On Tape

Rip It Up, Issue 81, 1 April 1984, Page 30

On Tape

Sue Wynd

Various Artists Songs From the Lowland (EST, 52 Longfellow.St. Christchurch. $4)

This tape springs from a neat ChCh mag called Every Secret

Thing,. which is the baby of Bat's Robert Scott. It's a collection of short, sharp shots (none over three and a half minutes and a few under two) from 14 South Island bands you might not have heard of. The sheer variety and creative vigour here is truly invigorating. You get Look Blue Go Purple's absolutely marvellous 'Labour Pains’, The Bats 'By Night', two pieces of ballistic idiosyncracy from the Axemen, The World's 'Strange Man' and the Builders' elegant malleable gem America'

(already available on record but you really owe it to yourself to own every version you can lay your mitts on). There's two Victor Dimisich songs from 1981 and two Doublehappys' live 'uns of four months' vintage. The only real fault is the occasionally poor sound quality. Wouldn't it be nice if some benevolent millionaire put these bands in a recording studio for a year or so? (PS: You can get a colour cover version for $6.50. (And the mag is 60 cents an issue)-. RB

The Final Solution, Casualty Hopper Wasn't Here (Ima Hitt. Box 407, New Plymouth, $6.50) I saw both of these bands at a hall in New Plymouth once. At the time I liked Casualty better - very young punks with fast hands and youthful voices and the good sense to cover a couple of No Tag songs. Here, however, they come across a little half-baked. The energy's still there but bits sound hackneyed and, apart from Worst Mate', the songs aren't too memorable. There's still plenty of time. Final Solution ( awful name), on the other hand, have carved out an identity for themselves spirited pop-punk with squeaky but exuberant singing. There's not a whole lot that's new but it's done with some style. The silly calypso bit at the end of their side is a nice touch. RB The Moa Hunters Strike Again!! (Portobello) Songp for wiping bottoms.CK Papakura Post Office The Woman At the Well (Industrial, $6)

Expectations this tape confounds them. From my experience of PPO I thought I knew roughly what to expect wrong. Delving in, I thought, ah, I've got this one sussed - wrong. With a combination of imagination, boldness, subtlety and happy fortune, PPO have brought together elements drawn seemingly at random from the musical spectrum. Japanese folk music, 13th-century European opera, the work of James K. Baxter, jazz. Western folk, rock 'n' roll, electronics. If that sounds pretentious, it isn't. One of the major surprises is the use of a Japanese opera singer named Yuko, a friend of a friend, on a couple of tracks. Mr Industrial, Paul Luker, conducted the recording and it's hard to credit that it was done in a bathroom and a lounge on a two-track recorder. A remarkable recording. RB Kim Blackburn and Sandra Bell Two Metallic Hearts (Industrial, S 6) Two women, recorded live from the small stage at Sweetwaters. Sandra has a good, tuneful voice and quite specifically aimed songs. Kim's songs are more generalised and her voice is ... is deep. Like Nico, Marlene Dietrich and a small handful of others, she has a voice that at first startles with its "masculine" resonances but which, once accepted becomes very exhilarating to listen to. If the first two songs on Side One 'l'm Jane' (Kim) and Meiko Enomoto' (Sandra) don't immediately grab you, flip over to 'Lili Marlene' at the end of Side Two and succumb. CK Nice in the Radiogram

The Beginning of the End of the Resurrection (lma Hitt. 56.50) Scary. I mean it. Two of this three-piece New Plymouth band turned to God after playing this music over a period of time and I'm not really surprised. There is

something demonic about 7 this an absence of hesitancy or obvious derivation. A vareity of instruments played sonorous and sparse, wailing, usually unintelligible vocals. And like good boys, they puncture it with a really silly ending. Wow. RB Say Yes to Apes, Impeccable Nasals, The Brainshake (TV Eye, 506 Queens Drive, Invercargill, $6)

