I don’t know who Paul Dreczko is. He has a Soundcloud account with a bunch of songs and what caught my attention was that there were a couple that were dated, 1986.

As that’s a year we all are very interested in indiepop I thought I would check them out. The first song I heard was “Taking it All”. I thought it sounded alright, but the one song I really enjoyed was “Magic Man”.

Interestingly enough when you see the little info added for “Taking it All” it actually says it was recorded in 1985, not 1986. It also mentions that the band hailed from Guildford in the UK. Oh yes, and that they were called Kameleon (if you missed the blog post title that is!).

We see a photo of three guys and a girl. All of them are posing with guitars, acoustic and electric.

“Magic Man” was recorded in April 1986, that one is dated correctly. The song was recorded at Catch 42 Studios in Godalming.

Then there are many songs Paul has uploaded. We notice that in the early 90s he was in a folk group 4 What It’s Worth and also in a band Nightshift.

Then I find a song that is also from Kamaleon! A third one. Maybe all three songs were part of a demo? This third song is called “Nice Boys”. Sadly there’s no details here.

But it seems there is a connection with Soundscene. Even though their songs are not on the WokingSoundscene Soundcloud there is an entry on their Facebook!

Here we find that the band was around from 1986 to 1987. That the band was formed by Keith Davies on guitar, Alex Marler on vocals, Paul Dreczko on keyboards and Rob Selway on bass.

They recorded one demo, so maybe I was right! This demo caught the attention of CBS and that gave them 11 hours at Catch 44 Studios (where they recorded “Magic Man”). With that master tape they went to London and met with Lincoln Elias, the A&R guy for CBS, but he didn’t sign them, he wanted something more commercial.

And that’s what I found about Kameleon. Anyone remember them?

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Listen
Tableaux Vivants – Don’t Trust the Luck / Born to Love?