Mothgods studio recordings

Here's a few studio recordings by The Mothgods. Our only studio efforts actually.

Two different band line-ups recording two different sessions.

V1: Bob, Pete, Darryl (Tracks 1-3).
V2: Bob, Tim, Paul (Tracks 4, 5).

Recorded at Nightshift studios, Chch by Arnie between 1993-96.

The way i hear this stuff now is that it's a bit 'naive' really. Recorded before we finally got into the swing of things and then failed to do anymore decent recordings. Lack of money probably the main reason for that. Some of the later Mothgods songs appear on my 'Strange conversation' CD. Notably 'Come back simon', 'Clouds' and the 'Without eyes' number (which was an instrumental in the Gods). They were recorded post band breakup but i still managed to rope the lads in to play a few tracks. Most likely i enticed them with promises of free homebrew....or lunch. All said and done, i prefer the rough as guts ' Live in the lounge' stuff over this because it's more fun. But then, this is still worthy of an archive...

One time before a gig, Pete, Darryl and myself had a cracker car accident after pulling out of a bottle store and running into an oncoming Commodore. Both cars were right-offs. Luckily no-one was injured but we were in shock for a while. We were sitting around on the footpath and people from local businesses were bringing us cups of tea. Then the cops showed up and we discovered our driver didn't have a license and it wasn't his car but his girlfriends. The cops were not impressed (neither was the girlfriend).

Originally released as a cassette (pictured).

Here: http://www.mediafire.com/download/vxe9el29rs84mk6/Mothgods_Studio_Mp3.zip

Kate in the lemon tree

Here's something i've been meaning to post for a while now. Some fabulous 'Kate in the lemon tree'.
I went to a party with Tim (mothgod's drummer) sometime in the mid-nineties and was feeling very cynical until this band started playing. I couldn't believe my ears! Great songs, great playing......really fucking wild stuff.
I discovered a while later that they lived down the road from me in Cambridge Tce (literally a stone throw). The whole band (five of them) lived there and they'd created a pretty serious band house for themselves.
The lounge was basically a rehearsal space if i remember rightly.

I've been trying for the last few hours (in vain) to find a birthday card they made me once. I was going to post it on this blog. On the front they'd drawn a wineglass and written 'Happy Birthday Rob', inside it said, 'From the 'How do you do club'. They'd (Chris and Pete i think....) knocked on my door and got me outa bed at about 8am on a freezing sunday morning to give me some cold, burnt toast on a plate and the card.
It wasn't my birthday.

Other strange events were to follow. These guys were up to mischief.....
Another night at about 3am (and again, freezing) we were woken by these guys chasing each other, waist deep in the Avon river across the road (after screaming their lungs out in a sing-along under the bridge).  
Then there were the occasional street antics. Pete and Simon were busking in the city one night late on a friday. Both playing snares and hi hats and jammin some wild stuff. My buddy ALC5 and i were heading to the pub and ran into them. People were trying to give them money which they were adverse to, so then either Pete or Simon would stop playing, pick up the money and throw it back at them.
Art, not money.... thanks. Love it.
Then there was the party we had where one of them drank spilt beer off the kitchen lino....
the list goes on....could write a book really.

The first two songs on this download are from a tape Simon gave me years ago (titles unknown, also ripped as they were on the tape. Don't blame me if there's an intro missing...!).
The rest comes from a CD i have which is NOT the album they released '50 Years of Shark' but contains some of it i believe.
Pete, Simon, Chris, Ian and Hamish (Nans) were 'Kate in the lemon tree'.
Jump in the deep end and give this a listen....highly recommend it.

Hope they don't knock on my door at 8am with some cold burnt toast.

http://www.mediafire.com/download/w2wdt4smz6971xr/Kate_in_the_lemon_tree_Mp3.zip

Jammin with the ALC5

Rob (left), Al (right) in the garden at Matai st, 1991.

Here's a couple of tunes knocked out by myself and my old buddy Al.

