After a few French bands that appeared on “Teeny Poppers”, the 1992 compilation tape I’ve been going through with a fine comb, now it is time for a one that is not French: In Heaven.
On this cassette that Anorak Records released in France the band would appear opening the B side with the track “It’ll Keep Awhile”. That wouldn’t be their only compilation appearance. in 1992 too they would have the track “Coast to Coast” on a tape titled “Sandcastles in the Sun” released by the German label Meller Welle Produkte (MEL10).
Lastly, in 2021, their song “Aquanova”, was on a British compilation tape called “Deliberately Lo-Fi” that Kyle Productions (001) released.
Speaking of “Aquanova”, that was the name of the band’s 1993 tape album that they self-released. On the sleeve of this tape it has an address as a contact information. It is in Devizes, in the UK. I had never heard of this town before. Looking at Wikipedia I learn…
Devizes is a market town and civil parish in Wiltshire, England. It developed around Devizes Castle, an 11th-century Norman castle, and received a charter in 1141. The castle was besieged during the Anarchy, a 12th-century civil war between Stephen of England and Empress Matilda, and again during the English Civil War when the Cavaliers lifted the siege at the Battle of Roundway Down and the Parliamentarian Army of the West under Sir William Waller was routed. Devizes remained under Royalist control until 1645, when Oliver Cromwell attacked and forced the Royalists to surrender. The castle was destroyed in 1648 on the orders of Parliament, and today little remains of it.
The tracks on this album were: “Ultramarine”, “Kodak”, “Aquanova”, “Coast to Coast”, “Head for Home”, “Seen it All”, “My Mine”, “Setting Sun”, “Mirror Me More” and “It’ll Keep a While”.
That same year, 3 songs from this album would be picked up by Meller Welle Produkte to release a 7″ titled “Aquanova E.P.” (MEL5). This great sounding shoegazey record had “Seen it All Before” on the A side and “Ultramarine” and “It’ll Keep Awhile” on the B side. The songs were produced and engineered by the band. The band also took care of the artwork with a photo of a cat named Bob on the back cover. Tracks were recorded at My Disco in 1992.
There is one name here, on the labels, though, J.M. Philipps. He wrote all the songs. Was his name Justin perhaps? I saw a Justin commenting on a blog post saying it was his band. No last name though.
And that’s what I could find. The songs are available to listen online, on Youtube, so you won’t have have difficulty to check them out. But there is no information about who were behind this band. How long did they last as a band or if they played in other bands before or afterwards. Would be nice to find out!
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