SECOND SCENE - ISSUE 8

SECOND SCENE ISSUE 8

PHILIP PARFITT RICKY MAYMI

THE TELESCOPES ELECTRIC MYRRS ASTROLOGY NOW DANIEL BENNETT THE SHADOW EVENT KATHY GILBERT DUG MOORE MARSDEN WILLIAMS & 245T GOD HATES UNICORNS WHAT COLOUR IS SOUND? PLASTIC PALS SMELL OF DECAY SOS2020 SHELTER N PLAY

HD AND THE DSB CHARLIE SUNDOWN THE SUNCHARMS PLEASING FORMS THE BLACK WATCH TEE TEE SUMMER THE MOLECULE PARTY JOE NORMAL & THE ANYTOWN’RS THE REAL SEA

LAISSIEZ FAIRS FRED ABONG CANDY OPERA NERO KANE THEVANISHINGLINES

PINKY DOODLE POODLE MAYFLOWER MADAME

Welcome to the eighth issue of the

SECOND SCENE

ACKNOWLEGEMENT: Bob McCutcheon, The Vault Recording Studio, Anthony “Rocky” Lamonde, Howie Rosenberg, Dave Pursh, Glenn Sebastian, Rick Radvansky, Michell Sekeras, Judy Rosenfeld, Eric Wisiewski, The Electric Crush, Shauna Lea McLarnon, Shameless Promotion PR, Get Hip, Gregg & Barbara Kostelich, Sean Newsham, Print Tech, Steven Boone, Nether Street & Dancing With Architecture.

Cover photo courtesy of Tapete Records

USA: Tim Thomas UK: Sterling Roswell Netherlands: Pytr Baum Writers: Dave Franklin, Simon Phillips, Mike Ivan, Tom Sobilo, Terry Thomas, Karla Doolittle, Dylan Chaz Mascellino & Michael Plater

Editor-in-Chief: Tim Thomas Contact: secondscenemagazine@gmail.com -INTERPLANETARY FREE PRESS-

THE SUNCHARMS The indie/shoegaze band The Suncharms from Sheffield, England. Originally active between 1989-1993. After releasing a retrospective CD compilation on Cloudberry Records, the band reunited and released a 7” single on Slumberland Records in 2018. The Second Scene talks with Marcus Palmer.

When can we expect a new release by The Suncharms?

We released our comeback single in 2018, a song called Red Dust on Slumberland records. We have had new material released on compilation albums from Shinyhappyrecords and Fadeaway Radiate Record labels and enjoyed the new tracks getting radio tracks amongst all the up and coming bands. ( which we still feel we are) We probably have about 13 new tracks we are mixing and adding extra instruments to. Our main aim is to release what will be our debut album.

This would be great as it’s 30 years since our debut single called Sparkle was released in 1991. Life took us in different directions in the early 90s, and the album was never born. 2021 an album.

What can you tell us about the sound and style of The Suncharms?

Our 1991 sound was often described as Shoegaze.

Melody and distortion on the pedals with the vocals low in the mix. That was some of our tracks, but a track like ‘Reflections ‘ had acoustic 12 string guitar and other tracks much more poppy.

The new songs, we’ve got heavy noise bits gentle ballad parts ‘country or surf twang and even spooky 60s organs.

We have never set barriers to our sounds but add whatever we think works for the song. We are always a very democratic five-headed musical beast, all bringing our own bits to a track.

the black watch

The black watch just released its nineteenth album to critical acclaim. Second Scene talks with John Andrew Fredrick.

How does it feel to be voted album of the year

by The Big Takeover?

It feels a thrill, quite frankly. It’s weird because, in the midst of making Fromthing Somethat, producer Rob Campanella turned and asked me what I thought Jack might think of this LP--before we’d even mixed it.

So we knew we had something monumental-in a “for us, for ourselves” sort of way. I’ve been a fan of his--and been turned on to so so so many bands/albums as a result of following The Big Takeover. I did opine of late that he should get an honorary Music Ph.D. I wasn’t joshing.

What can you tell us about Fromthing Somethat?

It was a reaction against the LP of ours, Brilliant Failures, that came before it. Brilliant Failures we wanted more sparse and atmospheric, like chamber music. Fromthing Somethat was meant to be more operatic. That sounds incredibly pretentious! But once you start adding mermaids singing to your recordings, well, it’s time to say you’re using the deepest recesses to reach for the highest heights.

There is a sort of arrogance about certain records; it might stem from anger or fear.

Fromthing Somethat is kinda a fuck you to anyone who’s ever skimmed over us, as it were.

HD and the DSB

PLEASING FORMS Todd Thomas looks to release his second solo album this spring. Here’s what he had to say.

What can you tell us about your upcoming release?

The upcoming release will be another ep. I am hoping to release six songs this time around. The working title is ‘Measured in Blue.’

When can we expect a release?

The feel of the music is similar to the previous release. I’d say it is an extension or continuation of the previous release. A mix of psych pop-rock.

This will be my second attempt at producing and engineering. I am hoping to improve on the quality of the production.

I am shooting for a spring 2021 release. Probably May 2021.

TEE TEE SUMMER

The Cash Registers frontman Tee Tee Summer plans to release his second solo, Charleroi, produced by Matt Ernst. Look for an April release on vinyl and CD. “It’s about the town I grew up in the Monongahela valley. My dad was a steel mill worker. His right hand was cut off in the Steel Mill Lyrics are about the mon valley rust belt. Music is all over the place some velvet underground influences Bruce Springsteen, The Clash, Notorious, Biggie Smalls. I have a side of country rap. It’s all about my hometown and surrounding area Pittsburgh as well, from punk rock to storytelling ballads hardcore rap folk. I don’t want to be Boxed in. I want to release it on my birthday, April 4th. It might be a double record.”

NO ESCAPE

The HD and the DSB released their first single, No Escape, with plans of an Eno’s covers album to follow. David Halloran explains.

Tell us about your first solo release.

The plan was not to release this one first, but I felt like I was finished with it, so I figured I would get it out. How music is listened to these days, I don’t see any reason to sit on a track until you have a whole album done. I had been referring to it as my Covid song, so it felt appropriate to put it out in 2020 as well. It wasn’t just meant about that; it is more about feeling stuck in any situation in life you don’t want to be in. It is probably more about my day job than Covid isolation, honestly.

It is a weird one, I started recording it on my acoustic guitar, and it sounded like a country song. The finished product sounds like dark 80’s electronic music or something, not really sure, and there is no acoustic in sight. I am not sure how it got there. I just kind of go with things when I record by myself. There really is no plan.

It got to a point where I thought it sounded good and liked listening to it, so I stopped working on it and decided to put it out.

Rumor has it that you have an Eno covers album coming soon. When can we expect its release?

Yes, hopefully, soon. I’m expecting to release it towards the end of March or the beginning of April 2021. I thought this album would be my first release. I have been working on these songs the longest. It will be a five-track album with songs from Eno’s first four solo albums. I am excited for it. I worked with some great guest guitar players on this album. It sounds great. I just need to finish up some final mixing and then figuring out how to actually put out an album of covers. I have never done that before; covers are new to me.

Dissonance that you can dance to. Each track’s machine precision is highlighted throughout Revolution, from Trigger Warning’s opening salvo to the final track 1-900 Rockstar, the latest from The Molecule Party, and main man Sean Murphy. Murphy collaborated with Allinaline (vocals, programming, arrangement) to create Revolution, an old school industrial dance music blow-out with it’s biting lyrics and pulsating rhythms. The standout vocals by Jessica Zoric and buzzsaw guitars from Dave Buzard add to the sexy snaking grooves that Revolution has to offer. Bobby Collins and Mollie Black’s additional backing vocals bring an extra dimension to the tracks 1-900 Rockstar and The Jam. This ten-track album is a must for the diehard or casual listener of Industial music.

THE MOLECULE PARTY - REVOLUTION

MAGIC WANDS ILLUMINATE

As I said when musing over the previous single, Blue Cherry, the great thing about Magic Wand’s sound is that it is both confident and muscular whilst being hazy and dreamlike. It seems like a sonic oxymoron, a creative contradiction in terms. But they create this unique

sound by having a hard kicking, beatdriven engine room, which they then cover with gossamer sonics, drifting sounds, dreamstate vocals, chiming shards of guitar, and shimmering synths.

The effect is to soften the sound, file off the sharp edges, muffle the bombast. A bit like being smacked in the face with a boxing glove made out of velvet. It feels nice, but boy, does it land a punch.

Illuminate is also an album that reminds us that making music that is simultaneously

intricate and appealing is less about writing clever chord changes and complex structures and more about dressing up simple arrangements with so many sonic layers that the original, basic structure, is hidden beneath beguiling sounds and swirling musical licks.

And by embracing such devices, Magic Wands produce songs with the most poised pop appeal.

Angel Dust is a gorgeous groover, sultry vocals and languid guitar riffs coiled around alt-

dancefloor beats.

Paradise is a shortsharp and shockingly appealing slice of hypnotic pop, Bat Baby is taut and twisted electro-rock, and Queen of Gypsies is a brilliant slice of popgaze.

Magic Wands sit somewhere between the charm of Beach House and the shimmering haze of Warpaint, but neither managed to combine pace and panache, beat, and beauty anything like as brilliantly as this band does.

Dave Franklin

What prompted you to do a solo album?

I started writing these blues and jazz-based songs, which just wouldn’t work as Enemy of the People songs. I have some friends who are top class musicians who play jazz and blues amongst many other esoteric styles. I asked if they’d help me out, and thankfully they were all available. We had two rehearsals, and then we hit the studio. It was a fast process, and we finished it within one day.

Charlie Sundown steps away from Enemy Of The People, albeit temporarily, to pursue a new direction with his first proper solo album. A dark bluesy jazz affair.

Is “Midnight Awakes” your first solo effort?

I used to do lots of home recording on my own and selfreleased (and by self-released, I mean I put it on Bandcamp and forgot about it) a record in 2011 called Peace Falls Upon the House. It’s pretty depressing. If you go to charliesundown.bandcamp.com, you can find some very old solo/band stuff. Don’t ask me how to play any of the songs, though! This is the first time I’ve gone into an actual studio (Bark Studios in Walthamstow) with some friends to cut an album under my own name.

“Midnight Awakes” is such a departure from your work with Enemy Of The People. Is this always something you wanted to do to record a Jazz album?

When I’m at home, I tend to mostly listen to jazz and blues (and the Jesus and Mary Chain, of course), and I’ve always wanted to make something dark and bluesy that’s held together with the natural, deep sound of a double bass and bursts of soprano sax. I love the music, but I’m not actually a jazz guitarist. I started learning how to play jazz chords and voicings to add some flavour to my playing, and then the album pretty much wrote itself.

“Midnight Awakes” is a great album. Can we expect more from you in this style?

That’s very kind, thank you. I have the follow-up already written, and I’m hoping to go back into Bark Studios in 2021 as Brian O’Shaughnessy, who owns and operates the studio, is a wonderful person to work with. He captured the sound I was looking for so perfectly. The next one is going to retain the swing of Midnight Awakes, but it’s going to have a bit more of a late 50s rock n roll/instrumental feel. I’ve just bought a Les Paul that I’m looking forward to combining with my Jazzmaster, so I’ll be turning the guitars up a touch.

The Real Sea, a four-piece from Pittsburgh made up of Sharon Mok, Sean Finn, Christopher James, and Eric Sakmar, is in full flight and ethereal mode with their latest release, a majestic version of the Flaming Lips Waitin’ For Superman, and they make it their own.

Why did you decide to record Waitin’ For A Superman?

During lockdown, with us all being separated and not able to get together to rehearse, we found it hard to get the motivation to work on writing new material. We tried different ways to get ourselves going, but nothing seemed to do the trick. I came up with an idea to work on a cover instead, thinking that at least we’d be doing something, and working on a song we already know might give us that spark that would lead to writing more original songs. We all enjoy the music of The Flaming Lips, and I think it was Eric who suggested we pick one of their songs to work on first. Being a big fan of The Soft Bulletin, Waitin’ For A Superman was the suggestion, and we ran with it. As it turned out, the song not only really fit our aesthetic but lyrically proved to be a rather poignant reminder of the difficulties we’ve been going through the past nine months or so with the pandemic and politically in the country and the hope we all have for better times ahead.

THE REAL SEA

How did you pull the recording together during these difficult times?

We all use Logic to record demos at home, so we all recorded our parts and got a rough mix together, which we sent to our friend, David Klug, for mixing and mastering. It was definitely a fun way to collaborate separately, and it was nice to hear the way the song progressed when everyone added in their parts. We’re in the process of working on a few other cover songs at the moment, as well as finishing up mixing/mastering of the songs we recorded last February at Miner Street Recordings in Philadelphia, which will all hopefully see the light of day in the next few months!

THE ELECTRIC MYRRS

The Electric Myrrs is an Experimental Psychedelic Rock Band based in Bay Saint Louis, Mississippi. The Second Scene talks with James Biven.

