Weekend is here! Not much news today from me. So let’s jump straight to the indiepop recommendations!
Herr Wade: the project formed by Sebastian and Jørn is back with three songs! One song is about Sebastian’s hometown, “Altenberge” and the other two are “Askim” and “Ja, Nein, Vielleicht”. All of them are superb really! It is no surprise of course as we know Sebastian was in Nah and The Grindcore Poppies and Jørn in The Loch Ness Mouse!
Plastic Girl in a Closet: here is a new version of the album “Eye Cue Rew See” that the Japanese band released in 2014. This new version was produced by Yuji from the band. According to them, the sound on this version is clearer, tighter and louder. The album includes 11 songs that were also released in 2022 by an American indie label.
Moon in June: another superb sounding Japanese band! Hailing from Tokyo the band is back after a few years. “Evergreen” is the band’s first release since 2020. In this EP the band puts out 6 wonderful songs that have been compared to The Pains of Being Pure at Heart.
Puzzles y Dragones: always excited to hear a new song by the Madrid band! They know how to make perfect pop songs. Their latest single is “El Final de mi Felicidad”. This song will be included in the band’s upcoming second album that should be released this winter by El Genio Equivocado. Superb!
The Crystal Furs: the Portland, Oregon, band have been recommended a few times on the blog. So let’s do it again. Their newest single is “Charlatan” and sounds great. This song will be included in the band’s next album, “In Coastal Light”. This album will be released on CD and vinyl too!
—————————————————————–
I stumbled now on a Soundcloud account that was last updated 10 years ago. It has a bunch of great songs. Some are indiepop and maybe some aren’t. I am only know listening one by one and discovering them.
The sad part is that there is no information about the band. Will I be able to find out any info about them?
The first song I listen is called “I Could Never Tell”. There’s a photo of a guitar player. An electric guitar on this photo. Black leather jacket. Looks like the 80s? Early 90s?
The next song is titled “I Don’t Understand What that Means Baby”. No info again. Photo of the same guy, acoustic guitar now. Then there’s “Dead to Rights” a lovely jangly song, and “Restore the Monarchy”, a rockier number.
“Kiss the Wall, Stroke the Floor” is possibly my favourite song here. It has great melodies, amazing jangly guitars. A superb track, reminiscent at times of Choo Choo Train.
Other songs you’ll find here are “Ringing Water”, “Legalise It”, “She’s a Natural”, “The Lesson”, “Stark Naked Truth”, “Are You Gonna Fuck Me Then?”, “Mantra”,”Captain Self”, “Drug, a Living Pyre”, “Nativity Greyhound”, “Rich Girlfriend Tree”, “Motif”, “Elixir (‘e licks ‘er)”, “Widescreen”, “Did It Ever Cross Your Mind?”, “Warm Black Hole”, “Glorious Unfinished 12th”, “Magic 8 Ball AKA I Was Born at Woodstock (dog version)”, “Waving and Drowning”, “Whole Lotta Nothing”, “Wild Horses”, “Esperanto”, “Legalise It (dub veersion)”, “Alison”, “You Are My Friend”, “VU What Goes On”, “Different Drum”, “Solar System of Lurrrve” and “Trigger Cut”.
Then there’s “Horse of Mud” which was played on John Peel’s on May 17, 1992). Peel mentions that it is a single sided single but he isn’t sure if it was available in the shops. He also mentions that the song was to appear on a compilation with Delicious Monster and other bands.
I think then that this is going to be the best piece of info to follow. I find the demo version on Youtube. This had been uploaded by Martin Smith, the leader of the band. Great. He mentions that the band played about 20 times, mostly supports in north London. The band’s first gig was supporting Suede at the Camden Falcon in August 1991. They also opened for Luna at their first London Show at the Camden Underworld in February 1992.
Someone called David Pascoe wrote about this song too on his blog “The Smell of the Greasepaint and the Sound of John Peel“. His posts dates from 2019. Martin has commented on the blog and has shared another Soundcloud account for another project of his, The Lyke of Wych. He also mentions that Andrew Mueller wrote a few nice reviews about Winterset.
On The Lyke of Wych it says that Martin is now living in Kent. There’s a bunch of great songs here too worth checking out.
So I find the 7″ on Discogs. It was released by Beechwood Music with catalog number 7EXPO2 in 1992. As mentioned, just a single sided record. On the label we see that the song is credited to Martin Smith and that it was produced by Chris Nagle. It was recorded at Blackwing Studios in London.
Two of their songs also appeared on another Beechwood Music release. It was a compilation titled “Expo 1” (EXPO1) that came out in 1992. The songs they contributed were “Restore the Monarchy” and “Horse of Mud”. Now I remember why Beechwood Music was familiar. In this compilation they had included Autumn Parade who I wrote about ages ago. The other bands on it were Curveball, Chimera and The Electric Groove Temple.
This compilation was released on CD, vinyl and cassette! It was compiled by Colin Simmons and Tim Millington.
Not much more info online, but this was quite a good find! I want to guess the band started more as a jangly indiepop band and went on a rockier path.
Would also be nice to know why only a single-sided 7″? Who were the members and what other bands had they been involved with?
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
