Some finds from over the weekend!
Pop at Summer: the superb Bandung, Indonesia, band that once had a song on a Cloudberry compilation is back with a three song that sounds ace! The EP titled “Chamomile Rhymes” comes with “Summer Night”, “There’s Me in Your Heart” and “Everything’s Fine”, all of them three timeless pop songs with female vocals that really makes us hope they get released in a physical format. It sounds very very good!
Pia Fraus: one of my favourite contemporary bands is the Tallinn based Pia Fraus. They continue releasing quality records and next January they will be putting out a new album. And I can’t wait. It will be called “Empty Parks” and it will come with 11 songs. Available in CD and vinyl, as it should be. The artwork looks great, and the two songs we can preview “Hidden Parks” and “Sweet Sunday Show” also sound great. This is very promising!
María María: a band from San Luis Potosí in Mexico. It must be the first band I listen that comes from there. That’s exciting. The band is formed by Carlos, Luis and Boris. and they have three cool demos here, “Take Me Away”, “Seen” and “Your Cat”. They are lo-fi pop songs and a clear picture of what’s happening in Mexico as of late, where a new and interesting scene seems to be brewing.
“F.A.R. Out”: this compilation came some weeks ago and I only now noticed I haven’t recommended it. And the CD is sold out. So yes, blame it on me. I missed it too. I wonder how many CDs were pressed, they went out so fast! It may have to do too that a lot of amazing bands were included like Pale Lights, Young Scum, Nah…, The Suncharms and more. At least you can play it many many times. Really, so many good songs in here.
Math and Physics Club: the Seattle classic band will be back with a 7″ single on Matinée and it will also be their farewell. Two songs will be included in this release to come out in December 2019, “Indian Ocean (The End of Everything)” and “In Dreams”. So far I have listened to the A side and it is so pretty, but also bittersweet. What a song indeed. This one can’t be missed.
Majorelle Blue: oh this band sounds amazing to me! Wow. That is exciting! The band has 5 songs up on Bandcamp, “Forever Naive”, “Stay in Bed”, “Dudes”, “Shut Up and Make Way” and “Don’t Have Time to Be Your Boyfriend”. All great songs, but especially the opening one!, with female vocals, catchy, jangly, smart. I really would like to see a record released by the Malmö band!
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In the early 2000s there was a very fine duo in the US called Jinx. For a reason I don’t understand they are not very well known. The band was formed by Chris Butler on vocals, guitars and other instruments and Wendy Skratt on vocals and bass. When they were based in San Francisco, I guess in their beginnings, the band also had Peter Butler in their ranks playing bass and drums.
According to the band’s website which still exists Chris started in Louisville. He was originally from Detroit, but moved to Kentucky during his high school years. Then he moved to Boston for college. And then to San Fran where he started the band The Rescuers and where he met Wendy.
Wendy on the other hand hailed from San Jose in California. She went to art school in DC and then returned to San Fran. There she met Chris who persuaded her to lend her vocals to a single he was recording. Thus Jinx was born. And then they moved to London (on Feb. 17, 2001).
Sometime when in London the band would meet Matthew who would become their new drummer.
During their time they only released one 7″ in 2002. It came out on the very fine Becalmed Records from London and founded by the Spaniard Jorge Cortes, home of the superb The Pines. The 7″ (KLE 10) included two songs, the A side “King of the Rats” and the B side “Bed of Pipes”. The songs were recorded by Matthew Lazowski (from The Lollies) and mixed by Mike Jones (who worked as producer on many The Pines records and even on the 3″ CD we released on Cloudberry by the amazing The First Division).
Aside from this release the band contributed, in 2000, the song “Marco Polo” to a compilation CD called “C188 Papercuts” that came for free alongside the Papercuts Fanzine and was released by Sheepish Recordings. This CD looks great by the way as it includes top bands like The Visitors, The Foxgloves, Spearmint and more!
There is another compilation they were part of. They contribute the song “Nothing More” to the superb 2002 compilation “A View of Our Dreams” that my friend Nikola put out on his label Balcony Records from Belgrade, Serbia.
On Discogs it doesn’t show any other involvement by the band members on any other music projects. Just a photography credit for Wendy Skratt on a Mates of States 7″.
But according to the band’s website there were more recordings. First it seems that from the same recording session from “Marco Polo” there was another song called “Nothing More”. It seems this session was called “Warm Without the Fire” and it also mentions that the full name for the song was “Marco Polo (DeLeon’s Fountain)”.
Then we learn that after the “King of the Rats” session there was another recording session called “Are We There Yet?” where at least two songs were recorded, “The Rings Within Our Tree” and “Terrible Two”.
While in London the band played some gigs. Mostly acoustic shows. On April 11, 2000 they played the Betsey Trotwood alongside The Foxgloves. Then on June 5, 2001, they played another show with Joe’s band The Foxglove somewhere in the East-end. Next up was a superb lineup, on Sept, 15, 2001, they played at The Blue Posts alongside The Relict, Bart from Cat’s Miaow! and The Pines!
January 14, 2002, would see them play at The Bull & Gate with Sokay and Squeaky Buddha. Two weeks later, on the 31st, they played at the same place.
Then in 2002 the band returns to the U.S. They relocate to Williamsburg in Brooklyn, NY. There they would play gigs at Galapagos with The Windmills and Simpático on May 7th 2002. What a lineup! Would have loved to be at that gig. Don’t think these sort of gigs happen anymore in WIlliamburg. At this gig they debut a new drummer, Aaron Woolsey.
Then I find something interesting, the Stamford-based nonprofit World Affairs Forum named Wendy Skratt as their executive director last year, 2018! This article mentions that Wendy had been in this nonprofit since 3016 as director of events and communications and before that she was president of the League of Women Voters of Stamford and also ran her own photography studio.
About Chris Butler, I can’t find any info. There seems to be a Chris Butler that worked on movie music, like Kubo. Is it the same Chris? Who’d know.
I would really love to hear the rest of their tracks and recordings. The little I’ve heard about them is great. “Nothing More” is just a gorgeous track, which I had uploaded to Youtube many years ago… sadly not getting any comments. I’d love to know more details about them!
Do you remember them?
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Listen
Jinx – Nothing More