The Electric Myrrs is shrouded in mystery. What can you tell us about the group without giving it all away?

The Electric Myrrs started as a mushroom/acid-fueled idea to break down the barriers of collective genres of Garage, Electronic, and Metal by approaching it in our own flavor of free form, improvisational Jazz.

What influences the group musically or otherwise?

In the early days, it was just myself and a four-track with the idea of a lo-fi project that resembled the works of bands like Psychic T.V. and The Books. Our first release, “Dreammaster,” was, for lack of better words, a “lo-fi album of songs made for movie trailers that didn’t exist” the weird nature of these spontaneous songs were hard to place genre-wise and always seemed to have breathed a breath of their own.

“The Electric Myrrs blend sounds of electronic and heavy guitar-based riffs into doomy jazz sections with metal intensity.” The description sounds terrifyingly beautiful.

Can you explain how you pull such diverse sounds and fuse them into songs?

The Electric Myrrs strive to keep ourselves DIY. All our albums

besides Myrr Jyrr was recorded by the band using minuscule equipment and hearts full of creativity with a passion to unearth, dare I say, a new sound/aesthetic in the psych/garage world that derives from mystery and spontaneous creativity and a love for countless countries heritage in music such as the Krautrock movement in Germany and the Swedish psych-folk communes of Trad Gras Ochs Stenar/Parson Sound and International Harvester. Early Afrobeat and zamrock (Sonny Okosun, witch and Amanaz) and much more James, you started The Electric Myyrs as a selfreleased project. How has it evolved with the addition of other members? Did the writing process change?

As for the band’s evolution in terms of members, it was extraordinary. To find members who were willing to come together around the idea of thoughtless and effortlessly creating a new sound in a place where our music goes under the radar was really a miracle. I’m forever grateful to them for sticking with me. Our first release as a band was the album Myrr Jyrr; in November/December of 2019, we stepped into Pest Land studios in Metairie, Louisiana to create our first non-self recorded album with Chuck Diesel of the New Orleans based punk band (The Pests/Death E.D) featuring songs from past self-recorded E.P. and L.P.s the Myrrs released earlier in the year.

What’s next for The Electric Myrrs?

As for what’s next, we have been trying to work our way into film scoring and, for the last few months, been working on the soundtrack for the movie “Jije.” A local horror film being shot on the gulf coast of Mississippi. The movie is still under production but will have more info soon.

We will also be joining Joey Miller of Gulf Coast Media Collective in mid-November at his studio in Biloxi, MS, to record one of our newest pieces of material, “Sun Ma.” It will be the single from our next album, “Myrr Dyrr,” which should be wrapped by the start of 2021.

artistecard.com/TheElectricMyrrs Artwork: Sam Kettle - Last Orders

P

aisley Underground, the musical movement kickstarted by the Dream Syndicate, the Bangles, Rain Parade, and the Three O’Clock in the early 1980s, may be associated with Los Angeles as its main hub. Over the decades, its influence has spread worldwide, especially in Europe, where reuniting Paisley Underground acts can still outsell large venues. Sweden is one of these countries, and the Stockholm-based Plastic Pals still keep the Paisley Underground fire burning.

Tom Sobilo talks to Håkan “Hawk” Soold, lead singer/guitarist/ songwriter of the Plastic Pals, who is in lockdown in Stockholm. So is Tom in Euro City aka Frankfurt am Main, Germany. The main reason for the interview was the release of the “It Could Be So Easy, Free and Fine” EP. A fine and truly majestic album with a big sound and loads of ringing and chiming guitars, four beautifully arranged songs with poetic lyrics written by Håkan. A true competitor for the album of the year 2020 award.

Thus, if he had been born American or English the musical future for the Plastic Pals would look bright for them and be all over the music press. Unfortunately, this is not the case. In that respect, Håkan “Hawk” Soold reminds me of Wolfgang Michels, aka Michels, head of the German-American cult band Percewood’s Onagram, who was discovered by Alexis Korner, who in turn knew a thing or two about good music. In other words: A neglected genius.

T: You played a streaming live gig with the Plastic Pals in April 2020 during the first lockdown when there was no live music happening all over the world.

This was so moving and brought a tear to my eye.

H: Thank you. I know what you mean.

We enjoyed it, too, and had a great response from the worldwide online community. In COVID-19-pandemic times we called our new album “ It Could Be So Easy, Free and Fine,” which sums things up appropriately, I think.

T: The show was great, and the band

Interview: Tom Sobilo

was really cooking despite a lack of audience. You describe your music as an amalgam of Psychedelic Rock, Paisley Underground, Garage Rock, and Powerpop.

H: We have so many influences— Swedish Folk music, for example. Mind you; I come from a musical family. My father was a choir leader.

I started out with learning the recorder, then piano, clarinet until I finally picked up dad’s guitar. I went to a classical music school and founded my first band at the age of twelve. We called ourselves HELP. Then in 1978, when I was 15, I was in a band called Guds Barn (Children of God), which released one single.

Glam Rock (Mott the Hoople and

H: I liked the Dream Syndicate, Green on Red, True West, the Church, Camper van Beethoven. Bucketful of Brains fanzine was a great source to discover new bands.

Funnily enough, I connected with Jonathan Segel (Camper van Beethoven violinist) via a Facebook post concerning a reading of Pat Thomas’ book “Listen, Whitey! The Sights and Sounds of Black Power 1968 - 1975” in Copenhagen. Jonathan currently lives in Sweden, and I didn’t know that. After that, we ended up playing together soon. He’s been sitting in with the Plastic Pals many times and has also helped me out recording my vocals. Jonathan and I have also performed together as a

LOCKDOWN BLUES WITH THE

PLASTIC PALS

David Bowie) and Punk Rock (Iggy Pop, Television, Radio Birdman, Patti Smith) had a big influence on me as well apart from the obvious influences such as The Beatles. I really liked their Abbey Road album, which I played to death.

T: Your voice is similar to Nick Cave’s, Iggy Pop’s resp. Lou Reed’s.

H: Thanks. Those are all singers I’ve listened to a lot.

T: The Plastic Pals have this classical dual guitar thing going in the Verlaine / Lloyd vein.

H: I like guitars and started the Plastic Pals in May 2005 to play our first gig in September 2005. The steady line-up since then is Anders Sahlin on lead guitar, Olov Öqvist on drums, Bengt Alm on bass, and yours truly on vocals and guitar.

T: Which 80s bands did you like?

Photos: Micke Wall

duo.

T: You played gigs and shared stages with many of your favorite bands and toured the United States and the UK (thanks to PU’s UK ambassador Gurbir Dillon).

H: Yes, we played with Band of Outsiders in New York City and played shows on our own in New Jersey and New York City. The Plastic Pals have opened for the Dream Syndicate, Steve Wynn & The Miracle 3, Dan Stuart, Chuck Prophet, and Chris Cacavas, plus I’ve sat in with Russ Tolman when he performed in Stockholm. Dan Stuart is great, very funny, too. So are all the Green on Red guys.

We backed up Sid Griffin of the Long Ryders in London. Marty Willson-Piper, formerly of the Church and All About Eve, is another good friend of ours.

Chris Cacavas produced our 2013 album “Turn the Tide,” recorded at the White Lodge studio in Ludwigsburg, Germany, with Rainer Lolk engineering.

The recording sessions took seven days. We started with breakfast and coffee, did a morning session, then Chris cooked lunch, afternoon session,

to the Galaxy,” where Marvin, the constantly depressed robot, comes from a line of robots advertised as your plastic pal who’s fun to be with.

Also, when we started in 2005, I wouldn’t dream of having the band with the same lineup 16 years later.

Thus, I thought Plastic Pals came out

dinner, then evening session. Chris is a great chef, by the way (laughs).

We also worked with J.D. Foster (Calexico, Marc Ribot, Richard Buckner, Dwight Yoakam, among others). He mixed several tracks on our album Psychic Reader (2018) and recorded with Dan Stuart of Green on Red. Dan is great, a very funny guy.

The same with Jack Waterson and all the other Green on Red guys.

T: I dig the live in the studio recording feel of the new album H: We like an organic sound, too. We usually record the whole band live in the studio, and if there’s a mistake or two, who cares as long as you get that live sound/feeling and a cool groove.

T: I really like it, especially the ballad “If love should call” with nice backing vocals by Jenny Roos and the closing rocker “More than an icon.” Jörgen “Jugglo” Wall has been doing a stellar job engineering the album.

H: Glad you like it (laughs). Jörgen is a great guy and is a well-experienced engineer. He’s worked with everybody in Sweden. We loved recording with him.

T: Where did the name Plastic Pals come from?

H: The name was inspired by the Douglas Adams 1979 comedy science fiction book “The Hitchhiker’s Guide

as a good name. Anyone could be a plastic pal. But luckily, that’s not the way it turned out.

T: In the 80s, there were loads of Swedish bands that became internationally famous, like Leather Nun. H: I know Jonas Almqvist well. He wrote a great review of my old band Guds Barn in 1980 in his fanzine Anarki & Kaos (Anarchy & Chaos). The Leather Nun were great.

T: Union Carbide Productions, the Nomads, and Watermelon Men. H: They’re all great. The Nomads are friends of mine. We opened for them in a small Swedish town called Borlänge.

T: What is the Stockholm music scene like these days?

H: Sometimes, it’s hard to get people our age to come out and see us.

Mostly there are between 20 to 70 people in the crowd. On a release show for a new record, we’ve had up to around 120 people coming.

When the Dream Syndicate played Stockholm, we supported them and played a packed venue with 500 punters. Unfortunately, for the most part, the local music scene is pretty dead, but there are a few exceptions, and we keep the fire burning!

facebook.com/theplasticpals

T: Are you interested in playing abroad?

H: We’d love to come to countries like Germany, France, Spain, and Greece. And we’d love to play in Italy, the UK, and the USA again. Alas, now there is a 250$ fee to be paid per musician to play America and the UK, too, because of Brexit. That’s a lot of money. But it would be great to play Pittsburgh as well, as we have only played on the East Coast so far.

T: Your new EP came out on Polythene Records, your own label. Did you get offers from other labels?

H: A Greek label was interested, but the deal was ridiculous, so we declined. All our records have been released on Polythene Records except for the 2018 release, the album Psychic Reader, which we co-released with the Swedish indie label Paraply Records.

T: What is the cover photo all about?

H: This was taken by our bass player Bengt Alm, who is a professional photographer, in 2013 while crossing the Brooklyn bridge. We were staying in a Brooklyn B&B, and the guys went for a walk, and Bengt took this great shot.

Says a lot, doesn’t it? Plus, it relates to the current situation.

T: What is happening for the Plastic Pals in 2021?

H: We rehearse the whole band when Anders comes up to Stockholm for a weekend every month. He lives in Gothenburg in Västra Götaland County. We definitely would like to put out a new album, maybe not this year but perhaps in 2022 or so. But we need to raise money for that. We’ll probably run another crowdfunding campaign as we did with the new EP that had about 100 pre-orders.

T: Thanks for your time Håkan and stay healthy.

H: You are welcome—the same to you.

For more information, check out: www. theplasticpals.se “It could be so easy, free and fine” is out now and in the shops, plus available on vinyl, CD, and digital.

Check it out on Polythene Records.

Discography:

• It Could Be So Easy, Free and Fine (CD-EP) 2020 • Psychic Reader (CD album) 2018 • Riding with Elvis (7″ vinyl single) 2015 • Turn the Tide (12″ vinyl and CD album) 2013 • Good Karma Café 2008 (CD album) • The Band That’s Fun To Be With 2006 (CD-EP)

TheVanishingLines The brainchild of Ian Smith, the debut album by The VanishingLines, ‘No Replacement Found,’ is a brooding drone masterpiece, drowned in feedback and repetition with equal measures of space and claustrophobia.

Ian, what can you tell us about The VanishingLines? The inner workings, the creative process, and what has influenced you as a musician/songwriter?

I have been playing around with ideas for the last 30 years or so. It’s been quite the gestation period! Things just never fell into place until the last four years. I started writing ideas again, and everything just started to flow; I haven’t stopped since.

The VanishingLines is a loose trio. Jake helps massively with structuring the pieces, which are then sent to Stephen. Stephen will add drums where necessary and then produce rough mixes, which are then polished up.

I have a wide range of influences from a variety of genres. My interest has always been in a specific element of the music rather than being hooked by a melody or anything like that. I find myself focusing on a specific guitar sound or a drone and just drifting away.

The debut album by The VanishingLines ‘No Replacement Found’ has just been released. What went into writing and recording the album?

The main issue was choosing which ideas to use. We eventually settled on the six , and they seem to complement each other really well. I would say that around 30 pieces were under consideration, many of which have been filed away to revisit later.

I am not a ‘natural’ musician, whatever that may be, so I had to develop a basic level of technique, which was quite the challenge.

I found that certain ideas were close to being finished, but something had been lost in translation, so they have been put to one side. New songs were appearing at an alarming rate, and I had to draw a line and say: ‘No, that’s it.’

