Supertanker & Vortex - Live at the Dux de Lux, Christchurch 05-06-93

Ok this tape gave me heaps of trouble. It just refused to budge. I even transferred the reel to another case to see if that would work but no, nothing. It would play for 10-15 seconds and then start jerking around, spit out some horrid noise & the come to a halt. Finally I had enough of messing around with it & handed it over to Lynton who has several tape decks and the know-how to get things workin & though he also had a few issues, he got it ripped so you can thank our resident tape expert Dr Lynton Von Denhoven for this baby. Glad it finally gets to see the light of day!

Supertanker were one of the 'fab five' shall we say that made it onto Rob Mayes' 'Avalanche' compilation (Sept, 1993) which was three songs each from five Christchurch bands which were basically the biggest crowd pullers in town at that time. For good reason too, they all fucking rocked. This compilation put them on the map almost instantly. Student radio ran with it and the bands had multitudes of fans nationally almost overnight & garnered some international attention too.

'Vortex' were the support band for this gig and I managed to get most of their set as well so that's present in a separate download. Really like the first song which is a reference to the Close Encounters movie. Someone had a decent reverb unit in that band!

Supertanker were sort of in the middle of the scene stylistically I suppose, not too heavy / not too light, clever and emotive songs with twisted fuzzed out lead breaks and wall of sound distorted rhythm guitars. Nearer the 'My Bloody Valentine' or 'Ride' end of the pop spectrum to my ears but don't forget that in NZ we have our own home grown influences as well & The Straightjacket Fits / Flying Nun back catalogue would be buried deep amongst the subconsciousness of these youngsters without a doubt. That and the influence of the southern alps, the bleak winters, the rising damp, the prevailing easterly wind, the hostile locals..... the fact nobody even knew where NZ was....definitely defined the character of a local sound.

The early 90's were so much fun there.... too many good bands to count... parties & gigs every week....nobody seemed to have a real job.... just a great scene of creative types spending their money on amplifiers & booze instead of food.....

It's a pretty low-fi recording & not the entire gig either but whatever, this is free shit people! Really you should be paying me for dishing out this rare and wonderful stuff.

Supertanker Download Here.

Vortex Download Here.

And here's a video of Supertanker to wet your whistle. This song is also one of the live tracks in the download.

Live Dead C. X/WAY 1

When it comes to the numbers, the previous Dead C. Live recording by James Greig has racked up nearly 700 downloads (currently on 682 as I write this so I may as well bump it up to 700 to make myself look more important) and so it is by far and away thee download king of this blog and rightly so as it's a bloody good recording.

So the story goes, James Greig rolled up the other day with a bag of drugs and a couple of rare and unusual Xpressway tapes to tinker with. James has also received the blessing from label curator Bruce Russell for this upload just in case you were wondering.
Thanks Bruce!

I have a few Xpressway vinyls which are very dear to me. One I really regret not getting back in the day is the now extremely rare Plagal Grind EP. Practically worth it's weight in gold these days. 
If you're not familiar with the back catalogue of this label, get a move on and start digging through it because it's basically Flying Nun's better cousin. The compilations are a good place to start. I'm playing 'Pile=Up' right now in fact. 'Making Losers Happy', a singles collection released on 'Drag City' also incredible listening and a good place to start your collection.

The Dead C. Live is exactly what it says it is. A selection of early live recordings circa 1987.

I've uploaded it with the tape artwork too so you have all the relevant details.

So here you go all you greedy Dead C. fans.....

The Live Dead See.

(Oh and it was a complete lie about the drugs by the way).

Tinnitus

Want some ringing in your ears? Then look no further people...

The entire works of Tinnitus have been re-mastered and are up on Bandcamp awaiting your download for very reasonable prices.
I purchased the entire back catalogue but if you’re not as keen as me, I would suggest starting with Tape 12. Also known as ‘Futures Past’ as released on CD by Flying Nun in 1992. A collection of works starting with an almost 40 minute live set, it’s a good place to start delving into this deviant crew.

Dark, ambient, atmospheric, drone……experimental stuff that’ll make your hair stand on end. These guys could easily have just made horror movie soundtracks for the rest of their lives.

There’s a good write up on the history of the group here.

And to show off my own nerdish behaviour, I burned all the albums onto CD and made my own Tinnitus box set……

Wasn't lying about the box set......

