BARNZ - "Adult Puppet Show" (1992)

BARNZ was basically a solo project by musical virtuoso David Barnes from Philadelphia, Pa.

This amazing tape called "Adult Puppet Show" was sent to me by David in 1992. It includes trumpets by Kevin Murphy, but virtually everything else was done by David Barnes, including guitars, vocals, bass guitars, drums, casserole dishes, hubcaps, washing machines, party horns and more! Here's one of my favorite songs from this tape...Make sure and turn it up!!!

"CRIPPLED FACE"

Happy New Year!

ORIFICE - "A Pretty Nice Guy...A Really Good Liar." (1989)

I got a lot of tapes from guys just wankin' off in their garage, but I also got tapes from a lot of real bands like this! Here's a song from a 1989 tape sent to me from Bryan Willette called 

"A Pretty Nice Guy... A Really Good Liar" by a band he was in called Orifice from Philadelphia, Pa!

Besides Bryan, the members of the band were Grant Acker, Pete Danz, Don Glass, and Frank Phobia! Sure, I could look it up, but I'd rather guess that some of these guys are still making music today!

Orifice - "Bludgeon"

Merry X-Mas!!

THE NORM - "the norm" (1987)

On the Ernie Noise Enterprises label from Ontario, Canada I now present you with THE NORM, and a cut off their 1987 cassette titled "the norm!" There's a loose insert with song lyrics, but I couldn't find the names of all the band members, and the writing is so small, it gave me a headache just to look at it! Here's a pretty cool and punky tune called:
"Gossip Column!"

THE RETREAT HOUSE DOLLS - "RHDolls" (1988)

Produced by The Pistil Twins, from 1988, here's the rockin' RHDolls with the....

"Retreat House Dolls (Theme)"

SNARL - Various Artists Compilation (Iceland) (1987)

One of my favourite kinds of tape or album has always been the various artists compilation! You're almost guaranteed to get something good, and getting a tape from somewhere like Iceland always made it that much more special, and that's exactly where "SNARL" came from! The bands on this tape were sogblettir, GULT AD INNAN, S.H. DRAUMUR, THE DAISY hILL PUppy fARM, ParrOr, and MUZZOLINI who sounded like The Fugs in 1967!
 Here's MUZZOLINI with....
"GROOASTOO RFKISINS"

THE VAGUE - "Home Of The Vague" (1988)

The Vague were just vague enough to not put their names on the insert sleeve, but there were two of them and all the songwriting credits go to either P. O'Malley or J. Armenti, or a combination of the two. They hailed from Massachusetts!

  I got this tape in trade in 1988, and all the songs are good including "Do The Vague" but I've chosen a different one to show off their talents! so...... 

 "Get It Straight!"
Lord Litter was kind enough to give us a link to what Jim Armenti SOLO (alone) is up to in the these days! You can go right here, and check out "The Herd!"

GLOOM COOKIES - "Have One" (1988)

From a label somewhere deep in Southern California called Scheming Intelligentsia Records, this was a 1988 tape by Gloom Cookies titled "Have One!" Gloom Cookies were Scott Bauer on vocals, drum kit, and percussion, Steve Rask on vocals, bass, keys, and electric guitars, and John January with vocals, guitars, keys, harmonica, and batter tasting! Here's the lead off song from the Moist Side, a little ditty called ......

"FUNK FAMILY PLANNING!"

1980's - 90's Cassette Adverts & Mini-Flyers

Pre-computers and Internet, we had to physically package stuff up and take it to the post office if we wanted to share something, so if you were going to go through all that much work, a lot of people would go ahead and include other things in the package, and the most common thing was, well I don't want to call them advertisements, but let's just say information about other bands, or zines, or labels etc. The little pieces of paper would vary in shape and size, and number anywhere between one and 12 or 15. Some were four or five inches square, and some weren't much bigger than a postage stamp. I found this to be more common with tapes from Europe, where I think the whole idea got started!

