Day 109! Not much news from the past weekend, but some good finds worth recommending. In the meantime I work in findnig the right art for the sleeve of our next 7″ and wait patiently for the Macguffins release to come out from the pressing plant.

The Bunbury: the Indonesian label Shiny Happy Records have more new releases. The latest is a digital single called “Evil Knievel” by this somewhat newish band from Yogyakarta. Jangle pop, shoegaze, post punk, all mixed here in a very good way. Can’t wait to hear more by them!

The Crystal Furs: Subjangle Records are releasing on CD the “Beautiful and True” album by the great Portland, Oregon, band The Crystal Furs. I have recommended this band quite a lot and it is no surprise that they found a fine home for the 12 songs that make up their third album! If you like great popsongs, with hooks and sweet melodies, you should get this album that will be out on July.

Various Artists – Moments: this is the name of the new compilation tape released by the very fine Osaka label Miles Aparts Records. This compilation has songs by great bands as Pale Beach, Pictured Resort, Superfriends and a favourite of mine for years, Mariana in Our Heads. Sadly the label is not shipping to US so… bad luck for me. Maybe you are lucky.

Morningwhim: wow! This Japanese band sounds amazing. I wouldn’t seeing them in a label that starts with a C and ends with a Y. Hidetoshi Murai, Hikaru Mori, Yui Nishio and Aya Katsumata have just released a tape single with two songs “Talking to Myself” and “Smoke from Cigarettes”. Both are bright, luminous, songs!

Cindy: what an amazing release is the album “Free Advice” on San Francisco’s Paisley Shirt Records. Sadly for me it is on tape which I will skip. But I strongly believe this is a very beautiful album and I hope if it is not the same label, someone else will re-release it in a better format (better for me that is, don’t take it personal!). 11 songs of smart arrangements, of great melodies, somehow reminding me of Aussie bands from the mid 90s.

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The Rainpals. I have actually meant to write about them many years ago. And then for some reason or another I never did. I don’t know why. Maybe because there were so many songs by them on Youtube? Perhaps because I thought I was going to be able to get a hold of their self-released retrospective CD and then, after knowing more details about them, write a post? I don’t know honestly. But as they say is better late than never.

The Rainpals. They released one 7″ as far as I know. It didn’t have a picture sleeeve which of course is a shame. It was self-released on their own Rainpal Records (JPL 1001). This is the only record listed for this label. The date was September 10, 1987, and it included two songs. The A side was “A New Day” while the B side was “Cool Forever”.  Both songs were produced at Cava Studios in Glasgow.

Does this mean the band hailed from somewhere in Scotland? Let’s find out. We do have a name, Kev Kirkham, who produced and wrote the songs.  He was in another band too called Kev & the Raindrops. But The Rainpals was a proper band, a three-piece. There was Kev Kirkham, Bilbo Fraser and Paul O’Donnell. Not sure what each of them played.

The interesting part of the story, I think, is that around the mid and late 00s, Kev put together some CDs under the name Kev & The Rainpals on his own RPR Records. I am not 100% sure if these are retrospective CDs or re-recordings of songs from the 80s. Or maybe it is a mix of new and old songs. Who’d know. The fact is that at least 2 CDs with a bunch of songs exist.

One is “Far Distant Silver Clouds” released in 2008 (RPR 5545). This one had a whopping 20 songs: “Castles in the Air”, “Romantic Story”, “Dream You Away”, “Far Distant Silver Clouds”, “Faces at the Windows”, “The Incline”, “Flying Phoenix”, “Why?”, “Shiny & Black”, “Forever”, “You’ve Flown”, “Fall into My Mind”, “Girl in the Sky”, “Feel the Wind”, “Circle Dream”, “Fog”, “Midnight March”, “Who are You?”, “Rainy Day” and “Reflexions”.