See you in the hearing clinic :)

Hampster - Live at the Dux De Lux 15-11-93

Hampster were an adventurous Jazz combo from Christchurch who were regulars at the old Dux De Lux in the early 90’s (sadly another Chch venue lost to the 2011 earthquakes). Jazz has never really been my bag but these guys were anything but standard Jazz and they added a great sense of fun to the mix so a good time was had by all regardless of your musical leanings. Jazz, pop, funk, fusion.... experimental.......good.
There's a moment where they talk about one song being like something off the soundtrack to Betty Blue. I get that, it does sound like something from that film. Most of the track names I've picked out but there's a couple that remain unnamed. Feel free to enlighten those of us in the dark.
The best show I ever saw them play though was at the laid back Orinoco music festival in Motueka (summer 1994 by my reckoning). Certainly the best festival I’ve ever been to. A wild mix of bands ranging from metal to folk to…..god, even Jazz! The bands played on a small makeshift stage amongst the hills, surrounded by bushland in the middle of nowhere over two (or perhaps three) days. Some 2000 people max in attendance. The weather was fantastic & everyone seemed to have a blast. Hampster were one of the highlights. I still remember they played some song about NZ Telecom which was a dig at how poor their service was at the time. Got everyone laughing. One hardcore Metal band played and there were a couple of little kids up on the stage dancing hence the singer kept cracking up laughing….hard to be seriously nasty ‘metal’ when there’s a couple of kids jumping round in front of you. Ha.
This was recorded at the Dux on my trusty Sony Walkman (again) and on this occasion, I also used a decent cassette instead of the old bottom of the barrel type and hence the sound is pretty sweet & quite listenable (albiet still Lo-fi). I wish back in the day I had spent some good money on a decent stereo portable tape unit & a good stereo mic but there’s wishful thinking for you….didn’t happen. More than likely I was behind on the rent and could barely afford to buy groceries let alone fancy hifi gear.
The other thing that helped boost this recording was that there was a ledge above the bar on which I could leave the tape running. Hence it has a good room sound…..some audience noise but it’s not too imposing. So all up, what we have here ladies & gentlemen is a rather plum live recording! Those who were regulars at the Dux will probably appreciate revisiting this exceptional group.

Get it here: Hampster

303 Concrete Method - Live at The Harbourlight, Nov 6th, 1993

The Harbourlight Theatre was a beautiful old building in downtown Lyttleton which hosted many an event over the years until it was irreparably damaged by the Christchurch earthquakes in 2011 & sadly, had to be demolished.  
This particular gig was recorded at said venue on my trusty Sony Walkman (mono) which I used to carry about religiously for a while in the early 90's. It's not a bad outcome either. A few edits, some EQ, a bit of boot polish & hey presto, rough as bags live recording ensues.....!
I had a vague memory that my friend Greg Cairns (drummer) had been involved with this project & he recently confirmed that yes indeed, that was the case. Also included were Sean O'Reilly, Alf Danielson and Brian Crooks. Talk about a sterling line up....a Dunedin super group no less!
There's also a few songs by Alastair Galbraith (same bill, same night) which shall be included here in a separate download. Great versions of his songs too. One of them is a version of Plagal Grind's 'Midnight Blue Vision' (speaking of Dunedin supergroups...) another is 'Warden Tye' which appeared on the fabulous Siltbreeze 7" 'Gaudy Light' and the other two I'm not sure of the names of. David Mitchell joined Alastair on stage for the version of 'Warden' as well. Seriously demented guitar playing... that could only be Mr Mitchell torturing those poor strings surely.
According to Greg, there is also a studio album by 303 Concrete Method that has never seen the light of day and remains un-mixed. 
Whoever has possession of that tape... time to get a move on! 

Oh and a couple of the 303 songs are cut short.... I think it was tape run out...

deal with it......:)

In two downloads......


303 Concrete Method

Alastair Galbraith

Tony Valens and the Incisions

Finally.....

A new entry....

And a treat for your ears dear customers. 

A volatile, heady brew of NZ r'n'r craziness to cheer you up on these wintery days happening right now.

And 'Deadly Lethal' was what was happening right now back in Christchurch in them late 90's. 
'The Incisions' were a  suspect bunch of dodgy local home-brewers (probably lacking in training) but without a doubt, much ambition to slay the audience attending with whatever they had up their sleeves. 