I jammed with Al quite a bit during the 90's. We also had a band for a while which we didn't really have a name for. That band consisted of me and Al on guitars, me on vox and a drum machine. We played a few gigs here and there (mostly supporting the black panthers i think) but sadly there's no actual recordings made of that project. I thought i had a live set in the tapebox somewhere but as yet i ain't come across it.

Al was also the secret 5th member of the black panthers and played keyboards on a couple of tunes during live performances. Namely on our cover of Deep purples 'child in time'. Ha. That was so much fun to play. Especially with Matt and Vaughn trying to reach those outrageously high vocal notes. Again sadly, no recording of that exists that i know of. But then, as my grandmother used to say: 'What you never see, you never miss'. I think she was bang on the nail with that one.

Now that Al is no longer with us i value any recordings that we made together that much more.

Hope you can find some value in it too.

Photo is of me and Al in the yard at Matai st. With a glass of homemade plonk i believe.

There's two tunes here...... enjoy.

http://www.mediafire.com/file/1a7rb1082e8i37e

Steve and Rob - One afternoon

 

Here's a little gem....

An afternoon of hangin out with my friend Steve ( Reay ). 

Steve came over to my house and decided we were doing an album. That afternoon.
We had no songs, had not rehearsed, and frankly i thought the idea was a bit..... ambitious.
Steve was convincing however and soon enough we had 14 songs and a 25 minute album!
All recorded hastily on my Sony mono walkman for a real low-fi sound.

Unlike the Rob and Stefan demos (where we'd actually rehearsed) these are right off the cuff tunes never attempted or even thought of before or after. 

We used to make a lot of home-brew me and Steve. It got quite competitive over who could make the strongest shit. Steve ended up being the winner with his 11% home-brewed lager. After drinking large amounts of that one night i barely made it home (i lived about 200 meters away). 

Stagger stagger....... fall fall....... thankfully i didn't fall in the river,

Check it out. two guys, two guitars. Acoustic madness.

Recorded around 1995? Somewhere in that ballpark anyways. 

Here's the download link:

http://www.mediafire.com/file/0ggg1vs1pe63v4u 

Single girls vid

Secret Circle

Here's another monster from the tapebox....

Think spicey cup of tea, meditating on a persian rug while having a massage. Instumental journeys developing (or unravelling) all on their lonesome. Galaxies collide.... and divide.... and seperate.

These are lengthy jams with my friend David Rayner and a few other crew. Recorded 1995 or thereabouts. Every few weeks we'd get together and bash out a few numbers. We used to swap instruments a bit too so it's hard for me to tell who's playing what but i'm playing drums for about half of it and guitar for the rest. And also maybe bass on a track or two. David Rayner plays bass, drums and possibly guitar and some other percussive instruments. Other crew involved include Hilary (percussion (tabla / bongos etc)), another David (percussion) my ex-girlfriend Sonya (keyboards) and a hippy called Jody on guitar (if it sounds 'funky' it's probably him playing, not me). David recorded all of this with one stereo microphone and a tapedeck. I can't remember what type it was but i recall it being rather high end gear and hence these recordings sound excellent aside from the occasional imbalance in the volumes of things.
At one point you can hear i'm playing guitar far too loudly and hence get told off by all present.
Typical guitar player 

We never had a name for this project and we never played live either so i've taken the liberty of calling it 'Secret Circle'. 
Recorded at 58 Matai St West, Christchurch, New Zealand. Another great old mansion that was knocked down to make way for numerous townhouses. Hooray for progress..... 

At least the reverberations of the old house continue to bounce around the universe. 

And here they are.....

CD 1 = http://www.mediafire.com/file/2h5m8k0549wmfk7

CD 2 = http://www.mediafire.com/file/cbbfcf9annhaflx

There's about 90 mins worth of it here. Divided into two downloads so if you don't like the first one, you don't have to waste your time downloading the second one.