You were assisted by Stephen Lawrie (Telescopes) and Jake Taylor. What did they bring to the creative process as far as writing and recording?

I co-wrote ‘Plague Dog’ with Jake, all written and recorded in a couple of hours. It feels so natural to work like that. I have known Stephen for a long time, and I think he deliberately kept a certain distance in order to make sure that this was primarily my work rather than introducing too many things from The Telescopes.

95% of the album was recorded in my house, and Jake stuck with me whilst I grappled with the logistics. I would gradually build more layers, and Jake was the sounding board for me to progress things forward.

Stephen would only hear the tracks when I was happy for them to go further. We would forward a rough mix to him, and it would go from there. When I was happy, Stephen would do a final mix, and we would move on to the next one. Stephen mixed and mastered the album as I felt that he would know what I was looking for.

From The VanishingLines press release.

“These are not so much ‘songs’ as feelings.” Can you explain?

This really goes back to what I said about ‘Plague Dog.’ I can’t help but sound horribly pretentious, but the best ideas always seem to be beamed into my head and

then recorded quickly. I wouldn’t call myself a craftsman. I don’t spend hours laboring over a guitar to try and perfect my art. I just leave it as it is and maybe tweak things a little here and there.

‘Comber Storker’ was exactly the same as ‘Plague Dog.’ I came home from the pub, the idea came from nowhere, and 3 hours later, it was recorded and basically finished.

If I find myself thinking too much about something, I immediately stop and store the idea for future use. If it’s not ready, I won’t force it.

What’s next for The VanishingLines?

I have continued working on new tracks since I finished the album, and I hope to have another album done by the end of the winter. The tracks are all there; it’s just a case of waiting for the inspiration to hit me to finish some of them off. It will be a continuation of ‘No Replacement Found,’ but it will have its own distinct identity. I have eight songs in an order in my head which work well at the moment, so we will see how many make the final cut.

We are also working towards playing live.

There is a London show booked for May of 2021 and I would like to do more. This project was never intended for a live environment, so my attitude when recording the second album will reflect this. We have never rehearsed, so 2021 is going to bring its own challenges! I may just decide to use backing tapes, which gives us more time to perfect the dance routines.....

vanishinglines.bandcamp.com

ASTROLOGY NOW Pittsburgh psychedelic rock.

Second Scene talks with Greg Mastrean about the history of Astrology Now and the latest release. The Knife EP. Let’s get to know Astrology Now. How about a brief history of the group?

After fumbling around with playing acoustic guitar and writing songs intermittently for years, about ten or twelve years ago, I (Greg) made a couple of friends who had a spot in the Lawrenceville section of Pittsburgh in which we could play electric guitars LOUD. That was something I had never really done before.

Around that same time, I had bought a used Tascam cassette recorder. Before I knew it, I

was obsessed with my tape machine and was constantly trying to figure out how to write and record. Over the course of the next few years, I had enough material for a full-length release and needed it mixed and mastered. I took the tunes to Nate Campisi (bass in AN and Mr. Smalls Recording studio employee). He asked me what my plan was for the songs and mentioned that if I were trying to put a band together, there would definitely be folks in Pittsburgh who would be into performing. Before long, Zach Bronder (gtr/ vox) and Matt Turcsanyi (gtr/vox) joined, and we played our first show as a band a few months later. We recently added drummer Even Meindl to the band, having played our lone show with him 2020 before COVID struck.

How would you describe your sound to the unknowing?

Melodically, many of my ideas tend to be influenced by my favorite bands from the ‘60s

What challenges have Astrology Now faced, and how have you overcome them? If any at all.

The last few years have been some of the best I’ve ever had, mostly due to this band. I’ve loved every bit of it. We’ve had the same minor challenges that most bands run into at times; members who quit, trying to find time to practice, booking cool shows. Overall, the one aspect of releasing music these days that is the most challenging is figuring out a way for potential listeners to wade through the thousands of musical and/or audio options out there, to discover and connect with your band. That’s why Second Scene is so important. Kudos to you, Tim! Have you been doing any writing and recorded during the age of Covid?

Yes, that’s pretty much all I do. Friends have joked with me that this COVID isolation is probably no different than my normal existence since I all really enjoy doing is staying home, playing guitar, writing songs, and recording. We also got together as a band on a couple of occasions and started recording tracks for our next release, and they sound great.

(Rolling Stones, Beatles, Pretty Things, Velvets) but with even louder and heavier guitars.

Your latest release, the EP Knife on 10” vinyl, tell us about the writing process. How does Astrology Now work as a group? Do you write as a group or individually?

That four-song EP encapsulates the band just as we were meeting and learning to play together.

Those songs were a mix of fully formed ideas I already had, brand new ideas spurned on by live practice sessions, and a riff brought to the group by Matt Turcsanyi. I’m constantly writing and demoing new ideas; nearly every day. The longer we’ve been a band, the more I’ve tried to avoid presenting songs that are entirely arranged and demoed. The rest of the band are so talented and have so many great ideas. I now try to get the gist of the original idea down in demo form, present it to the group and then see how it can evolve into a real tune.

What’s next for Astrology Now? Well, we closed 2020 by releasing two digital singles (Floating Eye and Martian Leather) and will be releasing two more digital singles to kick off 2021 (Atomic Weakness in January and Evil in February). I’m hoping that we release a ten or eleven song LP at some point in 2021, as well.

At this point, I’d say we’re about halfway there.

More than anything, though, I think we’re all hoping to play shows at some point this year.

Fingers crossed.

facebook.com/astrologynowmusic

DANIEL BENNETT

Daniel Bennett is a visual artist and printmaker from Holland. Bennett builds unique wall sculptures that incorporate clocks. Lately, his work is focused on making linocut prints. He gets his inspiration from all kinds of media like old horror and science fiction films, comics, weird stories, and strange music.

planet-bennett.com

instagram.com/planet.bennett

MAYFLOWER MADAME

Darkness at the edge of town. Psych-Noir from Oslo, Norway.

Trond Fagernes talks with the Second Scene Interview: Tim Thomas

Photos: Tim Harris

How did the desolate surroundings influence the dark sounds of Mayflower Madame, as mentioned in your bio?

Well, I think the darkness was already there from the beginning, as some of my influences when we started out were early 80’s post-punk/darkwave bands as well as silent-era horror films. However, the initial idea of the band was to make noisy psych- and shoegaze-oriented music so, at least

think about it. I guess all of this had a decisive impact on why our music grew to be a darker and more «post-punkish» version of psychedelia and shoegaze than we originally intended.

on a subconscious level, I certainly believe our first rehearsal space (in an industrial area on the outskirts of Oslo, surrounded by grey factory buildings, and sharing the space with a carwash company) reinforced the somewhat cold and gloomy aspects of our sound.

I remember that this atmosphere felt inspiring rather than depressing, so that further helped me realize that this was a natural path to follow. There was no other bands rehearsing there, and I think that was also to our advantage. We sort of had our own isolated space where we could make music uninterrupted without knowing (or caring) what others might

we had a very rigid sense of what kind of music we wanted to make, so it was hard to find the right people to complete the band. After a long search, we met our original bassist (Petter) through a mutual friend, and he knew of a drummer (Ola). Even though we had different musical backgrounds, they were open to new ideas and liked our song sketches.

Already on our first rehearsal, it was pretty clear that the four of us were a good fit.

So when things finally started happening, they happened fast, and not long thereafter, we played our first show and recorded a 4-track demo.

Tell us how Mayflower Madame came to be?

In the beginning, we were just two guitarists with some trippy riffs and a lot of loose ideas, but at the same time,

What have been the most significant influences on the group? Be it music, art, film & literature.

It’s hard to pinpoint the most significant ones as we’re not really aware of our influences when writing songs. We always try to let that process happen naturally without predetermined goals.

But, of course, I’ve been inspired by a lot of bands and artists and, to drop a few names, I guess it’s a combination

How is the group dynamic as far as songwriting and arranging songs? Do you write as a group or individually?

It usually starts with me having some guitar riffs and an outline of a song.

Then I introduce it to the other guitarist (Håvard), and together we develop these ideas further before we start completing the song as a full band.

That’s the most common process, but a few songs have also been conceived as

of some early psychedelia like The Velvet Underground and Syd Barrett, some post-punk bands like The Cure and Bauhaus and some later shoegaze/ neo-psychedelic bands like My Bloody Valentine, Psychic Ills and A Place To Bury Strangers. As a student of art history, that has also provided a lot of inspiration for me personally, especially the German Expressionist movement of the early 20th century as well as many Surrealist artists of the 1920s and -30s. And as mentioned, silent-era horror films could also be added to our list of influences.

an improvised jam during rehearsal. The vocals often come in late; usually, I finally decide on the lyrics and melody while recording the song.

What can you tell us about the music scene in Oslo? Is there a vibrant Psych/ Shoegaze scene, or is Mayflower Madame a band of outsiders?

It’s a quite vibrant scene in general, but there’s not many bands in our genres. Hard rock, punk, hip-hop, or more commercial types of music are really dominating the city’s music scene nowadays. There was a small wave of shoegaze bands when we started

out, and there was also a community centered around Oslo Psych Fest, which was really important for bringing in international bands to both the festival and club nights, but I feel that the scene has been slowly dying since the festival ended 4-5 years ago. I guess we’ve always felt like outsiders in Oslo/Norway, but especially during the recent years, and that’s also why we’ve mainly had an international focus.

How does touring across Scandinavia compare to touring Europe and North America?

Scandinavia and Europe are pretty much the same. There’s actually not that much of a different experience touring North America either - except that there are greater distances between the big cities, which means that we spend most of our time driving to the next show. Overall, we feel that our music has been equally well-received on both continents. One difference is that we are better known in Europe, and there seem to be more promoters specialized on our kind of music, while in the US, it’s mostly regular venues that book the shows, so it can be harder to reach the right crowd. In other words, you’re more dependent on the promotion and perhaps also playing with fitting local bands. On the other hand, another difference is that many Americans find it exotic that we’re from Norway and seem to be extra supportive just because of that. To sum it up, we have been feeling very welcome and love touring on both sides of the Atlantic.

What have been some of the high points as well as low moments since forming in 2011?

Luckily, there’s been most of the high points. Our very first highlight was to be named «Unsigned band of the week» on

one of Norway’s biggest radio channels and getting national airplay already with our first proper demo. Then in 2013, we released our debut EP «Into the Haze» and was booked to play Norwegian Wood Festival alongside the likes of My Bloody Valentine and Nick Cave, which was certainly another special moment in the starting phase of the band. The most important highlight in the band’s history was probably the release of our debut LP «Observed in a Dream» in 2016, which received rave reviews and brought us out on tours in North America and Europe during the following years. We also got to share the stage with some of our favorite current bands like Psychic Ills, Moon Duo, Froth, and The Underground Youth. The last highlight is undoubtedly the release of this year’s long-awaited sequel, our second LP, “Prepared for a Nightmare,” and we’re especially glad for the great feedback we’ve received. Unfortunately, 2020 was also the year for the lowest moment in the band’s history, as we had big plans and were about to embark on album tours in both the US and Europe when the corona pandemic broke out.

What does Mayflower Madame have planned next?

Since we unexpectedly got a lot of free time when our touring plans were canceled, we have already started writing for a new album, so maybe there won’t be that long before our next release. We’re currently also working to reschedule and book new shows/tours for the second half of 2021. Hopefully, it will be possible to tour again from Spring and onwards. I have to admit that the title of our current album, “Prepared for a Nightmare,” fits even better for these times than I had imagined, and we don’t know yet where we’re going from here, but we’ll certainly keep on exploring new ideas in the foreseeable future.

facebook.com/mayflowermadame

Second Scene recently had a chance to catch up with the two principal members of Pinky Doodle Poodle, a rock band from Japan, currently based in the United States (Georgia). Hi George and Yuria, thank you for taking the time to chat about the band with Second Scene. So let’s get started.

PDP: Hi, Second Scene! Thank you very much for having us. We are excited!

TT: So the first question on everyone’s mind is what does the name Pinky Doodle Poodle (PDP for short) mean, and where did the name come from?

PDP: The band name “Pinky Doodle Poodle” comes from a costume name of an American doll, “Blythe.” That doll has many costumes, and each of the costumes has each name. One is

“Pinky Doodle Poodle”. Also, some Japanese friends said that Yuria looks like “Blythe.” That’s why.

Additionally, the sound of “Pinky Doodle Poodle” is interesting for us, like a tongue twister.

TT: How long have you been together as a band, and what brought you together? What is your musical style and vision?

PDP: We formed this band in 2008. Three people started PDP. At that time, we had a bass player as a member, and Yuria played the guitar.

We are just friends. So “Let’s do a rock band!”, like that. But since the bass player is a webdesigner and too busy to do it, he left the band.

Then Yuria switched the guitar to bass. From the beginning, our vision is to become successful overseas. We think our music is ‘ROCK’ music influenced by ’50s, ’60s, ’70s rock, punk, funk, blues music.