I saw these kids at the old Provincial Hotel one night where they blew my head off with their instrumental  ballistic missiles.... they really were Lethal.... and Deadly.....and for want of a better metaphor, like a giant spew on the rock'n'roll red carpet of improvisational rock. As if you'd eaten a Thai green curry with a side order of beetroot salad...some greasy chips....a three litre cask of white wine....and a cheesecake for dessert.... yes that kind.....of puke... the one you don't want in your bed.
A psychedelic cataclysm of garish garage garbage that you wished you'd come up with yourself but didn't have the nous (or the bravado) to dabble in. 

It fell off the back of a truck and you were on your bicycle behind it dear fool..... 

A shocking fright to the system.... 

Can u dig it? 

Probably not :) 

Get it  HERE

Squirm - Feeding the Ground

Well here's something that should perk your interest good citizens.... the one and only first 'Squirm' Cassette from way back in 1993.

I actually thought (wrongly) that all of these tracks had been included on the Failsafe CD 'Master Mistake Maker' but as it turns out, only three of the seven tracks from this Tape were used. Another three tracks were used on the first Squirm CD / EP.
Later, a compilation by Failsafe called 'Good Things' would again feature 'Voodoo' as it was well received by local radio I believe.
Only one track from this cassette (Bone Tree) has failed to see the light of day by Failsafe.
This rip is taken entirely from the cassette version & only mildly tinkered with digitally to retain balance in the volume of the different tracks.

This would have to be my favourite Squirm release. It's funny because even now when I listen to it, I'm not getting any references like 'oh, this sounds like so and so band ... etc'... the songs are so fucking crazed... who knows where this shit came from? It could only have been cooked up in flat city..... the home of the deranged..... and fittingly, this cassette came out on 'Flat City Recordings' which also released a bunch of other stuff back in the day. Peter Mitchell (who later became the drummer for Squirm) was the curator for this label and it's worth hunting down anything they put out. Some way cool stuff in there.

Thankfully I was there to see this line-up play. They were instantly my favourite local band. I saw all the other line-ups afterwards too. Also all good... but this Cassette period remains my fave. As a three piece, these cats clicked together very nicely. Also a great job done by Arnie Van Bussel of NightShift studios. Without him, so much great music in Christchurch would never have happened. He recorded the first Pin Group 7" for Flying Nun back in 1981 you do realise. The beginning of the Flying Nun sound. And if Arnie had a dollar for every band that owed him money, he'd probably be a goddamn billionaire. True.

The last two tracks however were recorded at Puawai Studios by my old buddy Miles and a guy called Stu. That was a secret underground (literally) studio that managed to capture quite a few early 90's acts in their heyday... was only there for a few years but Kudos to they that founded it.

Here's some links:

Squirm - Feeding the Ground Tape

Squirm Discogs

Squirm Failsafe 

Mainline - A Christchurch Compilation

Here's a nifty little compilation from the late 90's (1999 I believe) which I recently came across in the CD shelf. Very hard to find things on that shelf as it's a total mess.... lots of 'Sleeve only' cd's which must be shuffled through like a deck of cards. Annoying as hell but after dusting this thing off it's good to hear it after all these years. Well worth the effort. A compilation put together by the Roger Wright Centre (needle exchange / outreach centre) to create awareness of their activities. It's good to donate your music for a cause I guess & hey, free advertising! Can't beat free press. Among others featured were my own band 'The Black Panthers' with one of our early efforts at recording. I didn't know we were even involved with this project until it came out & i was handed a copy.
Such were the days (back before everything was on Facebook within 12 seconds) where you'd have to wait to find out what was actually going on from either the local gossip pages in some local zine, or a phone call on the now much maligned 'landline'.
There's some real oddities in here. Barnard's Star really shines for me (pun fully intended). Fabulously imaginative sonic noise soundscapes which immediately bury themselves in the frontal lobes. Well, mine anyway. Losta other goodies. I may as well include a track list here so you know what's on the Comp. Definitely worthy of a listen & a catalogue number for your NZ oddities collection.


