Day 214.
Cindy: here is a great album that will be released on November 20th. Limited to 250 copies, the “Free Advice” album is coming out on 12″ vinyl. It will have 11 songs of superb guitar pop. Right now all the songs area available to preview and the record is also available to pre-order from Tough Love Records in London.
Three Berry Icecream: Blue-Very label from Japan has been putting out some amazing records as of late. I’d love to get them but I find the Japanese prices a bit too much for my budget. But for all of those that can afford them, get them. The latest is an LP by the classic band Three Berry Icecream. I believe this is a selection of 15 songs from previous releases. I’d love to interview them, maybe this is a good time. The LP also come with a CDR with unreleased track as well as a mini-zine!
Gladie: the latest from this Philadelphia pop band are three slices of upbeat guitar pop! My favourite out of the three songs that comprise the “Thank You Card.” EP is the 2nd track, “Sorry When I’m Not”.
Humsikk: the solo project of Rifityza Gestandi from Indonesia has an album out now called “Teenage Sound” on Tarsius Records from Jakarta. The album has 9 songs, all available to check out on Bandcamp, and has lots of great jangly moments. Good stuff.
Juliet et Joe: I am not a fan of much of the work Joe Moore does for Elefant, but this francophile project does sound good! Much much better than anything that he touches and sounds 60s. I think he has found his place here! The album “Marelle” is already out on Elefant Records on 10″ vinyl. This sounds quite good. I am a fan of this!
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The last band I’ll feature from the “Blabbermouth Volume One” compilation tape that the Medway Bands Co-op put together to promote themselves in 1986 will be The Strookas. Other bands that I know appeared on it are The Herbs (who I have featured in the past) and The Hyacinth Girls (who I do owe a post, but I do have much more info about them, so won’t be part of these series of posts).
The two previous bands have proven to be terribly obscure. No information whatsoever on the web. Will it be the same for The Strookas? Let’s see.
The song they contributed to the cassette only compilation was called “What Am I Doing Here on My Own?” and it is catchy, a bit powerpoppy, naive, and lo-fi. Shambolic too. I like it!
Well it turns out The Strookas are quite well known! So there is plenty of information on the web. That’s good isn’t it?
They seem to have moved more in the punkpop scene than in indiepop from what I gather in the web, even supporting Green Day. The band was formed in 1986 and seems to keep going to this day. They hail from Maidstone in Kent and are formed by David Bloomfield (guitar, backing vocals), Tony O’Rourke (bass guitar) and John Edwards (drums). Before Tony, between 1986 and 1990 Cliff Bailey was the bassist.
The band these days have a Facebook page as well as Bandcamp page with all of their songs!
So yeah, the discography. There is a 1986 4-track demo and a demo in 1987 called “Bathe in Plankton”. What songs were on these? I don’t know yet. Maybe we’ll find out. I do know though that their first proper release was “The Strookas EP” in 1987 on Halibut Records. This probably was the band’s own label. This 7″ EP had four songs. The A side had “Put It On the Shelf” and “What AM I Doing Here on My Own?” while the B side had “Is there Any Reason?” and “Something from a Different Angle”. All songs were produced and engineered by Graham Semark at Red Studios.
In 1990 the band would release the “Summer to Fall” 7″ on Moving Change Records (MCR-001). This also looks like it was their own label as all releases listed are theirs. Who could confirm? Anyhow, three songs on this record. “Summer to Fall” on the A side and “Out of Your Head” and “Cut Me Down” on the B side.
In 1991 the band would go to record their first album “Deaf By Dawn!” at Red Studios between the 14th and the 15th of September. Graham Samark would again be their producer and engineer. 10 songs would be included in the album that would later be released with the same tracklist in Japan by Fixing a Hole Records (fix-24) on CD. Originally it was released by Moving Change Records (MCR002) on vinyl. The songs were “Between the Eyes”, “Up Ahead”, “Living in the Past”, “Wish You Were Here” and “Shake” on the A side, “Dead Pan”, “Some Kind of Wonderful”, “Bambi”, “Head in the Sand” and “My Sister Dolly” on the B side.
In 1992 the band would release a tape album called “Sharron”. The 10 songs in this album were recorded between February 29 and March 1st of that year. Again at Red Studios. The tracks were “Pick the Bones”, “Blue to Green”, “Watch You Down”, “Still Comes Back to You” and “Across My Floor” on the A side and “Recover”, “Freight Train Sleep”, “Syrup” and “Remember This” on the B side.