PINKY DOOD

TT: Growing up in Japan, what music inspired you? Was it music from Japan or other parts of the world?

PDP: Yuria grew up in a musical family. Her grandfather was a conductor of his swing jazz band.

Her father was also a clarinet, sax, jazz player.

Listening to music, especially swing jazz music, was very common for her. George’s father was a common Japanese businessman. He loves Western culture, such as music, movies. He often listened to western music at home when George was a kid. We both had surroundings of American and European music by chance.

TT: Just to clarify, are you from Tokyo? How is the music scene there different from other cities in Japan? How is it different from the music scenes in America or the U.K. and Europe?

PDP: We both were born in Osaka. But, since we have been living in the Tokyo area for a long time and we started this band in Tokyo, we can say PDP is from Tokyo, Japan. Honestly, we don’t know must about the recent Japanese music scenes. Maybe, anime and girl’s group music might be very popular still. Also, we have not gone to Europe for a long time. So we can not tell you the difference.

TT: So as a band, you’ve based yourself in the U.S. for the past few years, particularly in Georgia, the American South – how do you find the reactions from audiences there? And why have you chosen the American South rather than other regions in the States, particularly places like Los Angeles, California, for instance?

PDP: Hahaha! Is it interesting, isn’t it!? It’s going to be a long story. PDP used to belong to the

DLE POODLE Interview: Terry Thomas

record company, which is based in Buffalo, NY. We were supposed to stay there and looking for a place we could stay. But we could not find out the place in a good condition. When we had a tour in the southeast area, we had a gig with the Athens, GA based band called “Five Eight” in Tampa, FL. The gig with “Five Eight” was great, and we liked each other. At that time, the drummer who lived in Atlanta, GA, joined PDP as a support drummer. Since we had not found the place in Buffalo, NY, we changed our minds and tried to look for a place around Atlanta. But still, it’s difficult. At the same time, we sent a message to the bass player of that “Five Eight” with another matter. At the end of the message, we added the sentence, like “We are looking for the place where we can stay around Atlanta now.

So looking forward to the gig with your band...”.

And then the bass player gave us a reply, “I have an extra room that I don’t use. you can stay if you want.”. Two months later, we were in Athens, GA. Honestly speaking, anywhere in the US was fine for us if we can play our music. As a result, we came to Athens, GA. TT: You’ve toured in the States quite extensively, and in fact, I actually met you in Pittsburgh a couple of times when I was based there. Coming from Japan, how would you characterize the difference in audiences in the American South from the North based on your touring experiences and interactions?

PDP: We’ve mainly toured in the east area these years. We don’t know the difference between the audiences of South and North. Fortunately, we get good feedback from both audiences when we did a gig.

TT: What is your favorite attribute about American audiences?

PDP: Most of the American audiences start to dance once we start to play. We love it!!

TT: I assume you have been well-received here in America, and from personal experience I’ve seen that you have, but have you encountered any awkwardness when playing to American audiences, or is that music truly is an International language in that respect?

PDP: We have not encountered any awkwardness until now. Some people like our music,

some don’t like it. Of course, we hope everyone enjoys the PDP music. But it’s just music. It’s OK. Yes, we believe that music is an international language.

TT: Since PDP has been continuously touring, I’m sure you have some great experiences and stories to share with our readers. What is one of your most memorable stories from the road?

PDP: Hahaha! Some people describe that PDP is a wolf in sheep’s clothing (poodle’s clothing?). We are aggressive in a gig, but it’s in a positive way, not the scary way. We release the happy energy/power to the audience. Some people who watch a PDP show for the first time might be surprised. We are always glad to see their happy smile after our show.

TT: And when I talk about the members of PDP, I should clarify to our readers that it’s mainly two members, George on guitar and Yuria on bass and lead vocals. But you do have a drummer when you play live, so is there a permanent drummer, or is that a revolving position in the band?

PDP: Correct! There is not a permanent drummer.

We always hire a drummer when we have a gig.

TT: I see recently that PDP is working on some new music. Can you tell our readers about that?

When can we expect to hear your recent efforts?

PDP: We went back to Japan for the visa issue last year. It took a long time to get it more than we expected. Also, since we were transformed to the new record company, we are supposed to release the new album this year. So we prepared/made lots of new songs during the stay in Japan. Since our tour was canceled and we are locked down here, we did a DIY recording at home. And then, three acoustic songs were released in July, and two electric songs were launched in November. We are ready for more recording anytime if the record company and the drummer were good to do it.

TT: With the topic of new music, this is a good time to ask about your creative process. Where do you get your inspiration for songs?

PDP: Nothing special! We always image the listener’s smile.

TT: How do you usually write? As a team, or do you bring ideas in separately?

PDP: George makes songs, the drum pattern, bass, guitar phrases, and vocal melody. And then, Yuria writes the lyrics. We are a good team.

Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/ pinkydoodlepoodle YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/ user/PINKYDOODLEPOODLE Twitter: https://twitter.com/pdp_jp

TT: Who writes the lyrics? Is that also a joint effort?

PDP: Yuria writes all lyrics.

TT: Before we wrap up our time together, is there any message PDP would like to communicate with their fans?

PDP: Hi, Second Scene readers! Hope you are doing very well. Now, we all are having a pretty tough and weird time. But we’re looking forward to seeing you soon. PDP is based in the US right now, but we would like to perform/play all over the world. Until then, stay safe and healthy!!

TT: Do you ever disagree on songs or musical vision? How do you resolve that? Is there a compromise?

PDP: There is no compromise. As mentioned earlier, George makes songs, and Yuria writes the lyrics. Our role is very clear.

TT: Since touring is on hold for now, how does the band keep busy other than practicing and recording? Also, what’s next for PDP in addition to recording new material?

PDP: We keep uploading the videos called “Live at Home” on the PDP YouTube channel. We play and shoot the video, edit it, and upload it.

It’s pretty busy because we are not good at making the video. And yes, recording new material is our top priority.

TT: Since your typical way to engage with your fans is during your live performances, have you been able to continue engaging with your fans despite the separation brought on by the pandemic? How so, and have you had to be creative or re-invent yourselves in any way or take advantage of technology to do that?

PDP: Live performances are the best way for us.

But thanks to the internet, we can engage with the listeners/audiences through SNS, such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, etc.

We can do live stream things, like ’Live. Me’, ‘BigoLive.’ It’s useful and thankful.

TT: So talking about new music and fan engagement, this is a good point in the interview to ask where fans old and new can find the band online, access your music and videos, and communicate with you. Can you provide some links for our readers?

PDP: Why not! website: https://pinkydoodlepoodle.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ pinkydoodlepoodle/

TT: Well, George and Yuria, I want to thank you both for sitting down with Second Scene to talk about PDP for our readers. We all wish you well during this difficult time, and hopefully, you’ll be out touring again soon. Until then, we look forward to hearing your new music and also catching up with you again in the future.

DUG MOORE Dug Moore, who calls Los Angelas home, is a well-traveled photographer with a background in postproduction. He is currently developing documentaries and music videos as both a director and story producer.

Who was the most significant influence on you to pick up a camera?

Long ago, an artist friend named Ray De La Cruz gave me a camera he was going to throw out. It was a really old Pentax from the late fifties. He had used it to take slides of his artwork and had just gotten a new automatic camera that was simple to use.

Around that time, I had really gotten into W. Eugene Smith due to his brilliant work with Kodak Tri-X film, and later with Robert Mapplethorpe. Their composition and prints were mind-blowing and I suddenly saw the world in a new way. Both also took some iconic shots of musicians I like as well, such as Bob Dylan and Patti Smith. Eugene Smith had such dedication to both photography and social justice that was unparalleled...it’s actually hard to fully comprehend his commitment. After being abroad for Fifteen years I had a different perspective on going to live shows and met local LA band photographer Scott Free. Connecting with him was paramount as he encouraged me to take more photos and make more videos.

What do you look for in a subject?

I look for a certain energy in a subject. Not necessarily high energy, but it’s a feeling that’s difficult to articulate. It sounds aloof or evasive, but I really can’t explain it. It’s similar to music. I love a lot of different styles, and it’s impossible to tell you if I am going to like a new song or not. It isn’t based on any specific genre or criteria. Music is the closest thing I know of that feels like magic or spirituality. It’s a feeling. It’s like falling in love. How can I know when or if that will happen, what that person would be like, or who it wouldn’t be? It’s just a feeling that I don’t understand, but I like it. I didn’t do a good job of answering that question, did I? How have you grown as a photographer over the years?

These days I take more chances as a photographer.

Different types of people, different situations, gear, and techniques. This can be awkward at times, and it doesn’t always turn out as expected; sometimes, it works out better than I thought it would! Occasionally I collect different types of glass containers, old bottles and shoot through them to get an analog feeling that is abstract. Or I will try some random film stock from China or Russia, and process it in the “wrong” chemicals. Either way, I learn a lot when I try these things; that’s all part of the magic, just like music.

STREET PLAY

V.E.X.

THE BLESSINGS SPRAIN

TRAMP FOR THE LORD

dugmoore.com

R I C K Y M A Y M I

INTERVIEW: TIM THOMAS

PHOTO: JENNIFER KALPIN

How many records do you own? Do you know the total number of records you have collected?

Well, over 2,700 stand-alone vinyl LP’s, not including vinyl box sets, I have about 70 of those, I have over 1,000 7” 45’s, almost 700 vinyl 12” singles, over 100 10”s, over 1,250 CDs, about 50 CD box sets.

I have to believe you must be a wellorganized person to have that many records. How do you have them classified?

Alphabetically, genre, or region?

Yeah, first it’s by geographic region, then time period, then alphabetically What/who got you started collecting records?

My mother. Ha! She had all the UK pressings of the Beatles records. Everyone in my family had pretty good-sized record collections. I come from a very musical background. One of my uncles was in The Tubes, Another in Zolar X, then the Pushups; then he became a studio engineer for a while. The one from The Tubes went on to play with Todd Rundgren and The Grateful Dead. So there was a wide variety of music I was exposed to. My stepdad is a major folkie and classical buff, my real dad, was into Latin music. I played and studied in school: Sax and double bass.

I was learning synths and drums at that same time.

Coming from a musical family sets you up for the future as a professional musician. Did you ever have thoughts of doing something else besides music?

MEREDITH FESTIVAL/MELBOURNE AUSTRALIA

The original interview idea was to ask Ricky Maymi, guitarist for The Brian Jonestown Massacre, about his ten favorite records. That idea went out the window after he explained he could do a Top 10 from just about any country or city. Second Scene asks how he became such an avid collector?

Never once in my life had it ever occurred to me that I should do anything with my life that didn’t involve making and performing music.

Have you ever gone looking for a record and come across one you don’t remember buying and thinking what a great find?

I can’t say that I’ve taken very many chances on anything I didn’t already know I was going to love, etc. I know the story with pretty much everything I have in my collection. These days I get stuff from labels or artists in the mail, and often I am impressed by quite a lot of it. Mainly the Chinese bands.

What are you currently listening to? Do you go through phases where four or five records get repeated plays?

I’ve been listening to a lot of New Musik; New Musik was an early 80’s New Wave band with Tony Mansfield.

He was more well known for producing big 80’s records than for any of his own records and highly recommended!

Also listening to Thomas Leer’s The Scale Of Ten at least once a day, Ashes & Diamonds

by Zaine Griff, and anything by Thomas Dolby, Bill Nelson, or Yukihiro Takahashi. This is all kind of staple listening around my place.

Last night I was listening to Lloyd Cole’s Bad Vibes LP produced by Adam Peters of Bunnymen/Triffids fame. Fantastic stuff!

Do you remember the first record you bought with your own money? Who was it?

I bought Let’s Dance on cassette at Rainbow Records in Serramonte mall right when it came out! I was 10.

Let’s Dance by Bowie is a great first record.

I was around the same age and discovered Bowie (Let’s Dance) for the first time through MTV. MTV played a big part in influencing young minds. Can you remember others that caught your ear? For me, it was the Talking Heads.

I loved Human League, Culture Club, Men Without Hats, Thompson Twins, Naked Eyes, ABC. All of that stuff (still do!) Then later, it was Lloyd Cole & The Commotions, Love & Rockets, The Church, The Bunnymen, and of course Japan! All along, there was no escaping The Beatles or Bowie You are such an avid collector. Has this opened you up to discovering different genres of music you might otherwise have passed over?

Well, sure, in my travels, I get exposed to a lot of great stuff, often while on the hunt for specific kinds of things.

Sometimes you hear something playing in a shop, and it just grabs you. I’ve had that happen. Where I’m in a shop, and I have to know what they are playing, I usually end up buying it. There is a shop in Perth that’s excellent for that! It’s Diabolik Books and Records. If you walk in there and Scott is working, chances are you’re going to walk out having purchased whatever it was he was just listening to. He’ll point to a few other things you may like and end up liking and buying. Happens to me almost every time I go in there, which is why I try and avoid the place! Ha! No, I go there every chance I get!

