Day 74. No news today. Quiet. It was a long weekend here, but couldn’t take advantage of it. Before the virus I was planning to go to Boston this weekend. But nah, I stayed put. Videogames, reading, answering emails, writing this post, writing a few interviews for the blog. I spent my time doing that. What about you all?
Here are some good finds from this past weekend.
Las Margaritas: last post I shared a video of Las Margaritas, the band that has Mai from My Light Shines From You. Now I found an amazing EP called “Invierno” that packs all the sweetness and twee in 6 songs. It is one of my favourite releases this year already. Jangly, bouncy and fun!
The Suncharms/Mirrorlakes: out now on Shiny Happy Records from Indonesia is the tape of two of my favourite bands of the moment. About The Suncharms I don’t know what else to say. A classic band who released records in the 90s and who we put a retrospective compilation a few years ago. So we love them. You know that. Mirrorlakes on the other hand have been reviewed on the blog in the past. Always recommending them as they sound great. Each of the bands contribute 3 songs to this cassette.
The National Honor Society: this Seattle band sounds amazing. We know that. Wish we had known about them early on before they putting out their first record. Yes, because they are releasing an album on May 29 and will be called “To all the Glory We Never Had”. It will include 10 songs and we can now preview one of them, “Cristalize”. It sounds terrific.
Airu: what a great discovery! This Bilbao, Spain, band has a dreamy and jangly sound. Their latest song is called “Me Sabe Casi Igual” and I am already hooked to it. From what I understand this song is the second single out of their up and coming EP “Do It for the Catharsis” that the trustworthy label Snap! Clap! Club will be releasing this year! We have to keep and eye on them!
Space Daze: the new project of Danny Rowland from Seapony has just put up on Bandcamp an album called “Phantosmia”. You can listen to all 10 songs in which we can see Danny’s talent. He recorded and wrote all of them! My favourite track? It is hard to pick, but I’ll go for “Get By”.
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A reader on Facebook asked me about this German band after reading a very old interview I did with the Firestation Records guys. So of course I said yes, we aim to please. So let’s see what we can find about this classic German band!
On that interview with Uwe Firestation, he told us the label started when Bungalow Records passed him the demotape of Bazooka Cain. What songs were on this demotape? I am guessing the same or similar to the ones that appear on Firestation Tower Records first release, the “Viele Grüße” 10″ (FST 001) in 1997. There were 10 songs on it, 5 by side. The A side had “Annahmeschluß” which Uwe told me was his favourite German indiepop song in that interview, “Wilkommen”, “Les Jours Parfaits”, “Immer Wieder” and “Ich Lach Mich Tot”. While the B side had “Juanita”, “Das Schönste Paar”, “Stop!”, “Zeit Zu Gehen” and “Egal”.
This record would be re-released the next year by Elbtonal on CD (CD ET 17). It will include 2 more songs: “Verlangen” and “Bitte Weine Noch Ein Letztes Mal”. This release had totally different art thanks to Sebastian Hartmann (from the bands Golden Toast Quartett and The Looney Tunes) and photography by Rüdiger Nehmzow. The liner notes were written by Reinhard Jellen a well known german journalist and Northern Soul DJ. And then we find the credits. The band members were Henry Grant on drums, Marcel Vega on vocals, guitar and lyrics, Matthias Pacht on bass and Max Knoth on guitar, mandolin and arrangements.
There would be many guest musicians in these recordings too, starting by Harald Monse on bass clarinet, Bea Kopyto and Julia Hinrichsen on backing vocals, Christian Wohlers and Udo Kern on clarinet, Stefan Sieveking on keyboards and melodica, Gabriel Coburger on saxophone and flute, Jonathan Myers on trombone, Christian Regel on trumpet, Nils Ostendor on trumpet and flugelhorn, Michael Biel on vibraphone, glockenspiel, timpani and percussion and Schorsch Külzer on zither and percussion.
The songs were mastered by Tom Meyer and were recorded by Clemens Kinder.
One thing to be aware of, is that a tape, with the same running order and 12 songs as the CD is listed in Discogs. It dates from 1997. It may as well be the demo tape that Firestation received? Who could confirm this?!
But let’s actually go back in time. This wasn’t the first ever release by the band. The band had already put out a 7″ back in 1992. Perhaps on their own. The label has no catalog number and was named No Harm Done Publications. The song titles are now in English, “Savings Of My Soul” on the A side and “Blank Space” and “Laughing” on the B side. Songs are credited to Marcel Vega but “Laughing” to someone with last name Loeseke. This is truly a mystery to me. What happened then between 1992 and 1997? Were there more songs recorded? How did these songs from the 7″ sounded like? Differently? Were the band members different? It is something we should try to find out.
In 2001 the band would release a split 7″ on Quince Records from Japan (QREP-06). It was shared with Cakeheads and Bazooka Cain had the A side. There they contributed the songs “Here Come the Days” and “Superschmoozer do Brasil”. The songs were written by Marcel and arranged by Max. They were recorded and mixed by Karsten Boettcher and Max Knoth. Produced by the band.
At this point in time the band had signed with Apricot Records. So, in 2002 the band would release a new album with this German label. Called “Here Come the Days Of” (APRICD025) it would come out in CD and LP vinyl as well as getting licensed in Japan by Quince Records (QRCP-05).
The album would have now 14 songs. The A side had “Frühling Im Herbst”,
“Hauptsache Gesund”, “Fürst-Pückler-Art”, “Fehit Dir Was”, “Superschmoozer”, “Schaf Um Schaf”, ” L’Homme À La Tête Gonflée” and “Am Morgen”. The B side had “Here Come the Days”, “Tais-Toi”, “Kurze Fahrt”, “I’m Lost”, “Komm Mit Mir” and “Allein”.