It's nice to see the Teev machine back in motion. Shit, they've even got real live gigging bands now. I know nothing of the Impeccable Nasals. Their side is entitled Deep Red Albert, which doesn't help at all. They write songs, real songs, coloured by acoustic guitar and stained by percussion, kazoo (ever heard of psychedelic kazoo?) and other things. They're good, as good as you'd expect someone who devised a title like 'Life Is Short, But Your Legs Are Shorter' to be. Like anyone on TV Eye, what they do is held together by a devious fijament of absurdity. The Eh? Factor. SYTA in Summer of Love 84 are captured in their current!?) (wah-wah abuse) period. The recordings are live so the sound quality isn't up to the standard*we've come to expect from the Teev Portastudio but it passes. The number of songs these people have composed in their time is hard to believe and, as they hobble into their early twenties, they seem to be getting more consistent. None of this is bad, most of it is good and a sizeable portion is excellent. From the opening instrumental 'V.I. Lenin' it could only be these people. You might hate it. RB All Industrial tapes are available from PO Box 8809, Auckland. All Portobello tapes are available from 18a Grand View Road, Remuera, Auckland 5. From the local folks who bring ya the mag Anarchy, Outrage and Serious Intent, 'ere come the tapes from ye olde Blighty. An update for the colonies? Read on. » The Apostles The Fifth Demo (52.50) Blank on one side? How did this get here? Believe me. Recording quality a bit rough ... hang on —that's not too bad soon forget doubts. Includes three days' philosophy and a guided tour of "their place." Not for the faint of heart. The fact that this tape contains unadulterated youthful passion ought to mean it rests in your tape deck. Walkman? Haven't had the courage yet. Various Bands Your Daily Dose of Misery (52.50) "A compilation of punk's better bands," it says. Right twice. But bloody hell can't figure out which band is which of the seven. Better be fixed it’s important. Definitely the hard edge. These people do live this way. On ... noise both sides! Stereo? Corpse The Seven Track Demo (S2) Peace, Anarchy and Love.

These people are so restless and angry, no wonder they play geetars so faaast. Seven track demo? If this tape was a No Nukes demo marching down Queen St no submarine would dare. PARDON? Luke Rupa All of these tapes are available from PO Box 25-004, St Heliers, Auckland for cost and stamped, self-addressed envelope. Various Flowers In The Spring Lurking in Dunedin's lofts and garages is an underground as challenging as it is varied and uncompromising. This C3O compilation boasts studio/live tracks irom eight entities in that gloriously murky medium: DIY. Fringe stuff all, but quite addictive because it ranges from Red Orchestra's numbing 'Ask/Question/Decide' through two tonal experiments by Wreck Small Speakers On Expensive Stereos to the more conventional Dunedin drive of Martin The Martian's 'Clear The Air'. Witchdoctors provide the swampabilly anti-epic 'Mudflats' and the Heat weigh in with the superb acoustic 'Penalty'. As important a document as 1982's Dunedin 2x45 (though not nearly as well recorded.)

Available from M. Morley, 36A Elbourne St, Taradale, Napier. Dave Taylor

Riverside Band, Riverside Calling (S 6 from Riverside Records. Riverside Community, RD2, Upper Moutere, Nelson.) Definitely not city music. This band is based at the Riverside Community, just outside Nelson. They play enthusiastically and reggae and rock'n'roll influences run through the tape. Sometimes the music works well, although the tape suffers from poor production. The acoustic guitar work on Life is So Hard' is no less than excellent. The vocals can tend to be a little forced, as on 'Only Dreaming' and the lyrics, often witty, can be a little stereotyped. This tape could easily have come out of the 67 summer of peace and love. It's worth a listen, it's different and it gives a real feel of alternative Kiwi lifestyle. Miles McKenzie and the Bandits, Try This for Size From 199A' Russell St, Gisborne.) Here is a group of really talented musicians.' Miles McKenzie's guitar playing, especially on tracks like Rock'n'Roll Casualty' and .'lf You Feel Like We Do', and Andrew Kirk's drumming are some of the best I've heard from this country in ages. This album comes with thanks to "the Gisborne ragers" and I can see why. These people play solid, foot-stomping rock'n roll. There is one "but" with this album and it's a big one. These guys waste an amazing amount of talent imitating the Rolling Stones.