Day 378
The Reds, Pinks & Purples: I like this band a lot as you might know, I’ve recommended them many times. But I am slow. Only last week I was looking for their albums, but they are sold out of course. It is surprising, I am so used to indiepop bands not selling their records out. But here is the exception. Maybe one day I’ll be able to find copies, for now I can enjoy two new songs by them, “Too Late for an Early Grave” and “Chemtrails Over the Country Club”, this last one a cover of Lana del Rey.
The Hermitts: the new project from Matt from Horowitz are The Hermitts! He has unveiled two tracks, so far the only ones in his Bandcamp, “Weight of the World” and “Hold Tight”. They are quite nice guitar driven pop songs, with the exact dose of noise and distortion. Let’s keep an eye on them!
Mint Julep: the Portland duo has been a favourite for the last two or so years. I have recommended them a few times and, of course, now that they have released their album “In a Deep and Dreamless Sleep”, I had to let you all know. It is out now on vinyl LP on Western Vinyl and it includes 11 songs.
Red Go-Cart: when it comes to Japanese bands I must say I am a big fan of Red Go-Cart! They have been going since 1996 and have made all sort of pop music, from the tweest and punkiest to the dreamiest. Their latest is a dreamy one and is called “Jellyfish”. A bit Sundays-like I must say. This is the first release since 2018’s “Sprites Gave”. And it sounds great. Would be nice to interview them some day soon!
Lentillas de Colores: the other day I received “Arrancacorazones”, the first 7″ by this fantastic León, Spain, band. Today I discover they have covered the classic song “La Fiesta de los Maniquíes” that was originally recorded by the band Golpes Bajos. It is a cool choice by the band for sure!
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Last March I was surprised with the release of the “Sneaky Feelin'” 7″ by Magic Roundabout. I’ve heard their name but never their music, so it was quite a surprise when I saw the video that was uploaded to Youtube for the title song. Where did all these treasures come from?
The 7″ was being released by a label that has nothing to do with indiepop, Third Man Records, a label that was founded by Jack White, Ben Swank and Ben Blackwell in 2001, in Detroit. Now the label is based in Nashville. Yeah, this label as you can see has more to do with indie rock, something I find very different to indiepop. But this may just be an anecdotal thing. In the end they’ve done a good job rescuing an obscure band from Manchester 80s!
How did they do it? How did the contact happen? That would be interesting to find out. The blurb on the label’s webpage gives some little info. They compare the band to the JAMC and the Shop Assistants. That sounds about right. They call the band The Roundies, I am assuming that’s how the band and their fans used to call them. Then we get the important details.
The band started as such in early 1986. They played gigs alongside The Pastels, Blue Aeroplanes, Spacemen 3, Loop, My Bloody Valentine and more. They mention too that Noel Gallagher roadied their final show.
One song was released back in the day, “She’s a Waterfall Parts 1 and 2”. That sounds more like 2 songs. And when checking the tracklist of the compilation tape “Oozing Through the Ozone Layer” that Mark Webber from Pulp put out, it does look like part 1 is on the A side and the part 2 is in the B side. So there’s two songs, right? I haven’t listened to the tape, so can’t say if it is two different versions of the same song, maybe they were.
It seems there was the intention to put out a flexi but that didn’t work out. It doesn’t say the reasons why.
The two songs on the 7″ that were just released, “Sneaky Feelin'” and “Song for Gerard Langley” date from 1987. They were unearthed by Ian Masters from Pale Saints. I am guessing then that Ian Masters made the contact with Third Man? Brooklyn Vegan confirms this. It says that Ian passed the tapes to His Name is Alive’s Warren Defever who works for the label’s mastering. This page also says that there are more recordings and the label is preparing an album to be released later this year.
The sleeve of the 7″ doesn’t give any other information about the band.. o band members names. The video only says it dates from 1987. I like when bands are rescued of course, but would love a little bit of history.
Looking on Discogs I find another compilation where thee band may have been involved with, “Piranhas in the Canal”. This tape was put together by the St. Helens Musicians Collective in the 80s and was reissued in MP3 in 2018. The link that Discogs has to download the songs doesn’t work for me. So hoping someone can help. Now, St. Helens is at least 35 minutes away from Manchester. So one can doubt it is the same Magic Roundabout. But the time sounds right. So this would mean the band would have released another song too. The one on this tape is called “Talk About You”. Would love to hear it.
Now, one thing that seems easy to find out is the origin of the band’s name. A quick search tells us two things:
The Magic Roundabout is an English-language children’s television programme that ran from 1965 to 1977. It used the footage of the French stop motion animation show Le Manège enchanté, but with completely different scripts and characters.
The Magic Roundabout in Swindon, England, is a ring junction constructed in 1972 consisting of five mini-roundabouts arranged in a circle. Located near the County Ground, home of Swindon Town F.C., its name comes from the popular children’s television series The Magic Roundabout. In 2009 it was voted the fourth-scariest junction in Britain
I’m kind of annoyed that there are no band members names. Or even where the recordings were done. No history of the band whatsoever. I hope when this label releases the album we get all the information we are missing. It seems wrong to not have that. Let’s see, for now we can of course enjoy these two tracks, but would be great to track down the tracks that they seem to have released on compilation tapes back in the day!
Who has any more details about the Magic Roundabout?
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