You mentioned Diabolik Books and Records in Perth. What other record stores are a mustvisit on your travels?

Monorail in Glasgow, Licorice Pie in Melbourne, The Seekers in Melbourne, Round & Round in Melbourne, Plug 7 in Melbourne (Melbourne is the best for record shopping) Flying Out in Auckland. Indie Music Shop in Beijing. Fruity Shop in Beijing. In London, you’ve got Flashback, Reckless, Music exchange, Liverpool has Skeleton over in Birkenhead. Probe is good. Shit, I could go on and on. Red Eye in Sydney What is the most prized record in your collection?

Hmmm. That’s difficult to say. I have some very valuable ones, but they aren’t necessarily the ones I am the most attached to. I have some family heirloom type stuff.

Tubes records my uncle autographed to his parents, things like that. Records people gave me, 35 years ago. You know. Some private pressings of stuff. Even some of the stuff I’ve done. It seems I often make music with my friends for essentially sentimental reasons. We basically release an album as a snapshot of our time together—the David Neil record with Steve Kilbey, the Imajinary Friends LP, the Baihu CD. Music, and even records and CDs themselves, can be quite personal.

Is there one particular record that you are still searching for?

Even Stevens b/w Hypnotic Suggestion by The Vegetable Garden on Clarion Records.

60’s Perth band. It’s the only release by them. Very hard to find. I have the tracks on a comp, but I want that original 7”! Michael Head & The Red Elastic Band - Artorious Revisited EP. Seona Dancing - More To Lose 7”.

What can we expect from you as a musician post-pandemic?

New albums, tours, etc. Come to think of it, will there be anything released while we wait out the pandemic?

Well, let’s see... Many months have now passed since wrapping up all of the backing and instrumental tracks for the next Wild Swans LP in Liverpool with Marty Willson-Piper, Edgar Jones, Stuart Mann, Henry Priestman, and Richard Turvey filling out the album’s personnel, along with Paul Simpson and myself.

Hopefully, we’ll see this album, and perhaps even some live dates happening in 2021. Fingers crossed! Also, I’ve curated a collection of recordings of my uncle Ed’s old band from the late 70’s/1980 called The Pushups. It’s coming out on HoZac records.

The same label that did the Baby Grande LP. Steve Kilbey’s band before The Church.

Are you currently working remotely on any new recordings?

I’m currently recording my parts for the upcoming Brian Jonestown Massacre release(s) for 2021, and there should be live dates with BJM as well!

That’s exciting news about the new Brian Jonestown Massacre.

What can you tell us about the upcoming releases?

There will be several! So many new songs!! Really enjoying the stuff, Anton’s been writing lately!

Thank you for taking the time for this interview.

My pleasure, any time!

PHOTO: TESS PARKS

THE TELE Second Scene talks with Stephen Lawrie about Songs of Love and Revolution and the journey that brought him to this point.

LESCOPES Interview: Tim Thomas

Photos courtesy of Tapete Records

PHASE ONE

What has been the most significant influence on your songwriting in The Telescopes’ early days?

Be it music, art, cinema, or books?

I think poverty was the most significant influence.

There was no money to do anything except live inside your own imagination and write songs.

People often ask me how I got the sound on the early records, sometimes I think they expect some kind of ‘tech head’ response, but again, it was being hard up, using cheap or free equipment that nobody else wanted.

Obviously, I listened to bands like Suicide, The Velvet Underground, Stooges, and 13th Floor Elevators. That stuff is in the blood, so it’s always going to come out in some way. I remember the film River’s Edge inspiring me a little, and a book about the Marquis De Sade called Satan’s Saint

by Guy Endore, but I couldn’t tell you what lyrics they had an effect on if any.

I tend to absorb things in life that find a release through my songwriting. It can be anything, a conversation, a gripe against something, anything really.

And if so, how has it changed throughout the last three decades? Do you still pull from the same influences, or have you reached a point where you no longer find them viable?

It really is a case of anything that inspires. I’ll circle it in my head for days, thinking about it from all different perspectives until I’m absolutely overflowing, and it just pours out very quickly.

With multiple line-up changes over the years, is The Telescopes a group writing effort, or are you the sole songwriter?

99.9% of it is me. There have been occasions where someone has come up with a riff or a phrase or two, and I’ll take it and turn it into a song. The Infinite Suns album is an exception, however, as that was completely improvised with no preconceived ideas, so that album was a total collaboration.

Looking back at your early singles, do you have a favorite? Or is that something you don’t look back on?

I look back now and then.

Sometimes it’s unavoidable. I tend to prefer the tracks that weren’t on the A-side.

Especially with the records we did on Creation, the B sides are far more interesting to me.

By 1992 The Telescopes ceased operations (assuming you did as there wasn’t another release until 2002.) Why? I couldn’t see any way forward.

It seemed like everything had moved off course and lost touch with its original intentions. I had no idea that I would ever

go back to it. All the things I was working on at the time involved heavy studio schedules, sampling, and sequencing. When I parted ways with Creation, I didn’t have the budget for that anymore.

PHASE TWO

What did you do between 1992 and 2002?

I took courses in Desktop Publishing and Studio Engineering in order to become self-sufficient at recording my own music and creating my own artwork.

During that period of time, home computers were coming in and liberating musicians and artists from needing big studio budgets in order to realize their ideas. I had friends who were using the new technology to create Break-beat music and figured it wasn’t that far removed from what I was trying to do with Akai samplers back on Creation.

I think it all had quite an influence on the Third Wave album, which is about to be re-issued on vinyl by Weisskalt Records.

I also set up an experimental music label called Antenna Records and released albums by Fuxa, Los Planetos Del Agua, (who John Peel loved), O, Afghan, and a compilation of contemporary underground artists called Dream Frequencies.

Randall Nieman from Fuxa and Peter Green from Double Agent Records were very encouraging and instrumental in my return to making music as The Telescopes. Peter released the original version of Third Wave.

PHASE THREE

This is the tenth Telescopes album since 2002; much has changed since 2002 but even more so since 1992. Thirty-three years and releasing quality work is impressive. Where do you find inspiration and motivation?

It’s all I can do, really. I’ve tried my hand at other things, but none of them lasted long. In the end, you just have to accept that’s who you are and get on with it.

For the latest album, Songs Of Love And Revolution, how did you approach writing and recording the album in 2020? Were lockdowns and social distancing restrictions a strain on the process?

No, not really, I had to do everything myself, but that’s nothing new. I’ve made albums like that before. I had originally intended to work with the line-up I had been touring within 2019, but that wasn’t to be. On the one hand, it meant I got to make the album exactly how I envisaged it, but on the other hand, it is nice to be surprised by other people’s input.

The revolutionary spirit is alive and well in The Telescopes. From The Telescopes press release, there is mention of “The New Weird.” Can you expand upon this?

That’s not a phrase that anyone in our camp arrived at. I think it was used by The Quietus to describe us and other groups that have emerged over the past couple of decades and don’t fit into any one bracket, kind of like the new underground/resistance movement.

DISCOGRAPHY STUDIO ALBUMS

Taste (1989) The Telescopes (1992, later reissued as # Untitled Second) Third Wave (2002) #4 (2005) Hungry Audio Tapes (2006) Infinite Suns (2008) HARM (2013) Hidden Fields (2015) [1] As Light Return (2017) Stone Tape (2017) Exploding Head Syndrome (2019) Songs of Love and Revolution (2021)

SINGLES

Where will The Telescopes be taking themselves and the rest of us next?

The next couple of albums will be completely different. One of them is finished and should follow SOLAR, and I’m planning to commence work on the other one early in the new year.

Hopefully, after that, I can make a record with a full band again.

Thank you for taking the time to do this interview.

My pleasure. Thank you for your support.

facebook.com/thetelescopesuk tapeterecords.de/artists/the-telescopes

“Forever Close Your Eyes” (1988) (split 7” flexidisc with Loop) “Kick the Wall” (1989) “7th# Disaster” (1989) “The Perfect Needle” (1989) “To Kill A Slow Girl Walking” (1990) “Precious Little” (1990) “Everso” (1990) “Celeste” (1991) “Flying” (1991) “Where the Sky Is Low” (2003) (split 7” with Füxa) “Mooga Destroya” (2003) (split 7” with Lo Casta) “Winter EP” (2004) “Live At Audioscope” (2005) (split 10” with Vibracathedral Orchestra) “Night Terrors” (2006) “Psychic Viewfinder” (2007) “Another Whip” (2007) “Landing Shadows” (2011) “Black Eyed Dog” (2012) “We See Magic and We Are Neutral, Unnecessary” (2012) (7” flexi-postcard) “I Wanna Be Your Dog” (2015) (split 10” with A Place To Bury Strangers) “Thrown” (2015) (split 7” with Deadly Cradle Death) “The Telescopes | Flavor Crystals” (2016) (split 12” with Flavor Crystals) “Strange Waves” (2019)

The Telescopes are back with the band’s 12th album in a 30 plus year career on the outer edges of psyche rock and spaced out droning musical madness, always pushing at the boundaries and the edges of what you might expect to hear. This is not a band going out of its way to make new fans, but instead making the sounds they want to and letting the music go and find its own audience.

The album opens as it means to go on with the super dense This Is Not A Dream with loads of low-end fuzz and wailing distorted, distended guitar and vocals so buried in the mix as to almost be a texture rather than words, you can make out against the slow thumping drums and bass. This, like most of the album, sounds almost like it has been recorded through the walls, and all you hear is the sound that has bled through to become a sludge rock epic.

Strange Waves has almost metronomic drums anchoring everything else down as the guitars splash at your ears low in the mix set against droning bass and lost in the maelstrom vocals as if they want to explore the outer fringes of narcoleptic meditative theory shot through a prism of feedback.

Mesmerized, as the title suggests, is hypnotic slow wallow in the mire tune with a tambourine marking time slowly throughout as they take you deep down into the barely-there yet beautiful poetry of lust and

desire that has them Mesmerised no matter how listless they sound.

Come Bring Your Love is super slow, totally sparse rumination on Love that makes The Tindersticks sound upbeat and poppy and the mumbled barely their vocals seem in stark contrast to the guitar that strafes across this song, before it explodes like an intense orgasm midway though as if they have finally been allowed to do what they wanted to with the object of their desires.

This Train is re-imagined as a slow rumbling dead of night freight train slowly making its way across your speakers and splintering your mind into fractal pieces as you try to imagine playing this next to This Train

by Sister Rosetta Tharpe and asking people which is the best version as the distortions decimate against the insistent rumbling of the Train over the tracks.

Songs Of Love And Revolution isn’t exactly a rallying call to mount the barricades and tear down the current system, but it does have the sort of splenetic guitar that almost sounds like they are spraying the government with Rayguns and tasers just to watch them squeal in pain as the slow march towards progress continues monotonously on.

You’re Never Alone With Despair, and let’s face it, if you haven’t felt some despair at the world we live in during the last few years, where have you been? This is a slow whisper in your ear despair that occasionally lifts its head off the floor in case the odd shaft of light makes it through into this darkest of rooms in the dead of night.

We See Magic, And We Are Neutral, Unnecessary has what sounds like squalling violas and pounding drums fighting against the fog of distortion guitars overwhelming the breathy almost lost vocals as this builds ramming itself into your brain like the darkest of spells shattering your brain in shards of pain.

The album closes with Haul Away The Anchor that opens with lots of ambient seaside noise and an almost not there organ as if they want to soothe our tortured minds at the end of what almost feels like an exhaustive listening experience with the as ever on the fringes and pushing boundaries sounds of The Telescopes with the band’s own nursery rhyme.

Simon Phillips

GOD HATES UNICORNS

Why would God hate unicorns? These sparkly creatures of myth have always been a friend to mankind. Spreading their adorable imagery across the world in the form of t-shirts, stuffed animals, and stickers. “Surely God likes stickers!” you must be saying to yourselves. And let’s not forget, it was the pureness of the unicorn’s blood that allowed Voldemort to hold onto life in Harry Potter. That’s awesome as hell. You know that God read that and was like, “Damn! Unicorn blood brought Voldemort back?! That’s some powerful shit!” But I digress; this isn’t about the greatest fantasy franchise of the past two and a half decades. This is about a powerhouse of a Pittsburgh band. I sat down with frontman Joshua Hartz and the rest of the group to see what it’s been like writing, recording, and releasing content in the Hellstrom of 2020 and where the band’s sights are set as they get ready to drop their next album.

Interview & Photos: Dylan Chaz Mascellino

How did the band first come together?

Joshua Hartz: It was Jeff and me; we were boyhood friends at catholic school. Hung out all the time, and he played music.

We were in a high school band together, that was really terrible, some Nu-Metal bullshit. Time passed, the years went by, and we decided to do some music again. We actually wanted to fuckin’ start it as a blue-grass band. Neither one of us knew how to play the banjo, but I had a fuckin’ banjo. We were gonna call it ‘The Leaf Smuts.’ Which is this black mold that grows on Kentucky blue-grass. It was gonna be this mixture of industrial and blue-grass, but that never panned out to anything. So we just started playing around. I had previously been in electronic bands, so I was writing a lot of the electronics for it, and Jeff was playing bass through two different amps.

