Day 32. This week, on Friday, I should mail the first batch of fanzines to those have pre-ordered. Thanks so so much for that. I hope you like them!
That’s it for news now. Things are a bit quiet, but believe I am working on new releases, like the Macguffins retrospective, to be released as soon as possible!
New finds from the weekend are here of course!
Gum Country: I wrote about Los Angeles band a few posts ago. It came to my attention that their song “Somewhere” had a cool video and so I had to share it! This song is the title track off their debut album that will be released in June 19!
Castro Morfeo: this fun synth-pop project from Chile has just released an EP titled “Amigxs/Niño que Vuela” on the netlabel Gemelo Parásito Records. The EP has 4 songs of introspective and catchy bedroom pop. Very nice.
Las Carreteras: not sure where this band comes from but they are releasing a tape (?) or a digital release on the German label Entes Anomicos. This EP is titled “Panamericana” and it sounds great! There are four songs in total here, and they all very good!
Ciel: there’s also a new EP by the Dutch band Ciel. It is called “Movement” and comes with 4 songs of jangly dreampop. The EP seems to be available only in digital format at the moment, but the good thing is that on Bandcamp all four songs are available to play and hear the very nice vocals and lyrics by Michelle Hindriks, their frontwoman.
My Proper Skin: and to finish this roundup of weekend finds here is a fine Portland, Oregon, band. My Proper Skin make some good shoegaze noise with girl vocals and their latest track, a digital single called “Haunted” is no exception.
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Last post of my “weekdays” challenge, a band now that wrote about Sunday… who else but the superb Washington D.C. band The Ropers who penned “Blue Sunday”. Mind you, this song doesn’t appear on any of their proper releases but on a Slumberland compilation called “Why Popstars Can’t Dance” (SLR 031) that was released on CD and vinyl in 1994. On this compilation they appear alongside other great bands like Boyracer, Stereolab, Rocketship and more. It is not the only song they contributed though, they also had the song “Drive” on it.
But let’s talk first about their releases as there are many. There are many compilation appearances too. This might be a long post! So brace yourselves.
Some introduction about the band won’t hurt too. The band was formed in 1991 by vocalist Doug Bailey and guitarist Mike Hammel while they were students at the University of Maryland. They quit their studies (what were they studying?) after two years in to start making music. They recruited Alex Hacker on drums who they had met after a brief stint in the Lilys and also Greg Pavlovcak on bass. Okay, now we have the basics.
The first release was a 7″ on Slumberland Records (SLR 17) which came out in 1993. It had three songs, “Waiting” and “Lost” on the A side and “Cool Self” on the B side. The songs were recorded by Jim Spellman (from Velocity Girl) and Trip Brock. We also know that there were two different versions of the single, one in regular black vinyl and one in white vinyl (for mail order copies).
The year after, 1994, they would release another 7″ on Slumberland (SLR 38). Two songs, “I Don’t Mind” on the A side and “It’s So Strange” on the B side. This time around Geoff Turner recorded the tracks. But something more interesting is that there was a CD version of this 7″ that included 4 more songs! The tracklist for the CD was “I Don’t Mind”, “September’s Rain”, “Lost”, “Waiting”, “It’s So Strange” and “Cool Self”. “I Don’t Mind”, “September’s Rain” and “It’s So Strange” were recorded by Geoff Turner at WGNS Studios in Arlington, Virginia, while the rest were recorded by Jim Spellman and Trip Brock at The Station in Germantown, Maryland. The illustration for the sleeve was created by Khoi Vinh.
In 1994 it seems the band went on tour with Boyracer during the summer. So they prepared a split 7″ for the occasion, to sell them at their merch table. This split 7″ was put together by Slumberland, on their sub label I Wish I Was a Slumberland Record (WISH 005). Boyracer had the A side with the song “One Step Forward” while The Ropers appear on the flipside with “Pretty Quiet Song”. Then that same year the band released yet another split 7″, one that I already talked about on the blog in the past. That is the one they shared with The Tribbles and that was released by Brilliant Records (ant-09-si) in the US and Giant Pool Balls Records (ball002) in Germany. The German version came alongside the summer 1994 issue (which was the 8th issue) of Sunset Magazine. The Ropers appear on the A side with the track “Sweet Lord I know”.
