The indiepop detective seems to have been on a long vacation. Someone told me that he had been sunbathing on some idyllic Caribbean island. Another friend told me he was skiing in Norway. But I needed him to solve a case for me, the mystery of  The Hermit Crabs. So I sent him an email yesterday asking where he was, if he could help me with something. He answered:

“Hi Roque,

I could take the case, but I don’t have access to my indiepop archive, I can answer you from the top of my head. Tell me what it is about and I’ll get back to you.

Life is good now, I’m in Vietnam and I plan staying until December. I came to rest and to surf.  You should join! I know you have the beaches very close to you, but you can’t compare the exoticism of this place to South Beach. Look, I’ve traveled a lot, and I can say that the most beautiful and uncrowded beach in all of Southeast Asia stretches from Da Nang’s Son Tra Pennisula to the tourist town of Hoi An. This 30 kilometer long white sandy beach was the site of the famous China Beach R&R spot for GIs during the American War, as well as an international surfing competition in 1992. Despite the fact that Five Star resorts are popping up like mushrooms along the Da Nang/Hoi An corridor, surfers and other beach-lovers are few and far between.

This section of the coast is beach break. We have pretty consistently surfable waves beginning sometime in September and trailing off in May. During the summer months of June, July and August, the seas tend to be quite calm. Off-shore storms can be a source of wave action, stirring up the usually calm seas of August to yield a couple of days of good surfing or making the usually surfable November seas so rough that you might think twice about even walking on the beach!

looking forward to hear from you!”

What a coincidence I thought. These Hermit Crabs loved to surf, and actually they had a song “Surfin’ Vietnam”! Go figure! They also had a song called “Surfing Mice”.  So I wrote him again, and told him to tell me everything he knew about The Hermit Crabs, the 80s band, not the contemporary one from Glasgow that I had the chance to see in New York Popfest 2008.

“Roque, first thing you have to know is that the word hermit comes from the Greek ‘eremites’, “person of the desert”. Second, you have to learn about this little animal that many people like having as pets. In general, and despite their moniker, hermit crabs are social animals that do best in groups. They also require a temperature and humidity-controlled environment, and adequate substrate to allow them to bury themselves while moulting.

Most frequently hermit crabs use the shells of sea snails; the tip of the hermit crab’s abdomen is adapted to clasp strongly onto the columella of the snail shell. As the hermit crab grows in size, it has to find a larger shell and abandon the previous one. This habit of living in a second hand shell gives rise to the popular name “hermit crab”, by analogy to a hermit who lives alone. Several hermit crab species, both terrestrial and marine, use “vacancy chains” to find new shells: when a new, bigger shell becomes available, hermit crabs gather around it and form a kind of queue from largest to smallest. When the largest crab moves into the new shell, the second biggest crab moves into the newly vacated shell, thereby making its previous shell available to the third crab, and so on.”

This was clearly not much help, but quite interesting. Especially the Greek part.

“About the band I don’t know much to be honest, they seem to like to surf like me. And probably they came to surf to Vietnam, you know they have that song and I see a lot of British tourists around here. There was that 12” EP on Thunderball that I have never got the chance to get it. I don’t even know the tracklist. Last time I saw it on eBay was like two years ago. Then of course, the iconic song, “Surfin’ Vietnam” that appeared on the “Lets Try Another Ideal Guest House” the compilation that was released by Backs Records where all profits were donated to Shelter on a National Campaign for The Homeless. Right? Some ace bands on that compilation, Talulah Gosh, TVPs, Close Lobsters. Their other known song, “Surfing Mice”, appeared on a split flexi shared with 14 Iced Bears on Frank Records. This one is a live version. A shame, because the song is GREAT! and I’m sure that properly recorded it could have been a smash hit. On the sleeve it says:

THE HERMITCRABS
greg waverly – vocals, malibumo – bass, tam tam tareago – drums, marky – guitars & vocals, recorded dec’86 by Juliet.

But checking on the flexi itself, the song “Surfing Mice” is credited to J. Martin and M. Hellings. I assume it is Marky Hellings. But what about J. Martin?

That’s all i have, hope it helps! I’m off to put on my wetsuit, the waves are calling me!”

And so, that’s all? What a disappointment.

Clearly, the mystery is still not solved. So many loose ends, and not that many clues to figure out about these Hermit Crabs. Whatever happened to them? Anyone wants to give it a shot at being detective and telling me anything else about this lost band from the golden days of indiepop?

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Listen 
The Hermit Crabs – Surfin’ Vietnam