Our first show we played, it was me, Jeff, and then I had my buddy, Sean. He pressed the buttons on stage, do all of the sequencing for the stuff that I had written. I remember the sound was bad. I ended up not even performing. I was just laying on stage and walking around with a bull-horn yelling at people.

It was terrible- but I see my buddy Nick there, and I was like, “Hey man, what’d you think? You wanna join up and play guitar?”. And he ended up saying yes. A few years later, he ended up leaving, and we got Marcus and Tim from ‘Scratch.’ Who’ve been awesome additions to the band. Then we got Matt, who Marcus had met through an improv class. They think they’re pretty funny, but uh- no one else does, haha.

We hadn’t really become a full-fledged band up until about two years ago. Before then, it was a lot of fuckin’ around, we had an album out, but it was just white noise rock, real abrasive stuff. Now we’re starting to come into our own, hone in on what we’re doing, and how we’re going to make it work.

That growth is something that I’ve seen, even in this short time knowing you. I remember watching you guys play back in January, and you absolutely killed it. But there’s this refined quality to the two new singles, ‘It’s Not Real’ and ‘Puppeteer,’ that is really making them stand out from some of the older tracks.

JH: Everyone who has joined the band in the past few years has been an absolute godsend. From Marcus getting involved in the video and promotional side to Jess and everyone else coming together and solidifying our sound, things have definitely turned a corner. Before, it was like, “let’s make a lot of racket and let’s just be dickheads”, to now where it’s like, “Let’s make some good music and still be assholes.”

So a lot of that does come from us progressing as a band and as musicians, but also Johny at Razorblade Recordings. He’s fucking amazing, one of the best engineers I’ve ever worked with and heard in the city.

Johny does it all when we’re in the studio. We go out

there for the weekend; so far, we’re two weekends in. We have a few more vocal days, and we should be all set. He’s a very easy guy to work with. I mean, he works with us; gotta be pretty easy going if you’re gonna work with us.

What can you tell me about getting involved on the video side of things, Marcus?

Marcus Gabriel: That’s been taking up my life. I’m taking an editing class - it’s eating up my life. I can’t wait to just play guitar and not think about homework.

Just looking to get through the quarantine and play some shows.

Where did the name ‘God Hates Unicorns’ come from?

JH: That’s actually from the Creation Museum in Kentucky. We used to go down there to my buddy’s place and play shows by the Kentucky border.

They’re (The Creation Museum) the people that believe that dinosaurs lived with people, that the earth is like 7,000 years old. So me and my buddy Doug are walkin’ around there, and we were like, “Where are the fucking Unicorns at?” And I was like, “God Hates Unicorns.” That always stuck with me throughout the years. So we started playing shows and slowly started shifting from ‘The Leaf Smuts’ to ‘God Hates Unicorns’ because we thought it was funny. It’s almost zero divided by zero; it’s like ‘Nothing Hates Nothing.’

You guys have such a unique sound and stage presence. It’s hard to compare you to anyone. If I had to make a comparison, I’d say ‘Primus’ or ‘Buckethead.’ When you sit back and think about the band, who are some of the artists you look to for inspiration?

JH: We used to get a lot of ‘Butthole Surfers’ references when we played. We do get Primus a lot as well, probably because of Matt and his bass playing and my twang when I occasionally sing. I can’t even tell you why I sing with a twang half the time, but I do. But when it comes to inspiration, I don’t necessarily pull from what I’m listening to. In the beginning, when we were starting out, I was trying to draw from ‘Fetus’ and some early noise rock from the ‘80s and ‘90s. But now, with all these people in the band, it’s more a matter of gelling everyone’s ideas, where they came from, and their style. But for me, it was a lot of noise rock and post-punk. Joy Division, Nick Cave, stuff like that.

So we’ve already touched on it, but let’s dive in deeper to the recent lineup changes. Not only have you brought on a new member, but you’ve also made some instrument position changes as well.

time to practice keyboard and get a lot better at it.

What information can you give me on the new album?

JH: We moved Jeff from bass to keyboards and brought Matt in on bass. Matt and Marcus have a really good report as far as guitar and bass go, and Jeff is doin’ really great on keyboard, so I think it ended up working out great. And yes, we’ve added Jess Zoric to our ranks on vocals. She’s a great addition to the band, and our vocals mesh really well together. She’s just gonna have to make sure I don’t run her over on stage. We both move around a lot. We may need to coordinate dance moves or something. I’m very negligent, I was gonna say clumsy, but I’m negligent on stage. That was our biggest problem before, me. We’d play shows, and I would break equipment accidentally.

How are you liking being a part of the group Jess?

Jess Zoric: I don’t even know what happened. One day Josh is standing outside of one of my shows, holding up a sign that said ‘Jess Can’t Dance,’ and now I’m here. I don’t really know how that happened, but here we are, and it’s been pretty great!

How’ve you been doing through quarantine with the band, Matt?

Matthew Crippen: I can sum that up with one action; a lot of pickling. I’ve been doing a lot of jarring and pickling. Anything, socks, ya know, old tires. Been laying down some fat tracks and gettin’ nasty, ya know, full-on.

Are you enjoying playing the keys, Jeff?

Jeff Snow: Being an aspiring pianist, which I always love saying it’s too funny, I figure this gives me a lot of

JH: Well, it’s going to be an eleven-track album, with one cover. The cover’s a Shania Twain song, acting as a bonus track. Technically a ninetrack album, with two bonus tracks. We did a re-recording of ‘Chipped Ma’am’ with Jess Zoric on it. That’s actually going to be our next music video coming out. We have some cool stuff planned for this album. Can’t wait till it’s done, and we can actually release it to somebody.

You can’t fucking do anything with it now, with no one able to go out. We want to do physical copies, as well as digital, but we want to make it special.

Can’t go into too much detail, but I have some fun stuff planned for a physical release. We’re thinking a spring or a late winter release, somewhere between February and April. I was thinking Good Friday would be a fun day to drop it. Our next single’s going to be coming out on Christmas, so might as well, ya know, keep up with the whole religious thing. And I can give you the album title. We’re going to call it ‘No Glory Holes in Heaven.’ Every song is about God or Sex. We’re two singles in, and we want to release two more before it drops, just to get more heat behind it.

Smart strategy. If you’re thinking of a potential April release, just going off the release of ‘It’s Not Real,’ you’ve laid a year’s worth of runway for yourselves.

JH: That seems to be how a lot of people are doing it nowadays, like not releasing a whole album right away. They’re trying to build shit up and releasing four-song EP’s or two songs at a time to build up to release. In a digital age, you have to keep people’s attention; you have to keep releasing things. We will do a physical release party when the album drops, provided COVID restrictions don’t prohibit it. It’ll be invite-only. We’re all being very careful, doing our part. Wearing our masks and being safe. We are thinking of live-streaming it, though, or at the very least recording it and uploading it later. But right now, to have an open seating release show would be irresponsible and possibly dangerous. It makes even practicing nerve-wracking. What if one of our coworkers gets the virus? What if one of us gets exposed? I’m even homeschooling my son right

now, just to keep the family exposure to anything down. We’re just trying to do our part as a band to be smart, but at the same time progress and get shit accomplished, which in a way quarantine has helped with by allowing us to get more planning and behind the scenes shit done. If we were playing shows every month or every other week, we probably wouldn’t have gotten all the things done that we have this year.

I’ve been in the same spot this year on the photo and video side of things. I had a lot of gigs canceled. And while it was disappointing to have to back-burner those opportunities, it has been nice to take a step back, focus and dial in on a lot of projects.

JH: Exactly, it gave you time to focus your energy in a positive manner. Even though it killed a lot of fucking prospects, it also gave you time to reflect and think about what you’re doing and how you’re doing it.

Can you tell me a bit about your experiences in the Pittsburgh music scene as a whole?

JH: I’ve been in the Pittsburgh scene for twenty plus years now. It’s gone through phases. I’ve worked with bands from all genres across the city, like ‘The Moat Rats’ and ‘Back Alley Sound.’ Bands with sounds that aren’t even close to what we’re doing, but they’re extremely easy to work with. The VS Fest is the perfect example of that; they come from all over the place.

That was going to probably be THE show of the year for me, ya know? We had about eighteen great

acts, three or four artists. It was going to be crazy. But ya, the city’s pretty tight-knit. We definitely have our fallbacks that we love playing with. Like Skye Light, we regularly like to hit up for shows.

What else can fans expect to drop before the album?

I know you said you wanted to drop another single on Christmas. Any more information on that?

JH: Yeah, we’re dropping the song ‘Gothic Jesus’, which seemed appropriate. And ‘Chipped Ma’am’ will be the next one after that. Marcus is editing the video for that now. Our buddy Patrick Hogan shot most of it.

Beyond the album coming out, what else do you have you have planned for 2021?

JH: A lot of promotion for the album, the release itself, and beyond that, it’s just so up in the air. We’ll start writing and go back to the drawing board until we can actually do stuff again. Hopefully, get out of Pittsburgh for some shows. We’re trying to get traction in different cities and demographics. Finally getting some radio play for our latest single ‘Puppeteer.’

Beyond that, we just don’t know. If this were a regular year, we’d probably release the album in December.

Then hit the road and immediately start playing shows. For now, we’re just gonna promote the thing as much as we can.

facebook.com/Godhatesunicorns

1C

an we start with a bit of background, where has the musical journey taken you so far and what music and artists have inspired you along the way?

Since the beginning of my solo project as Nero Kane, I’ve been through many satisfying things. Starting from the collaboration with Joe Cardamone (ex-The Icarus Line) for the recording in Los Angeles of my debut album “Love In A Dying World” (American Primitive 2018) and the film shot in California by my partner Samantha Stella and scored with my music, to the many shows that we played together both in Europe and Italy till the last UK Tour made in February 2020 and ended just before the beginning of the pandemic.

After this, all the process that led me to write and record my new album “Tales of Faith and Lunacy” (Nasoni Records 2020), produced by Matt Bordin and released last October, which has been gaining amazing reviews and appreciation and was listed among 2020 best albums in many charts.

Along the way, I’ve been inspired by so many artists, but I’d like to mention in particular: Nick Cave, Nico, Swans, Johnny Cash, Mark Lanegan, Wovenhand, PJ Harvey, Neil Young.

How did you and Samantha Stella end up working together?

Please tell us about your audio and visual collaborations.

We collaborate since 2015. Basically, all has started when I asked Samantha to shot some promotional videos for one of my previous records. From this moment, our two worlds, that are really similar and complimentary, began to mix with each other, and our collaboration has given birth to new projects. The performance “Hell23”, presented in 2016 in Milan and Los Angeles at the Italian Cultural Institute, was the first step. The following year Samantha shot the film “Love In A Dying World” based on the music of my debut album, then I asked her to join me on stage on vocals and keyboards for the live promotion of the record. I ended up writing new songs, and I asked her to add some lyrics and to sing them because I really appreciate her vocals and imagination. This last step took shape with this new record and a short film made up of two episodes, “Lord Won’t Come” and “Mechthild,” that we shot together for the new release. Samantha has an aesthetic taste and a visual approach that really permeates my music and my visions.

1

There is a wonderful mix of The Old West and a wonderfully bleak Dystopian future landscape Being painted on the album Tales of Faith and Lunacy, where do you draw your inspirations from to build and populate that place?

I have many sources of inspiration. Literature, poetry, paintings, and movies, first of all. To be more specific, for this new album, I’d like to mention these artists with their relative works: movies, like the darkness of Béla Tarr’s “The Turin Horse,” the desert territories of Wim Wenders’ “Paris, Texas,” the shamanic spirit of Jim Jarmusch’s “Dead Man,” and novels, like the visionary border landscapes of Cormac McCarthy, and in particular “The Road,” or John Williams’ “Butchers’ Crossing.” And also ancient writings like “The Flowing Light of the Godhead” by Mechthild of Magdeburg, a thirteenth-century German Christian mystic.

And music, of course, with the artists mentioned in my first reply.

And again, it is a place where religious imagery is very prominent, particularly on songs such as Mechthild and Lord Won’t Come, does this come from a personal place or is it more an artistic feature?

I would say both. As a songwriter, I’d like to investigate those topics that are part of our life, such as love and death, darkness and light, and of course, religion. Although I can’t say I’m a religious person, I’m really attracted by these aspects, how they determine our path and how we face them. On the other side, also the aesthetic, religious imaginary play an important role that I think it’s deeply connected to my Italian origins and heritage, which are dominated by Christian culture.

If Tales of Faith and Lunacy was the soundtrack to a Hollywood movie, and I think it should be, who would star in it?

Vincent Gallo and Juliette Lewis or William Dafoe and Tilda Swinton.

You’ve released this album through several different labels simultaneously, and the reaction has been solidly positive.

Has it been a challenge getting the word out to the world about this new album?