The band’s second album on CD was “Cumagutza” that was released in Japan by Fixing a Hole Records (Fix-23). The songs on this album were recorded in two weekend sessions in September 1995 and October 1997 at Crimson Music in Kent. Graham Semark is again credited as their producer. This album has more songs than their predecessors, 15 tracks! They were “Just Like Home”, “Canvas”, “Haven”, “All Around You”, “Kill Straker”, “Sourbelly”, “Rake”, “Gatecrashed and Lonely”, “Punished”, “Throw You to the Ground”, “Crumbling”, “King of the Limbo”, “Dumb Electric”, “Beck and Call” and “Live and Breathe”.
In 2006 the band released a compilation called “What You Want to Hear” on Engineer Records (IGN098). This compilation was a collection of unreleased and album tracks from 1991 to 2000. There were 20 songs in total on this CD, “Hey You”, “Too Slow”, “Some Kind of Wonderful”, “Tomorrow World”, “Nothing Happens Here”, “Goatboy”, “Bambi”, “What You Down”, “Best Laid Plans”, “It Makes Me”, “Emmerich”, “My Sister Dolly”, “Different Sound”, “Shake”, “Structure”, “Pointless”, “This Easy Life”, “Syrup”, “Let Me Drive” and “Freight Train Sheep”.
Lastly in 2008 the band released another 20 track compilation, this time on Japan’s Fixing a Hole Records (FIX-25). This compilation was called “Summer to Fall” and had the following tracklist: “Summer to Fall”, “Out of Your Head”, “Cut Me Down” (these first tracks from the 1990 “Summer to Fall EP”), “Put it on the Shelf”, “What Am I Doing Here on my Own?”, “Is There any Reason?” (these 3 tracks recorded in 1987 from “The Strookas EP”), “Something from a Different Angle”, “Chatham Pout”, “Bobby Crush is Innocent”, “What Am I Doing Here on my Own? (demo)”, “Bright Pink Gloss”, “35 Please!”, “16 Hands”, “Indigestion (But it might be Heartburn)”, “Divorce My Car”, “Fuzzbox”, “Washing Up” (all these songs recorded in 1987 for the “Bathe in Plankton” demo), “Put it on the Shelf (demo)”, “Just as I Thought” and “Why Am I a Tsetse Fly?” (from 1986’s first 4-track demo). All songs produced by Graham Semark and The Strookas, and recorded at Red Studios in Kent.
When it comes to compilations we see that the band appeared on a few. On “The Unknown 10” cassette comp from 1990 and released by Rain Tapes (R15) they had two songs, “Nothing Happen” and “Find Your Own Way Home”. That same year and also on Rain Tapes’ “The Unknown Eleven” (R17) they appear with two songs, “Out of Your Head” and “Cut Me Down”.
The comp tape “The Unknown Twelve” from 1991 released by Rain Tapes also included two songs, “Too Slow” and “Summer to Fall” .
In 1992 the band contributed three songs, “Up Ahead”, “Living in the Past” and “Wish You See Here” on a French tape compilation called “Are You Still Ready to Follow Your Leader? Vol. 2” by the label Acts of Defiance. Rain Tapes would also put them in “The Unknown 14” compilation with two songs, “Between the Eyes” and “Living in the Past”.
In 1993 they would appear on two compilations as well, both on cassette. “International Compilation – Volume 3” on Rain Tapes included the songs “Pick the Bones” and “Blue to Green”. Again that year they would have a song, “Pick the Bones”, on a French compilation, this one was called “Revanche Tome 3” out on Violence Productions (VIOL004). This one came alongside the Violence fanzine issue #9. If you know French or still want to have a look/listen. You can find more info at Violence Fanzine blog.
And in 1994, the band would appear on a CD compilation called “The Best Punk Rock in England, Son” released by Snuffy Smile (SMILE 002) in Japan. They would have the track “It Makes Me”.
After a little more digging I return back to the Facebook page I mentioned earlier. The last post dates from March 15 this year. From it I get that band members David Bloomfield and John Edwards went to be in a band called Tonota 80.
Another place we can find the band is on Soundcloud. Here there is a cool interview with Mike Brill on Radio Kent from 1987! There are also rare and related songs like The Andy Pandys’ mid 80s song (but recorded in 1999) “Barbara Dickson”. The Andy Pandy’s featured two of The Strookas and a member of The Claim.
The Kent Band Archive page has some gigs listed like one on July 9th 1988 at The Railway in Sheerness supporting Planet Mushroom. Then we know that they toured France for two weeks in 1993. There is even a video of them playing the songs “Bambi” and “Syrup” in February 1993 in Annecy, Frnace.
Let’s keep looking. The Dentists’ gigography page has two gigs listed alongside The Strookas. The first dates from September 16, 1988, when The Dentists, Cud and The Raw Herbs played at the Medway Arts Centre in Chatham. The second one is also in Chatham but at a different venue, Victoria’s. It dates from December 21 of 1988.
And that’s it. Some good info here, right? What else can you share with us? Did they play alongside other well known indiepop bands like The Dentists or The Raw Herbs? Who remember them?
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