01. Glisten - The Centre Will Hold
02. All Tied Up Now - Michael J Hex
03. 7am - Anastasia Strapon
04. Mesa Drive - Lost Found Sound
05. 4 Score - Paul Kean
06. Yo Holmes get off the stage! - High Tone Destroyers
07. Stray Cat Blues - Matt Alien
08. Evil - Squirm
09. Untitled - Barnard's Star
10. Deep Down - Black Panthers
11. Get Outa Town - Thee Strapons
12 Forbidden Planet - Ritchie Venus


Download Here!

Prosthetic Heads

Yet another ancient goody out of the tape box.... 

Prosthetic Heads were a local ChCh (NZ) hardcore band back in the mid- late 90's. This tape hails from 1997. It is, as I understand it, the only thing they ever released. A very tight sounding band so they'd obviously done their homework before they recorded this.
Recorded at Nightshift studios, it's a really good recording and a sweet mix.
For lovers of Minor Threat, Fugazi, Bad Brains type of hardcore punk mixed up with a grunge element if you like. I think I can hear 'Green River' in there somewhere.....and probably Danzig era Misfits. You get the idea, thrashy, anthemic choruses, short songs. It's probably grunge inspired punk thrash pop.....? Who knows, if you like punk rock, you'll probably dig it. If you like Mariah Carey, then fuck off.
There's also a back yard, garage rock, home brew influence on these guys. The local sound is not lost on me. I know it and they have it. The fact that they reference Speights Ale on the inner sleeve gives them 10 points in my book for a start.
The full cassette cover is quite large and has a lot of details on it so I've uploaded it with the music so you won't miss out on anything.

Thrash out & be a Lout.....  

Prosthetic Heads 

Whitey Hiss Cassette

Hey Suckers, here be the mighty and whitey 'Whitey Hiss' cassette. It sure is Whitey and Hissy and Dirgy and raw as Demerara sugar. 
Pure Molasses man.
A project of Mikey Hex who was best known for his band 'Squirm', Mike had other things on the go too. This was one of his babies & also released on his own fledgling Label 'Noseflute' (which also put out the second Squirm album by the way). Four songs are presented here on one side of a C60 generic cassette. If you read the fine print on the artwork (supplied with download) it suggests you should make a compilation with the blank space. Generous to the end Mike.
I'm assuming Mike gave me this cassette too at some point or other. We used to rehearse at Hex Central (his abode & Venue in downtown ChCh) as did a few others like Ape Management etc. It was a rockin' place & Mike was the purveyor of thee rockin' site. 
Many a band owe him big time for looking after them. He was always enthused & always positive about the future. My favourite memory of him is sitting in His Lordships Hotel (downtown ChCh) one night when there had been numerous fights at the bar (one guy was unconscious on the floor for a while... ) and Mike, myself and some others at the table came up with some anti-fighting sing-along which we would kick off as soon as another fight erupted. Hilarious drunken revelry.
Sadly Mike passed away back in 2004 so this is a homage to the guy. Cheers Mike. You were a good bloke. Sadly missed by many. May you find some fish in heaven! ( some may know the reference :)

Whitey Hiss Cassette (1994)

T.M.A-1...... Screech! on vinyl.

T.M.A-1 (or,Tycho Magnetic Anomaly One if you want the full name) were an early 90's band from Christchurch New Zealand from which spawned a prolific recording label named kRkRkRk cassettes.
A label worth exploring on it's own, lets just stick with TMA-1 for a minute because their Classic 1993 cassette tape 'Screech!' has just been released on vinyl in a limited run of 150 copies. The story goes: my friend Lynton Von Denhoven comes over for dinner, we start talking about releasing something from the kRkRkRk back-catalogue on vinyl, Lynton suggests 'Screech!' which also happened to be on the stereo at the time. I agreed, a good decision (and probably the maddest decision we could possibly make).
So that said, this has now been released on Lynton's own new record label 'RTR' (Ready to Rock) and pressed by Zenith here in Melbourne. A box of these are currently in a canoe in the middle of the Tasman sea (keep rowing slaves!) but hopefully it won't be too far offshore. Slaves always row faster at Christmas in my experience, they want to get home for New Years.
If I was you, I'd keep an eye out for one of these in Galaxy records in the next month or so. You can also find them for sale on Discogs.
Here's a link to their Bandcamp page so you can have a peek at what you're reading about and a video Peter Wright made recently when he recreated the artwork for this fine beast.