This has really been a wonderful experience. We are working on this and also with Shauna (founder of Shameless Promotion PR), who has been very kind and there has been a good success and communication with her during the PR campaign.

Which artists these days do you see as your ‘kin’?

David Eugene Edwards/Wovenhand, Nick Cave, Michael Gira/Swans, Mark Lanegan, Lingua Ignota, Anna Von Hausswolff.

And where next for Nero Kane, both musically and otherwise?

I’ve started to write new songs for a new album. I also would like to go back to tour as soon as possible, but in the meanwhile, I’m looking forward to enter the studio for a new chapter of my music/story.

Dark Psychedelia At Work

Nero Kane Interview: Dave Franklin

Photo: Samantha Stella

PLEASING FORMS HAPPINESS IS A WRECK

pleasingforms.bandcamp.com/album/happiness-is-a-wreck

PSYCHODAISY

sos2020pgh.org/concerts

KATHY GILBERT Kathy Gilbert is a professional painter living and working in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Her landscapes are painted in a contemporary impressionist style.

She has exhibited in the Carnegie Museum of Art, Westmoreland Museum of Art, Southern Allegheny Museum of Art, and the Butler Museum of Art.

Contact: kgilbertpaints@yahoo.com

From the Perfect Disaster to solo artist Philip Parfitt just released the excellent and careerdefining Mental Home Recordings.

Here’s what he had to say.

PHILIP PARFITT Interview: Tim Thomas Photos: Jean-Charles Feunteun

Let’s start with your latest recording, your second solo album, “Mental Home Recordings.” Where did you draw influence from when it came to writing songs for this album?

Well, that’s an interesting question. I draw a lot from experience, dreams, and imagination like any other writer. The key to it for me is to step outside of my head and look back in as a spectator.

Are there any particular experiences you pulled from that you could share, if not too personal for the Mental Home Recordings?

From my earliest memories, I’ve always been some kind of chronicler or medium as if I was witnessing or writing someone else’s life. I’ve amassed a large volume of musings over many years. I have a pretty good memory, and constant writing probably helps that there’s a lot of material to draw on life and all its Ups and Downs How does it affect you when digging through the past, opening up all those old feelings for better or worse?

It doesn’t really work like that (digging through the past) as such I play, and if something like a motif or riff or chord sequence comes through to me, that promotes some kind of memory or feeling belonging to a certain moment or period of time in my life or a particular person or relationship or event. Then I go with it and develop it. It’s always a flow thing. I just tap it when I need it, or it taps me when it needs to be heard.

With a six-year gap between releases, how would you compare your first solo release with your latest release? How do they stack up against your work with The Perfect Disaster?

I’m not the man I used to be. I wanted to do something a little different to what I’d already done with previous recordings and albums. Obviously, there is, though, a strong thread running through all my work. My writing style and lyrical content, my voice, and playing is practically the same. How it stacks up is difficult to say and probably not objectively knowable to me at this point, but the response has been really cool so far What did you get up to in those years between 2014 and 2020?

I was mainly living off-grid in a very old Watermill in circa 17th-century bits of it even earlier, bringing up my young family How have you changed as a songwriter since your time with The Perfect Disaster?

I’ve changed to some extent with more experience, of course, but also I’ve managed to be free of band egos and record company shackles. I’m free to do what I want and follow a path to wherever it takes me as far as is possible. I never stop writing as such, so expect more of the same with twists and turns the deeper I go down the wormhole of my psyche What have been your main influences as a songwriter since the days when you started until now? Be it music, books, cinema, etc.

Life experience has been the biggest influence overall, losing people, finding people. Sometimes in the most extraordinary circumstances. I seem to be one of those types who attract a certain kind of person or persons that never allow life to be dull, or maybe I always notice the crazy in everything. I don’t know? I’m happy like that though I’m interested in many forms of music from early folk and blues, 60’s 70’s music of innumerable genre, jazz classical avantgarde as well as rock, pop, film soundtracks, field music, you name it. Cinema everything from Art house to hardcore Documenta, literature too, from the classics to pulp as long as it’s cool, Dada Surrealist to Dostoyevsky

So many kinds of Art actually please me too many to mention. As long as it feels like it’s aiming to transcend normal states of consciousness, I’m in.

Let’s go back to the beginning. What set you on the path to being not just a musician but a songwriter?

Probably listening to the music in the house as a child, I have elder siblings, and the house was constantly filled with music Beatles, Stones, Kinks, Pretty Things, Hendrix, Small faces, Pink Floyd, Dylan, etc., as well as Morricone and John Barry. I always loved film scores; however, Dylan made the transitional link from poetry to music that really opened my mind. I remember hearing Bringing It All Back Home when it came out, and I kinda thought, wtf is that in a very good way. Much later, I had very much my own tastes. Bowie the Velvets that oeuvre struck something, but it was all connected in a seamless way to me, but literature was always in there, as was film. Dylan Thomas was and still is a great love and an inspiration in terms of writing. After those very early years, I hardly made any distinctions between the genres of painting, writing, film, and poetry. I just searched for what I liked and followed it.

There were many pivotal moments, seminal books, films, music. I mean, how many lists do you need? I could literally never stop.

What were the records that made the biggest impression on you as a youth?

Coltrane( John and Alice ), Monk, Mingus, John Lee Hooker, Jimmy Reed, Fred Neil, Alex Chilton/Big Star reams and reams. I think the first two groups I wanted to join were The Spenser Davis Group and the Small Faces.

I remember thinking at that tender age of 7, “I could do that job” obviously, I had little clue as to what, but I was already singing in the school choir, so I knew how to get a vibe going, so to speak.

facebook.com/p.mused.on

As we do this interview, the reviews for Mental Home Recordings have been coming in. They have all been very positive. How does that make you feel? Does it even matter?

Well, this is an interesting question because it does matter in many respects. In the sense that it means something, it matters because potentially it makes life easier for my label and their distribution network, it potentially makes it easier for people to make choices about what they listen to or even purchase, and also it is very cool to receive positive feedback from people, many of whom are fellow musicians, many of whom are not musicians but folks who have followed me for a very long time, plus a good number of folks who’ve just discovered my work for the first time, for those I am eternally grateful, but (inevitably there is one ) in truth I haven’t got too much time to wonder what other people think! I’m too busy wondering what I think and why!

What do you have planned next?

I’m well on the road to the next album, writing and recording, but the next project that will surface probably will be a project with Japanese visual multimedia artist Motoko Tachikawa comprising of two books and a Cd of reworkings of my song/poem John Clare. Work on that is currently well underway; there will be exhibitions in Paris and various other major cities in France and Europe as well as London, Tokyo, and hopefully the USA if plans go well. Artworks and the book/cd will be commercially available from Bandcamp and other outlets.

As well as at the exhibitions. Then after that, a new album from me and maybe some live performances if we are ever allowed and anywhere to play actually exists anywhere anymore.

PHILIP PARFITT - MENTAL HOME RECORDINGS

I don’t know if it was a conscious move on Philip Parfitt’s part or not, but the cover of this, his second solo album, seems to be a metaphor for the music found within. Take a glance, and you easily register the main component and themes, look again, and see small and wonderfully clever details that you missed when you first laid eyes upon it. And so to every time that you cast your eyes across its beguiling motifs, over and over again.

you get tuned to its subtle ways.

And so it is with the music which makes up the brilliantly titled Mental Home Recordings. On the surface, it is mostly a collection of gently lilting, folkinfused alternative sounds, conjure as much out of moods and atmospheres as it is from sonic moves and musical grooves. But, like the picture I have just described, each subsequent play reveals more and more hidden depths as

Somebody Called Me In might seem to be merely the sound of a “guy with a guitar,” and those who might describe it in much less than gracious ways wouldn’t be wholly wrong. But that would give away the fact that they had totally missed the chiming sonics in the background, the shimmering undercurrents, the haunting, whispered lyrical lines bubbling up from below the waterline, the slow waltz of sound dancing with sentiment across a deserted dance floor.

And when more weight is called for, such as on the recent single All Fucked Up, it is added through hazy textures and resonant guitars rather than anything so pedestrian and crass as volume control. Are We Really Still The Same? It seems to build unavoidable dynamic and drama out of very little, sparing chords and the occasional crashing sonic jolt, My Love is whispered yet euphoric, and I Saw There Beside Me mixes classical grace with the echo of Lou Reed’s urban musings.

Even having been so long in the game, steering bands such as The Perfect Disaster and Oediupussy to critical recognition and rubbing shoulders with the likes of Jason Pierce and Terry Bickers on various projects, Mental Home Recordings is proof, if proof were needed, that Philip Parfitt is still capable of suggesting new sonic benchmarks for himself and then out-reaching even those dizzying heights. Simon Phillips

reception of your music. Stay true to yourself.

Frontwoman Christina Santavicca discusses her journey through the local music scene.

When did you first realize your love of music?

That would’ve probably been upon my first eclectic selection of albums before I was ten years old. That would consist of Ozzy, Michael Jackson, Cindy Lauper, Duran Duran, Chicago, Queen, and Chipmunk Punk.

How many instruments do you play?

Well, I play any that I can, but how well would be another question. Haha. I do play guitar, drums, keyboard, and bass.

I have a sax that I still need to master.

What was the first instrument you learned to play?

My first instrument was a stupid flute. Yeah, that’s hard, right? I was probably in third grade. I specifically remember a concert where no one else showed up. I had to play “99 Luft Balloons” solo. That was scary shit.

What came first for you? Singing or instruments?

Singing definitely came first because vocals are free.

Tell me about your first band; how old were you, and how did it come to be?

Oh, haha. That would have been when I was 19 or so. I was in a band with my older brother Damion. He was on rhythm guitar. Some of my dearest friends were also in the band; Tommy Auxer (drummer), Jay Watrowski (lead), and Chris Parrish (bass). The band was really fun. We only had one original, and I growled on it. One of our covers included “Leper Messiah.”

What’s it like to be a frontwoman?

There honestly is nothing at all that compares to singing to a crowd and having them receive what you’re delivering.

Every artist wants that. But, rest assured that even though I’ve been on stage since I was five years old, I still get nervous—every single time.

What words of advice do you have for girls wanting to get into music?

(Christina chuckles) Well, I’d have to go on defense with the industry first. Being a female in a male industry is tough. It’s very tricky. So, beyond any advice coming from that avenue, I would have to say, don’t let anyone make you doubt yourself.

Listen to feedback but listen more to the reactions from the

How long has The Shadow Event been together, and how did you come about? Can you talk a bit about the other members?

The Shadow Event began in 2015, and it’s kind of an interesting story that not many people know about actually.

Three of the members, me included, were actually in an old band a few years out of high school.

In 2015 we decided to get together with the original drummer. No agendas in mind, just to have a fun, little reunion type of thing. We had Mark DiBello on guitar and Dave Burek on bass. I had to follow my already growing intuition, and I pushed for us to try it again, musically, and see what comes after these many years. The original drummer, Kris Hidekamp, had to pass for personal and very much understandable reasons. We decided to move forward and check it out. I had put myself to sleep, musically, for several years, because I couldn’t find exactly what I was looking for. And low and behold, here it was.

Something I was already in. We have all grown on our own paths, and the reuniting was perfect. We had some painful downfalls on our percussion end but have now ended up with Mike Matjasko on the drums. I can’t wait to see where we go from here.

Got a fun fact on the band to share?

As for a fun fact on each one of us, you ask? (Christina laughs) Honestly, any fun facts I can think of, off the top of my head, are dirty little secrets that I must not share.

However, I can give this; everyone in the band likes Slayer except for me!

What did the future look like for the band pre-Covid, and what does it look like now?

The future of The Shadow Event pre -Covid was gaining some serious momentum. Landing some high stake shows, getting lots of focus on us, and our followers were pouring in. But, to be fair, the local music scene itself had been growing. This was beautiful. And so, that being said, we all sit idle and only hope that we can pick up anywhere near where we left off. Hopefully.

Are there plans to record and release an album?

I’d say we’re on the verge of releasing what will be our first album. We have a few titles in mind but haven’t locked one down yet. We were in the studio in February and then again in September. So, yes, definitely be on the lookout soon.

Do you have a favorite and tune?

My current favorite is “Mosaic.”

How is the band getting through the pandemic?

We’re crying and throwing tantrums just like everyone else! (Christina laughs) Seriously though, we’re just trying to make the best of it. We had a fantastic photoshoot with Marcus Crawford (Crawford Productions). We’re writing and recording. The band is just trying to stay in the circuit as best we can, with any moves that are still available to be made.

Thanks so much for chatting with me, and stay safe.

Thank you for the interview. It was fun. Stay safe.

Interview: Karla Doolittle

Photo: Marcus Crawford

THE SHADOW EVENT

The (social distance) gathering of tribes. As Covid-19 rages, every corner of society feels its effects. As music venues worldwide are closing at an alarming rate, those working in the service/ entertainment industry face uncertainty and, most likely, unemployment. Under the banner of SOS2020, Pittsburgh musicians with Eric Rodger’s direction and songwriting skills have united in support and to raise awareness for the Pittsburgh music scene’s plight. Second Scene talks with Eric Rodger about his endeavor.

