A new weekend coming up! What are your plans? Any cool gigs?

The Age of Colored Lizards: the Oslo based band has been featured on the blog many times. And when they have a new song there is reason to feature them once again. They have just unveiled a new track called “Blurry Eyes” which is quite lovely. The question is, will it be released in physical or will stay digital?

Happypills: another band that I feature time and time again is Happypills from Fukuoka in Japan. And I have a big reason to showcase them once more, they have just released their first album “Milk Floe” which is available to stream on Bandcamp. This is bedroom pop at its finest!

Uchu Nekoko: a new Japanese band for me and sounds noisy, dreamy and poppy at the same time. They have 7 songs, a mini-album, titled “Kimi No Youni Ikiretara”, that is I am hooked with now. But can’t say much more about them. Don’t know how many people are behind the band, from where in Japan they are… little information but great music!

Tennis Club: another band that has graced the blog is going to be releasing a 9 song 10″ mini-LP on Elefant Records in a few weeks (out May 31st). We can only preview one of the songs at the moment on Bandcamp, the catchy “Pink Sweater! Pink Shoes!” which shows the great talents of Wilson Hernandez from Joplin, Missouri.

Winter: and lastly this LA band that released on their Bandcamp a 5-track EP called “Infinite Summer” last month. It sounds really pretty, all of the songs are fine examples of classy and sweet dreampop with female vocals. I’ll keep an eye on this band!

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Now it is the later S. And for the letter S I want to find out any information available about the American band The Streams.

I knew this band through a 7″ they released in 1992 on the legendary Bus Stop label. But now that I’m looking for details I notice this wasn’t their first. They actually released another 7″ the previous year on #1 Records (003).

The band formed by David Brooks (vocals and guitar), Jeff Wiederschall (drums) and Michael Priggen (bass and backing vocals) released their first 7″ in 1991 with the songs “The Drift” on the A side and “Failed Speech” on the B side. Both songs were recorded by Adam Lasus at Studio Red in Philadelphia. We know too that David Brooks wrote the songs and Tom Rutigliano did the layout for the cover art. I am guessing Tom ran the #1 label as he did all the art for their releases.

The 2nd 7″ was the one on Bus Stop (024). Again they had two songs on a record, the A side had “Virginia Hellhole” while the B side was “Rust Red Shore”. The songs were recorded in 1991, once again at Studio Red in Philadelphia by Adam Lasus. The art, again designed by Tom Rutigliano, for the record shows on the front cover the Gallego flour mills in Richmond, VA. It is a photo the band got from the Library of Congress in the US. The back cover has yet another historical photo, the sidewheel steamer Sutltana and her cargo of released Federal prisoners of war. Quite interesting.

Only one compilation appearance is listed on Discogs. The band appeared on a 1992 CD comp called “Blood from the Streets of New Haven” that was releasde by Caffeine Disk (CAF 203). The band contributed the song “Keeping From the Dead”.

Looking at the band members I notice that David Brooks had also been in The Lean-To’s who released a 7″ on the fine Watercolour Records from France, as well as recording solo. Michael Priggen was also in The Lean To’s as well as in The Hello Strangers, The Caroline Know and Big Louise. Jeff Wiederschall was in the Miracle Legion and The Peacock Flounders.

Then I find some live footage. There’s a video on Youtube of the band playing “Virginia Hellhole” at the Boston’s Middle East Cafe in 1993. Then I check the channel which David Brooks owns and there are even more videos! From the same gig we find them playing “Marye’s Heights” and “Wilards“. Then there’s another gig on video, a gig at Rudy’s Bar in New Haven in 1993. There is footage for “Old Blue Light“, “One Last Move“, “Willards“, “Get Off the Pike“, “Life at Six” and “Empire State“.

Also there is an official video for “Willards” and “The Drift“. They have the lyrics on the video for singing along.

Then online, on several digital platforms, I noticed that the band had put together a 14 song compilation called “Today, I Died”. I’m guessing these are all recordings from back in the day, nicely packaged for today. So we find the tracks “The Drift”, “Keeping From the Dead”, “Failed Speech”, “Marye’s Heights”, “Sugar Shack”, “After the Standard”, “Powder Monkey”, “Tired Boy”, “Willards”, “Raintaps”, “Wilderness”, “Desperate Farm”, “Virginia Hellhole” and “Rust Red Shore”. I suppose these are all of their recordings? Or perhaps there were more?

It looks though there was a CD for this release. It is not on Discogs, so I’m not sure. I will have to look. But the New Haven Register has an article about the band and the release dating from December 15, 2011. Here it mentions that Dave Brooks hailed from Branford, and that for the last 14 or so years he had been a baker and owner of Judie’s European Baked Goods in New Haven. It also says that the band played at Toad’s Place and Bar, CBGB and more. For this special release of the “Today, I Die”, which was put out through CD Baby, the band reunited and played a gig at Cafe Nine in the Connecticut city of New Haven. It is a pretty interesting article, I recommend having a read.

I also notice that he has been playing solo. And he has a Facebook page. Then another article, one by the Daily Nutmeg, where they talk about his bake shop as well as his band. Through this article I learn that he studied at the Culinary Institute of America in New York.

Well, that’s quite some information methinks. I knew next to nothing about them but now I do have much more information about them!

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Listen
The Streams – Virginia Hellhole