The second CD doesn’t have a release date but I believe it came out later because of the catalog number (RPR 7747). This one is called “A Superstorm at High Velocity” and also included 20 songs, some of them that were included in the previous CD: “High Vel’ocity”, “Superstorm”, “The Incline”, “Far Distant Silver Clouds”, “A New Day”, “Welcome”, “Heat of the Day’, “You’ve Flown”, “Forever”, “Don’t Let it Get to You”, “Climb the Wall”, “Fall in to my Mind”, “Girl in the Sky”, “Space Travellers”, “Outerspace”, “Astro Galactica’, “Universal Rhythm & Rhyme”, “Dream You Away”, “Christmas Day” and “Dream You Away”. Yeah, odd, two times we see “Dream You Away”. Why?

I mentioned I found lots of these songs on Youtube. Of course. The channel is called The Rainpals RPRRecords. We find here the following songs: “Rainy Day“, “The Incline“, “Castles in the Air“, “Climb. the Wall“, “The Wind“, “Welcome“, “Gold Circle of Dreams Medley“, “Reflexions Medley“, “Fall into my Mind“, “Why War of the Worlds“, “Astro Galactica“, “Rhythm & Rhyme“, “Flying“, “Shiny & Black“, “Feel the Wind“, “Far Distant Silver Clouds“, “Circle Dream“, “You’ve Flown Today“, “Outerspace“, “The Day“, “Heat of the Day“, “You’ve Flown“, “Faces at the Window“, “Rainwalk“, “A New Day“, “Cool Forever“, “A New Day“, “New Day“, “At the Window“, “Superstorm Inst“, “Christmas Day‘, “A New Day ext“, “High Velocity“, “Why War of the Worlds“, “Tide of Dimensions“, “Fog“, “Velocity“, “Universal Rhythm & Rhyme“, “Those Days“, “Romantic Story“, “Dream You Away voc“, “Space Travellers“, “Midnight March“, “Castles“, “Astro“, “Bell City Lights“, “Who Are You“, “Fall into my Mind“, “Circle Dream“, “Astro Galactica“, “Rhythm & Rhyme“, “Outerspace“, “Don’t Let it Get to You“, “Romantic Story inst“, “Dream You Away inst.“, “Travellers“, “Superstorm voc.”, “Superstorm video voc“, “A New Day ext“, “Travellers“, “Welcome“, “Gold Circle of Dreams“, “The Wind“, “Astro Galactica“, “Outerspace“, “Far Distant Silver Clouds“, “Forever“, “Time“, “Astro Tide Dream medley“, “Superstorm video voc“, “Reflexions medley“, “Superstorm voc“, “Girl in the Sky“, “Forever & Forever“, “Forever & Forever CD version“. Yes I know a lot of them repeat. I am not sure why this is. I haven’t included others that were also repeated. I wonder what was the idea behind these uploads. In any case there’s lots of great music to listen.

Then another finding, according to Allmusic there was two more CDs. “The Rainpals” was just a 4 song EP with “Rainy Day”, “The Day”, “Rainwalk” and “Bell City Lights” while “Gold Circle of Dreams” had also 20 songs! “Travellers”, “Forever & Forever”, “At the Window”, “Castles”, “Climb the Wall”, “Romantic Story”, “Rhythm & Rhyme”, “Superstorm Voc”, “Those Days’, “Astro Galactica”, “Rhythm & Rhyme, “Astro”, “Fell into my Mind”, “A New Day”, “Welcome”, “Gold Circle of Dreams”, “The Wind”, “Tide of Dimensions”, “Superstorm” and “Tide of Dimensions”.

All of these songs seem to be in most of the digital platforms. The curious thing is that I kind find any biography for the band. No details. I only found a small blurb in CD Universe where it says that the band have toured Britain consistently around 2004-2008. That they recorded and gigged in London (had they relocated from Scotland then?) and that they have been featured on TC and radio all over the world. It also looks like that on the CDs it was just Kevin Kirkham playing nearly all instruments. So I would guess then that the songs on Youtube are new recordings? Not  from the 80s?

So yeah. This time around it seems it will be lots of music but very little details. Hope some of you can help!

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Listen
The Rainpals – A New Day