So, here's a couple of collage scans of snippets and bits that I used to get in the mail on a regular basis! Being a paper hoarder, I'm sure I have 100's or more of these things!

GENTLEMANIAC - "Primitive Primer" (1989)

I sent the 222th copy of our first tape "The Worm's Turn" to a guy only know as Gentlemaniac in Greensboro, North Carolina in what I think was 1989, but it might have been 1990! Either way, he sent me back this cassette called "Primitive Primer," that featured the Gentlemaniac himself on Voice, Guitars, Keyboards, and Harmonica, with E. Sheperd on Guitar & Keyboards, and Murray "King" Reams as Voice, Guitar, Keyboards and Congas! 

  Here's the second song from the A Side of that tape, a sweet little instrumental called:

"It Wouldn't Bother Me If..."

LOCUST PUDDING - "Supermarket Sasquatch" (1987)

They called themselves Locust Pudding, and they hailed from Albany, N.Y.! 

Two guys do all the work, and their names are Joe Sokolinsky and Eric Hausmann!

Joe gets credits for Lead and Background Vocals, Acoustic, Electric and Bass Guitar! Producer and Engineer Eric also gets credit for Drums, Keyboards, Trumpet, Guitar and Background Vocals! 

So here you go, you lucky people, here's a 1987 cut from the Fungus Fire Music label, titled "Supermarket Sasquatch," a short but wacky tune called:

 "Do You Wanna Dance?"

JOHN BARTLES - "Orange Album" (1989)

 
We've been fortunate enough to record songs via the mail with luminaries of the 80's tape scene like Lord Litter and Don Campau, but I think the best one was on this 1989 release by artist/poet/visionary John Bartles from New York! I sent John a few instrumental tracks on tape, and he took them to Gary Holt's studio, and added amazing vocals and freakin' awesome sax riffs by Ethan Lyons. Unlike digital sounds of today, these cassette tracks got muddier with duplication, but when you've got the right guy doing the job, you can still get an amazing song like this! Here's
"President's Head,"
a song that might well be a lot more pertinent today than it was some 28 years ago!
I think I now have over a 100 cassettes and cd's from John, in fact, I just got one from him a couple of day's ago entitled "A Carrot For Good Behavior!" If you would like to hear more of John's music, I'm sure it's available at Aric Schaubroeck's record store called Mirror Records in Rochester, New York!

JOHNNY PRIMITIVE - "Primitivudu!" (1987)

 So, just like it says over there on the sidebar, in the late 80's, cartoon artistes extraordinaire Brian James Riedel, Gary Wray, and myself had a lot of weekend garage music get togethers, and after the advent of fairly inexpensive drum machines and four tracks, we started taping the stuff we were doing as a band called Hermanos Guzanos just for kicks. One year I met Bob X's brother Johnny Primitive at the San Diego Com Con and he told me he was having pretty good results making cassettes and sending them to college radio stations! I thought that sounded like a pretty cool idea, so I started sending, and then receiving cassettes and magazines from artists all over the world. 

 Johnny Primitive's music was some wild electronic mixes like I had never heard before, and it was easy to understand why he was getting college airplay! Unfortunately, as meticulous as I am about cataloging all this stuff, I've somehow lost the first tape anybody ever gave me, and now only have the case!

THE BUD COLLINS TRIO - Shaky Town" (1989)

As far as I can tell "The Bud Collins Band" is still working it today, which makes a whole lot of sense considering how good this "Shaky Town" cassette was that came out in 1989! Here's a link to the band's Facebook page!

Hailing from North Franklin, CT, back then the band consisted of Chris Duers and Pat Guiney on guitars and vocals, Tony Castellano on bass and keys, drummer Chris Weinland, and Gordon Clark playing percussion! Here's a great tune called 

"FISTICUFFS!"