1995 had a bunch of releases for the band. Slumberland would release yet another 7″ (SLR 53), that included their classic song “Revolver” which even has a promo video shot by T. Treyfid and Bill McKenna in 1995. The B side was a cover of the The West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band’s “Transparent Day”. This time the songs were recorded at Zabriskie Point in New York City by Kurt Ralske from Ultra Vivid Scene. The art was once again credited to Koi Vinh and also to Caramel. It is said that some mail order copies came in a color xerox Catwoman sleeve. I’ve never seen those. How did they look like?
Then came their debut album which was titled “All the Time” (SLR 50) once again on Slumberland. All songs were recorded at the same place and also by Kurt Ralske as the “Revolver” single. It was also mixed at Zabriskie Point. Khoi Vinh is once again credited to the design alongside Caramel with The Must Brother. The photography is credited to Nalinee. The album was released on both vinyl and CD with the same running order. The A side had “Revolver”, “Flashlight”, “Rain”, “You Have A Light” and “Drive” while the B side had “Chained”, “Blind”, “Spider Web”, “Tried” and Mystery Girl”. Now the CD had an extra track at the end, “Drive (reprise)”. For this record the band added some cello to the songs thanks to Melora Mather.
Lastly, in 1997 the band would release their sophomore album but this time on a different label, Teenbeat Records. “The World is Fire” (Teenbeat 225) was also released on CD and vinyl (the vinyl version was a co-release with the German A Turntable Friend (TURN 33)). This record only had 7 tracks, the A side had “Drink You Up”, “Please Understand”, “Take Your Time” and “Home”. The B side had “Paste”, “These Days” and “Dawn”. The tracks were recorded by Treiops Treyfid again. On this album we see that Mike Donovan had replaced Alex Hacker on drums.
I’ve already mentioned one of their compilation appearances but there were more. For example they contributed a version of The Cure’s “Jumping Someone Else’s train” to “Give Me The Cure” a benefit CD for AIDS research released by Radiopaque Recordings (ROPQ01CD) and Corduroy Records (ROPQ01CD) in 1995. The proceeds from this CD were donated to the Whitman-Walker clinic.
Then in 1998 they contributed “You Have a Light” to the “1998 Teenbeat Sampler” CD (TEENBEAT 251). Then 11 years later they had “Pretty Quiet” on the CD compilation “Slumberland Records The First 20 Years” (WISH 12) that was released by I Wish I Was a Slumberland Record in 2009. Then 9 years after they would contribute the song “These Days” to “The Test of Time” a compilation released by A Turntable Friend (TURN50) on vinyl and CD celebrating the comeback of the label.
It is also worth mentioning that the video of “Revolver” was included in the “Munch (Part Two) Another International Independent Music Video Compilation” that Season Records and Drive-In Records put out on VHS!
We know that the band members worked on other bands. For example Alex Hacker played in Air Miami, Treiops Treyfid, The Still and (The Sounds of) Kaleidoscope. Mike Hammel played in Pink Skull, Juniper and The Mondo Crescendo, these two last bands have been interviewed on the blog!, other members though! Greg Pavlovcak played in The Last Wave, The Castaway Stones, The Still and yet another band that has been featured here, The Saturday People! Then Douglas Bailey was on (The Sounds of) Kaleidoscope, Panax, The Still and The Sunshine Feels.
It looks like Douglas is still making music. I found a Bandcamp of his which has recordings from 1998 to 2018! It also looks like he left D.C. and moved to Austin, Texas.
Another question that I have for them is if they took their name from an American TV show called The Ropers…
The Ropers is an American sitcom that aired on ABC from March 13, 1979, to May 22, 1980. It is a spin-off of Three’s Company and loosely based on the British sitcom George and Mildred, which was itself a spin-off of Man About the House, on which Three’s Company was based.It was taped at CBS Television City in Hollywood, California, where its parent series, Three’s Company, was taping at the time, from February to April 1979 (Season 1) and from July 1979 to February 1980 (Season 2).
There are a few blogs that have dedicated some lines to the band, sadly all repeat the same information, adding nothing new. I read that the band disbanded shortly after the Teenbeat release. I wonder why. I also wonder if the band left any other recordings, recordings that remain unreleased to this day.
I’m sure many of you remember them. They even played not long ago a reunion gig at the Slumberland 20th Anniversary Festival in 2009 at the Bell House in Brooklyn on November 14th 2009. I missed that, I wasn’t living in New York then.
I hope you can fill in the blanks this time around.
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Listen
The Ropers – Revolver