The Quince Records release had a different tracklist though. I don’t know exactly why. And it had 16 songs total. “One Fine Day”, “Fruehling Im Herbst”, “I’m Lost”, “Tais-Toi”, “Kurze Fahrt”, “Fuerst-Puekler Art”, “I Could Spell”, “Superschmoozer”, “Here Come the Days”, “Fehlt Dir Was”, “Hauptsache Gesund”, “Komm Mit Mir”, “Am Morgen”, “Superschmoozer do Brasil”, “Here Come the Days (Rremicks by Merricks)” and “Am Morgen (Remix by Erobique)”.
On this album Erich Abel appears as part of the band, playing the organ.
The album would be mastered by Tom Meyer and mixed by Karsten Böttcher and Max Knocht. The band would produce the album. Again too the band would seek many guest musicians for the record including Markus Bersing on alto saxophone, Rolf von Nordenskjöld on baritone saxophone and concert flute, Falk Breitkreuz on tenor saxophone, Ralf Zickerick on trombone and Wolfram Borchert and Eddie Hayes on trumpet. The wind section was recorded by Max Knoth and Michael Pregler. The photography was taken by Frenzy Höhne.
But that wasn’t all. The band would appear on many compilations. Starting in 1990!
Yes, that might be the earliest we know of the band. When were they formed then? So on the “Karls Unruhe” compilation released by Manick Turttle in 1990 they included the song “Nashville Tennessee”. This compilation featured bands from the city of Karlsruhe and surroundings.
But then I find in the Apricot Records biography that the band actually was founded in 1989 by Marcel.
In 1992 their song “Laughing” would be included in a 7″ compilation called “Garbage Pearls Vol. 1” also released by Manick Turttle (MTP 002).
Then there is silence until 1998 when their song “Zeit Zu Gehen” appears on the promotional CD “Komm Küssen Kompilation #5” that came alongside the Komm Küssen fanzine’s 5th number. In the year 2000 their song “Here Come the Days” gets included in the Firestation compilation CD “You Thought It Was the End of the World When the Rain Ruined Your Hair” (FST 016). Again that same year on the “Brausepulver” a joint-release by Apricot (APRICD032) and Firestation (FST044) they would contribute a song, “Frühling Im Herbst”. This same song and “Cigarillo” a song by them and Die Soundmasters would be included in Hazelwood Records (HAZ 022) compilation “Pop Ist Sheriff 2” that year too.
In 2003 they would have their song “Fürst-Pückler-Art” on Tapete Record’s “Müssen Alle Mit.” (TR 013) compilation.
In 2003 the band would contribute the song “Hauptsache Gesund” to ZYX Music double CD compilation “Aufnahmezustand – Neue Deutsche Vielfalt”. The next year also oin the same label, their song “Here Come the Days” appear on “Digging Your Scene” CD comp. Lastly, on the DVD “Neue Deutsche Vielfalt” from 2005, the band would have their video for “Annahmeschluss”.
This video was actually shot in 1995, before the Firestation release. It was shot mainly in Poland by Bernhard Marsch.
Then it is worth mentioning that sometime along these years there was a compilation on triple vinyl called “Maximum Beatbox HKTC 01” released by Fidel Bastro (FB 05). The band appears here too, with could be a live set, or a live song (I am not sure). The recordings come from the legendary Heinz Karmer’s Tanzcafé in Hamburg.
Lastly in 2013 the band appears with two songs, “Annahmeschlus” and “Immer Wieder” on the compilation “Firestation Pavilion” that was released in Japan by TKO New Music Corporation (TKOK-0015) that features songs by many Firestation releases!
There are some more videos too on Youtube worth watching. For example a live performance of “Besame Mucho” and “Mountain King” at the Treuanisch Ship in 1995 as well as “Immer Wieder” at the ShuShuShow in 1997. There is a trailer for a movie of the band that was to be shot by Bernhard Marsch. The year is 1999 and one wonders what happened? Why wasn’t it filmed? There is also a small interview of the band on the Polylux tv programme in 2002.
What are they up to now? Max Knoth seems to be successful as a composer, arranger, orchestrator and sound designer, working for many movies including “Die Sterne” and “Lassie Come Home”. He was also involved in other bands like Frank Spilker Gruppe and Mobylettes. Harry Grant went to play with Charles Curtis Trio and Die Antwort. Matthias Pacht played on Go Plus.
I also was told that Marcel Vega had released one 7″ under the name of Jean de St. Malo on the Hochverdichtet Schallplatten label (HVS 0601). I don’t know the year for this release but it included two songs. Would like to listen to them!
There is not much more about them on the web. It is true that some years ago they had a website. But it doesn’t exist anymore. Something that I thought I was going to find was interviews or articles about them, as they had been around in the late 90s and early 2000s. Not in pre-internet days. So kind of unlucky there.
I did find an article from June 16, 1994. Here it mentions another name that was part of the band then, Markus Lezaun. It says that the band had toured Prague in 1992. In 1993 they had been to Moscow and that year, 1994, they were planning to go to St. Petersburg. Another tidbit I found on the web is that they played at least once at the Atomic Café in Munich.
Now it is time for you all to help me fill in the blanks. Especially those years in the 90s were we don’t know much about them. It seems they had been traveling all over Europe. But what about songs? Had they been recording at that time? Why didn’t they put more releases? Would be great to find out!
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Listen
Bazooka Cain – Annahmeschluß