THE CRANKS - Friends & ...Enemies" (1989)

If you find this place to be interesting, and you just can't get enough good indie music, then make sure and gone on over to Lord Litter's Radio On Show where he's spotlighted this blog a couple of times among a host of other freakin' amazing music! If I had nothing better to do than sit around and listen to music all day and night, I'd be spending a good amount of my time there!! 

The Cranks were from Wantagh, N.Y. and consisted of Allen on drums, Slim Crank on guitar and vocals, and The Psychic on bass! Unless you're dead, I'm pretty sure you're gonna like this song, here's:

"POOR ADAM"

TOM FURGAS - "Turn Back The Rainbows" (1987)

 One great thing about making music with no chance of having any commercial monetary gain is that it turns into a no-holds barred affair, and creativity is to the max! That's kind of how I would describe the music of Tom Furgas. He has no rules, and you can like it or not, but one thing you can be assured of, and that is that it's never going to be predictable! From a cassette I got from him in 1987 called "Turn Back The Rainbows," here's a tune with lyrics by Hans Arp, with all vocals and instrumentation by Tom Furgus!

"The Guest Expulsed #3"

SCOTT DAVEY - "Goner" (1993)

 

From the 1993 San Francisco, Calif. 'Egg & Anvil' label, here's an interesting release called "Goner" This is "a collection of solo electronic sound works executed from 1988 - '93.

Most cuts created with FM synthesis and sampling"

Here's "Tales from the Grassy Knoll: Entrances & Exits" by Scott Davey

THE LARRY MONDELLO BAND - "Mondello Mantras" (1991)

In my world, if you could imagine The Big Lebowski as a kid, he would have been Larry Mondello! 

On the classic TV show. "Leave It To Beaver," Larry Mondello was the kid who always getting The Beaver into trouble, and as innocent as it was, that's the best way to describe this band named after Larry himself! I always liked The Larry Mondello Band, after all, they sent me a video for our public access TV show "OFFBEAT," where they were all wrapped in tinfoil! I'm telling you Sparky, it don't get much better than that! Before Grunge, there was Splunge! From 1991, here's a cut off their tape titled "Mondello Mantras":

"Somebody/Nobody"

MARK HANLEY - "Scar" (1992)

I've gotten a lot of music from Mark Hanley over the years and it's all good! This was a tape he released in 1992 called

 "SCAR!" 

Mark hailed from Youngstown, Ohio, and played all the instruments, except on two songs, where he was helped out by Tracy Makepeace and Sylvia Slip!
On the first song of the first side, Mark tells it like it is, and it's titled:
"It's My Life!"

PUNCTURE PROJECT - "Like Medusa" (1990)

Puncture Project was a great band that hailed from Philadelphia, Pa. that included Dave Barnes on screaming guitars, and searing vocals, Norman Carter playing thund'rous bass with occasional vocals, Glenn Leonard on pounding drums and razor wit, and Kevin Murphy on eloquent trumpet, subtle percussion, and very rare vocals!

This 1990 release was titled "Like Medusa" and here's the lead-off song, something called:

"Innocent Gestures."

ORDINARY BOYS - "Southwestern Suburbia" (1990)

I got this tape from the Ordinary Boys back in 1990.They hailed from Phoenix, Arizona.

The band consisted of Walter Charchuk on Bass,Vocals, Wes Johnson on Guitar, Drum Programs, Vocals, Fred North on Guitar, Bass, Keyboards, Drums, Programs, and Mike Stephens, Guitar Vocals. Paulo Finateri is also featured on two songs, including the one I'm presenting right here...

Put your hands together for the Ordinary Boys and the title track of their release...

"Southwestern Suburbia!"

JOHN BARTLES - "Music Licked Clean By Dirty Crows In The Moonlight" (1990)

In 1990 I sent some unfinished tracks to John Bartles! Pre-internet, we'd been writing and exchanging shit for a couple of years, and he had already used some of our music on his awesome "Orange" release, so  I was glad he used some more or our stuff on this tape, and even though it wasn't always exactly his style, he always made it his own, and it worked!

Here's:

 "Used To Be A Preacher!"