More Ether!

Oh yes people, you demanded it so here it is....! 

Ok, that's not entirely true, nobody demanded anything..... Zilch in fact. So without further untruths, here's some early practise room jams plus our last ever concert for anyone who might actually give a fuck.

I've been listening to these early recordings a lot lately and really enjoying them. The recording is top notch. I think it's one of John's early Zoom recordings? Not sure but everything sits nicely in the mix. These date back to when we were first finding our feet & before we had any confirmed 'songs' to go with. Some concepts expressed here see the light of day in our set list much later on but most of it is pretty unrecognisable to the untrained ear. 

There's also a download here for our last ever concert out in Whittlesea which I recorded on my Sony DV Handycam. This was us in our most 'developed' state and the recording is quite listenable too so there you go, you now have both ends of the Ether scale.... undeveloped musings & the tightly woven structured songs.

Both worthy of a listen. 

In two downloads:

Early practise room jams

Live at Whittlesea

Onaweta - Dance Little Children 7"

Wow, this last year I've had some great success in adding to my NZ 7" singles collection and a week or so ago I finally bagged this little baby which I've been after since the late 80's.
I remember seeing the video they made for the single on the 'Radio with Pictures' music show (which was so informative for us back in them days) and I think the 'Dance little children' riff has been stuck in my head ever since. How catchy is it? Really, it should have gone to No.1 in the charts on our wayward South Pacific island paradise but when you're talking about a self released single by a rag tag Wellington trio of a few hundred copies, it probly ain't gonna hit the headlines anytime soon (or back then.... however much it deserved the accolade).
The song 'Dance little children' also appeared on the 'Killing Capitalism with Kindness' compilation put out by Turbulence records (Belgium) which I thought was kinda odd as it seemed like an anomaly amongst the predominant cast of Expressway label misfits. Anyhoo, great to see it there anyway, I'm not complaining.
There was one other song of theirs on the compilation 'Celebrate the Sonic arts' entitled 'Persecutor baby' which is also a very worthy groove and hence it shall be present in this download. I'd love to know if they recorded anything else. If they did, it should be in the public domain god damn it!
For those of us that need these kind of off funk, off punk, post poetic blasts of groovedom, we need more do you hear?

Here's the download to wet your whistle.

Onaweta

Into the Void - Instrumental stuff....

Ok, this is a rip of an 'Into the Void' tape I scored off James Greig a whiles back. No idea when or where it was recorded. Ronnie is obviously missing as there's no vocals to speak of. Just heavy instrumental stuff. Still very tuneful..... altho a bit fuzzy here & there.
I like the fact that Paul Sutherland's mad background scratchings are quite obvious during a lot of this. He's a very necessary part of the equation & often overlooked.

The Fuzz is the life....

Here's the rip.....

The Ether

Here’s a live recording by The Ether from the Tote Hotel in Melbourne. Recorded by Lynton on his Zoom recording device...... it packs a good deal of punch!

Lance - Photos / Keys

The Ether are / were John Billows, Joanne Billensdon, Lance Strickland & myself (Joanne & Lance played Keyboards, John played Bass and sang, and I bashed the drums). 

Joanne - Keys / Vox

Mostly we were a brooding mesh of heavily effected instruments. The result being drone-esque soundscapes and Kraut-style monolithic rhythms. In fact we were heavy enough to match most bitumen laying road machines (and if we played outside you’re house on a Sunday morning at 9am, you would think you're local council was doing just that).

John - Bass / Vox

Often the interplay between John's bass noise & Lance's Keyboard noise was enough to confuse me to the point where I wouldn’t know which was which or who was who, which I think helped give us a ‘looser’ feel overall. Any song we invented that was deemed too structured or inflexible was swiftly given the boot in favour of tunes we could just jam out on & play as long as we liked. 

Bob - Drums

We played a few low key shows around Melbourne. Thrice playing the iconic Tote Hotel in Collingwood. Our final show was an outdoor event out in Whittlesea, an informal backyard festival on an invite only basis. Bonfires & beers, mildew & mayhem, an excellent way to finish up this project if you ask me. Here’s a few links & a couple of videos.


The Ether - Live at the Tote

The Ether - Bandcamp

https://www.facebook.com/theethermelbourne/