it is a good idea to repeat bands other fine blogs out there have featured. I would argue that it is a good idea, blogs have different readers, different reach. Also the post about the New Haven, Connecticut, band Beauty Constant there dates from August 2009. So more than 11 years. Maybe I’d get some new interest here, maybe we’ll learn new details about them!
With that in mind I check out the only release by the band, a 1987 album called “Like the Enemy”. This LP was released by Forehead Records (FHD 016). I don’t know anything about the label. Not sure where it was based. A good guess would be here in the Northeast. Maybe? What we do know is that there are credits on the back of the jacket.
So we know that Chihoe Hahn played guitar and vocals, Steve Folta guitar and backing vocals, Hugh Schoolman drums and Sandy Smallens bass and backing vocals.
Also worth noting is that the design of the sleeve was done by Donna Fringuello. The cover photography by William Vazquez while the photos on the back are by Barbara Longo. The production is credited to the band, Mike Denneen and William Garrett at Q Division in Boston for the A side and to the band and Al Hemberger at Lips, Bronxville, NY, for the B side.
Most songs were penned by Chihoe Hahn except “Thursday Night” which was written by Steve Folta and “Send a World Away’ written by both Hahn and Folta. The band’s manager was Tricia Davies and she was based in NYC.
So yeah, the LP had 10 songs in total. I’ve mentioned two so far. This was the tracklist. On the A side there’s “Ed’s Anthem”, “Under the Gun”, “Like the Enemy”, “Catching You” and “Fortunately”. The B side had “It’s One Life”, “Second Minor One”, “Site to See”, “Thursday Night” and “Send a World Apart”.
On the comments on the blog post from Wilfully Obscure we find a few little tidbits about the band. We know that the band was around at least as early as 1983, that they used to play R.E.M. covers at their gigs including “Green Grow the Rushes” and that there were other songs by the band that remain unreleased like “Halcyon Days”. It also mentions that Chihoe Hahn became a luthier and owns Hahn Guitars. Wow!
Other things we know… yes, the band appeared on two compilations. In 1985 they contributed the song “Second Minor One” to “Scream: Sampler Containing Really Exciting American Music” released by Thirsty Ear (SCRM-4) and then in 1986 their songs “Thursday Night” and “Sight to See” appeared on the LP compilation “Some New Ruins – The Yale-New Haven Compilation” which was released by I.V. Towers Records (I.V. 001). This record is on Soundcloud here.
Chihoe Hahn not only became a luthier but also released records on his own. There are at least two albums released by him. He also did engineering work for the band Jack’s Empty Hours. Steve Folta also was involved with other bands like Speed Bumps or Junket. Sandy Smallens was in Too Much Joy and Gramercy Arms and works now in Audiation.fm.
We know too that in the Spring Weekend festival of 1985 the band performed alongside Man Ray and Miracle Legion.
Some good information I found in the end, right? Not bad. Maybe we’ll find out more details about them eventually. Why just one album recorded? Were there demo tapes? Are there more songs by them? I hope we find out!
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One Response to “:: Beauty Constant”
Great to find your blog about Beauty Constant. I was their manager for a couple of years when they released ‘Like the Enemy.’ (The label was our own, by the way.) There was a fantastic buzz when the New Music Journal picked the record/band as one to watch in the future, but the timing was off as it was just before bigger labels started to sign “college radio bands”. When nothing came of it our bright Yale-educated guys all dispersed for graduate school, etc. I still love the record (listening to it as I type this!) I also have demos on cassette…will see about getting them digitized and sent to you.