Day 11. Fanzine is being printed. This weekend I had to print the CD sleeves. So the fanzine is sort of ready. Just the situation is not great of course. But I will be adding in the next few days pre-order button. And again, going to the post office won’t be as often. But I of course will appreciate any support there is to the label!
Happy music finds? There are some!
Yellow Dudes: interesting find thanks to my friend Casio from Spain. This band hails from Tepic, Mexico. Is it the first band I hear from there? Could be. Must be. They released an EP called “Parking Spot” last October that has 6 songs that shine under the vocals of Isabella Bru, especially in the closing song “84”.
Marcos y Molduras: the latest from the Spanish label Discos de Kirlian is the song “Un Nuevo Año” by this band. It is a nice sweet song that lasts a little more than 4 minutes. I am not very familiar with this band but this song has made me very curious. I’ll keep an eye on them.
The Radio Dept.: I was very much looking forward to seeing the Swedish band next month in NYC. Well, that is now canceled. But there are news on their Bandcamp, two versions of their song “You Fear the Wrong Thing Baby” are available to stream, the video and radio edit versions. Good timing.
Dayflower: our friends from Leicester have just released on their Bandcamp the “Popping Candy EP”. This new digital release includes 5 songs, “Popping Candy”, “Twirlpro”, “Lips so Dry”, “Alive” and “Dance Dizzy (Saxx Laws Version)”. It is also worth mentioning that the song “Popping Candy” will appear in the CD that will accompany the new Cloudberry fanzine!
Popinjays: and this is quite cool! the classic band that released on One Little Indian in the early 90s have put on Bandcamp a compilation of “Rarities & Demos”. There are 10 songs including a demo version of their hit “Too Jung”. I hope there is a proper release of this, even the artwork they’ve made is really cool. Happy times and happy listening!
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Back in 2004 the Japanese band Cleandistortion released their sole record, a 6 song mini-album called “Teenage Archives”. I am still looking for a copy myself.
It came out on one of my favourite Japanese labels ever, the Bluebadge label. It was a CD and had the catalog number BBCD-006. For the front artwork it had an illustration of a girl with headphones, listening to music. In orange tints.
The songs on it were “Endpaper”, “Caroline”, “Carnival Ride”, “Apology Drops”, “Sweep” and “Sailor”. They are all credited to Jun Inoue. That’s the only name I have so far. But it wasn’t a one-man band, was it?
Aside from this release the band appeared on three compilations in the first half of the noughties. In the year 2000 they appeared on the very fine compilation “Pop Jingu Volume 2” that was released by Clover Records (CLCD-408). They contributed two songs here “Wendy’s Blues” and “Teenage Green Cracker”. Something interesting is that the band’s name here was broken into two words, Clean Distortion.
Two years after they appear on the Bluebadge Label’s compilation “Pop Comes Up! Bluebadge Compilation Vol.2” (BBCD-002) with the song “Girl Friend”. Then in 2005 again on a Bluebadge compilation, “Guitar Pop Crazy! (Bluebadge Compilation Vol. 3)” (BBCD-009) with the song “Sweep”.
Okay. That would be all. But there are actually some live footage on Youtube. That’s why I think it wasn’t a one-man band. I see 4 people playing. For example on this video of a whole gig at HOME in Shibuya in June 22, 2010. Sadly there is no tracklist for it.
Another gig on Youtube is the one of them playing also in Shibuya at the venue ChelseaHotel. This one dates from March 21, 2007. They would play again at the same venue on January 19, 2008 and there’s proof of that here.
This account seems to have many live videos for the band. For example playing the song “After Hours” at the Edge End in Shibuya on July 18 2009. Then a full gig at Koenji High dating from January 11, 2009 and at Daisybar in Shimokitazawa dating from April 12 2009.
To my surprise, not too long ago the band has put together a Youtube channel and uploaded more videos of them playing live! We find “Harmony“, “One Four Harmony“, “Apology Drops“, “XTC-Radio“, “ユレルオモイ” and “Carnival Ride“.
So the band is still playing? Maybe. In 2015 they were still playing as I notice on this videos of them playing at the Bar EdgeEnd on January 31 of that year. We find the songs “Carnival Ride” (was this their most popular one?), “I Wanna Be Your…“, “Endpaper” and “Sway“.
I keep googling. I find another release by the band that I didn’t see on Discogs. A CD single it seems, “Sailor/Teen Wave”. It was released by the Bluebadge label with the catalog number BBCD-005. On the front cover we see a photo illustration of the four members. What were their names now?!
Then a Soundcloud page with many goodies! Ok, maybe this band is not so obscure. But it was for me before looking for information about them. Here there are some songs I’ve never heard like the unreleased songs “Micro Cosmic O’Clock”, “Platanus-hi” and “Nightrider” or “Hung Up!” which seems to have appeared on a compilation CD called “Sunshine Pop Show! Vol. 3” on the Sunshinepoplabel in 1999! It also looks like the band released in 2010 an EP called “One Four Harmony”. Okay! Where was this one released? It included three songs, “Guitar Pop”, “Country Tiger” and “One Four Harmony”. Discogs is really not up to date!
And that’s quite a trove of music I’ve found. But really no story of the band. Like who were the band members? Had they been in other bands (I have a hunch one or some were in Sloppy Joe)? What years were they active? How did they start? Are there more releases other than the ones I mentioned? Tons of questions that I hope to get answers!
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