What can you tell about the SOS song project? What set you on the path to putting it all together?

In late Sept, I caught an image of my phone in the mirror and noticed “SOS” was contained in a backward 2020. Then I started humming this cheesy melody to myself: “SOS 2020, SOS with Royal Honey.” It was pretty bad, haha. But I couldn’t get the melody out of my head and started adding to it “SOS – Save Our Stages, For all the ages.” From there, the song just started writing itself.

That’s when I got the idea that we should make it a benefit. I had a bunch of ideas instantly running through my head. I figured I’d get Anthony “Rocky” Lamonde to produce it, and we’d record it with his band (The Borstal Boys) and my band (Royal Honey), and then we could get a bunch of friends to come in and sing on the gang-vocal chorus. One minute, I thought it was a great idea, and the next minute, I thought it was ridiculous. I needed another opinion.

I was at The Vault [Pittsburgh studio] with Bob McCutcheon mixing the next Royal Honey album.

I ran the idea past Bob because he has tons of experience with benefits and philanthropy, and he owns a recording studio! So I figured he’d give it to me straight. If he liked the idea, we’d get the ball rolling. If not, we’d pull the plug on it before wasting any time.

Bob said, “yes, let’s do this – I have some ideas how to make this work.”

What do you hope to achieve?

We are raising awareness and funds to help struggling venues, promoters, audio engineers, and support staff.

We are piggybacking on the national #saveourstages campaign, which is administered by a group called NIVA (National Independent Venues Association).

We are getting the word out about how people can donate directly to NIVA, as well as donating any proceeds from the SOS 2020 song to that fund.

There will also be a matching grant up to $2000 from the Ryan McCutcheon Rhythm 19 Fund. It’s also a testament to the strong sense of community we have in this music scene. The musicians want the venues and promoters to know that we’re with them.

Tell us about the song. What style is the music? What is the lyric content?

The music is straight-ahead rock and roll, with a gangvocal type chorus that I would say sounds like AC/ DC. If you took Donny Iris, AC/DC, Kix, Tom Petty, and Buckcherry and threw them in a blender, you’d get SOS 2020.

Did I read correctly? You have over 140 Pittsburgh area musicians involved. How do you make that work?

Haha, it wasn’t quite that many. All said and done; we had 27 bands and 60-65 musicians on the song. And another ten or so people working on video, website, promotions, and merchandise.

Who are some of the key players, be it the musicians or studio personal?

Well, I wrote the song, Rocky produced it, and Bob engineered it. Alexis Salinas is doing all the artwork, photography, and video, which is an enormous amount of work. She’s also our social media czar, so she’s teaching us old guys how to use hashtags and stuff. Bill Domiano from Build The Scene did our website at www.sos2020pgh. org, and Jennifer Schlieper at Flying Scooter Productions did all of our PR work. Lastly, Robbie Perrone from Endeavor After LLC is doing our merch.

Everyone who participated in this project brought their top-level, “A-game.” There’s so much talent on this recording. And it’s incredibly humbling to have all these musicians play on a song I wrote in my shower.

When can we expect the song to be released?

The release date for the song and full-length video is January 8, 2021.

SOS2020 Website: www.sos2020pgh.org - Facebook: facebook.com/SOS2020PGH/ - Instagram: instagram.com/SOS2020PGH/ - YouTube: youtu.be/8ZA979cLZUw

WHAT COLOUR IS SOUND?

Michael Plater Photo: Fawnia Mountford

It was after the first U.K lockdown hit in March that I got the idea for starting up an online label, which I decided to name What Colour is Sound? (after an old article on Syd Barrett-era Pink Floyd, which had, for some reason, always stuck in my head).

With its allusion to the neurological condition of synesthesia (where people may, for example, see sounds or taste words), I aimed to make the label as wildly diverse as possible, encompassing everything from indie-folk and acid country to psych rock, electronica, experimental exotica and beyond.

I was living in remote Cornwall at the time, having moved over to the U.K the previous year from Melbourne, Australia. My life since moving over had been an endless blur of activity - as well as the practicalities of eking out some kind of existence for myself; I had been playing shows up and down the country and in continental Europe and had been recording a solo album over in the Essex countryside.

Like so many of us, these projects ground to a halt when COVID-19 hit, and the whole nation was forced into lockdown. With time on my hands, I found myself spending time listening to (and reevaluating) old recordings of mine – old demos, live tracks, outtakes that never saw the light of day

- stashed away on old CDRs and USB sticks. It struck me that all musicians would have recordings like this, things that they had never released or shared, for one reason or another.

I guess this sense of nostalgia – for bands I had played in, projects I had worked on – was, in part, due to the enforced isolation of lockdown and was something that a lot of people seemed to be going through at this time.

As such, I thought it might be nice to provide some online outlet for these kinds of recordings – demos, lockdown projects, home experiments, archival sessions, radio sessions, live tracks, etc. I didn’t know how much interest such a project would attract, but I put up a post on social media and was flooded with replies from all over the world – so much so that I am now working on the fourth volume in the series.

The three volumes I have released so far (as pay-what-youlike downloads from the What Colour Is Sound Bandcamp page) have included new and often exclusive tracks from many of my old Australian friends and contemporaries – Andrew McCubbin, Marsden Williams, Penny Ikinger (with Deniz Tek), House of Light, Tony Millman and Jane Cameron, Belle Phoenix, Mineral Sands, Jo Meares, Duderama, Light Magnetic, BBQ Haque and many more. Loki Lockwood from Spooky Records generously gave me two tracks from his new electro noir project Velatine. My old pal Mark Spinks from Gravel Samwidge gave me exclusive tracks from his new outfit Mark’s Paranormal Dysneyland.

On top of this, I was receiving tracks from the French gothic noir act Opium Dream Estate, Colorado’s psych-folk duo Astralingua, London bedroom psych-pop auteur David C.W. Briggs, Irish soundscape artist Sand Snowman, as well as other wonderful U.K acts like Rothko, Abrasive Trees and Jo Beth Young. Another old friend of mine, the superb Australian comic book artist Leigh Chalker, handled these releases’ wonderful cover artwork.

I also thought it was appropriate to donate any proceedings these releases made to various charitable causes, including the U.K Cats Protection agency, the Sidmouth Donkey Sanctuary, and Black Minds Matter U.K. The fourth volume in the series will be released in late January and is shaping up to be a mammoth 24 track release. My old friend and bandmate Matt Palmer has unearthed a 1999 recording of Carousel, his project with Ash Naylor (of Even, the Stems, and the Church). My London friend Dave Renegade has given me an exclusive recording from his forthcoming debut album, with Katharine Blake (Miranda Sex Garden, Medieval Babes) on cello. My collaborator Stafford Glover (who runs the Essex esoteric label Hypostatic Union that will be releasing my forthcoming solo album “Ghost Music”) has sent me a 16-minute soundscape piece psych-folk act Trappist Afterland will be giving their final ever recording. The album will also feature contributions from such acts as Emily Loves Snow, Ben Salter, Forever Autumn, Zeuk, Malcolm Carlo, Moonbloom, and Constant Light. It’s a wicked life and a wild ride!

What Colour is Sound: whatcolourissound.bandcamp.com

MARSDEN WILLIAMS & 245T The East Brunswick, Australian group Marsden Williams & 245T found themselves in a difficult situation with lockdowns and exclusion zones. The group featuring Joseph Dwyer, Matt Palmer, David Faiman, David Faiman, with the addition of Sammy El Mariachi and Alex Speechly, pulled together to record Exile On Lygon St. Marsden William talks with the Second Scene about how the coronavirus put an end to a promising project called “The Ampex Sessions,” and the process of recording the latest album.

Was this album spawned from the “Ampex Sessions?”

Not really, sadly. Corona put an end to those sessions sharply as people were not able to travel freely (there was a 5 km travel limit in the Greater Melbourne area). We will return to that idea when a little normality has resumed, we had a great time, and it was a fun project. I think the best of all was when we covered Slim Dusty’s “Broken Saddle Blues.”

How were you able to pull this all together under these trying times?

Covid and lockdowns.

A few of the tracks were recorded before lockdown, in all-night sessions. All of Matt’s songs were recorded this way, usually over a Friday or Saturday night. We have our own studio here, so whenever we felt the urge, we just got into it. After lockdown wasn’t so easy, but Joseph, Sammy, and myself were all living here, and Dave lives a few doors away.

There was very little to do during the long days and nights, so we really got down to recording and got very proficient at it. We could lay down a backing track of drums, bass, and guitar in two hours and then spend countless hours doing overdubs. It was fortunate we had a handful of versatile players at hand. Someone like Sammy could lay down the drums, do the horn arrangements, flutes and then do harmony vocals, whereas myself and Joe are fairly proficient at most anything we can turn our hands to, banjo, dobro, ukulele, keyboards, harmony vocals, what have you.

The results were a little more honest than my normal methods. I usually like to use specialists for things like slide, mandolin, and accordion, but the results speak for themselves. It would have been great if Mark Di Marzio had been on hand for some of this stuff, but he was outside the 5 km exclusion zone! We ended up recording over 5 hours of material that we are trying to whittle down to a double album. For example, “Exile On Main St” is 96 minutes long, whereas the last running order we put together was 180 minutes.

we shelved for another release down the line somewhere.

I was using the template of the Rolling Stones “Exile On Main Street” as a basic framework, but without trying to cover them or ape their style too much. Just the length and scope of the styles and influences. Mind you, when we turn our minds to being Stones clones, we are pretty good at it! Another dimension was added when Sammy El Mariachi started overdubbing his horn sections, and Alex Speechly did his synth parts. Using synth in roots music seems to be a skill long abandoned in the early ‘70s, but he really understood the feel, and it fits organically into what we were already doing. We really did make this album in exile; lockdown was in full force, the streets were empty, and we were trapped in what Sammy calls a “Covid Submarine.”

We all live in a Covid Submarine, a Covid Submarine, a Covid Submarine.

How did you go about recording the album? (technologywise) We had set up a live room in the middle of the house with instruments in it, and in the next room under the stairs, we created a control booth to monitor the sounds. So all the mics would run out of the room into an early 70’s Teac Tascam Series 5 mixer and then into a 16 input Tascam interface into the computer. We had set up talkback, and it was a good system, but it was kind of slow and required someone to run in and out of rooms to adjust things, so eventually, I ended up putting a computer in the main room to save time. Then it became a much more efficient setup, and everything was wired to go at a drop of a hat. The only problem was that we worked so much I burned out four different secondhand computers, sometimes with our work on the hard drives. At one time, I had to use an old Fostex four-track because we had nothing else!

What do you have planned next? More with 245T or a solo album?

Before Covid, I went into Soundpark studio (Melbourne) to record a solo album, “Pastoral Casual,” with guys from another band I’m in, “Cross Eyed-Cat.” We did a day and recorded eight or nine backing tracks of drums, accordion, double bass, and acoustic guitars. It’s going to be a totally acoustic Country / Folk affair in the style of Ronnie Lane’s Slim Chance. We are going back in shortly to finish it off with dobro, banjo, mandolin, and grand piano.

I’m looking forward to hearing the overall picture because I’ve never made an album all at one place with the same people and instruments before. I imagine the overall concept will hang together more like an overreaching package than a collection of songs. Beyond that, 245T wrote a bunch of songs together that are not on this album and deserve a decent recording, so we are hopefully going into the studio together as a band to give them the full treatment.

Tell us about the sound and feel of Exile On Lygon St. It’s a band record, so everyone contributed songs and styles. We didn’t shy away from trying anything we liked, so aside from the usual Country Blues stuff, there is a bit of Psych, Rockabilly, Soul, 80’s style pop, Muddy Waters and Howling Wolf covers. There is 90 minutes of Electro music

facebook.com/245tmusic

Liverpool Cult 80s Band Candy Opera Back For A Second Round.

Dave Franklin interviews Paul Malone Photo: Steve Hines

There is quite a gap between the band’s two musical chapters. What are some of the differences both within the band and perhaps the music industry as you find it today?

We don’t find much difference between the band back then and now because we are the same people. We’ve been friends for a long time, and as for the music industry, it’s changed mainly because of the

these more observations and your own experiences?

Well, we are aware of our own ages, and it would have been no good shouting and screaming like we were 18 years old back in the day. So, the album was built around observations and ideas that reflect our own lives today. I see it more as turning the pages of a newspaper and seeing the headlines and their reflection on society in this world that we live in now.

Do you think you could have written this album the first time around, or has it taken this long for all the right elements to be in play. If so, what are they?

No, because lyrically, it wouldn’t have made sense, and we probably wouldn’t have had the maturity to be able to produce, play and promote it in the way we have. It is an album for a lost generation. The post-punk youth, the now 50-somethings, are back out going to gigs and buying into their own culture again, but also, it seems to have gathered momentum through listeners of all ages.

CANDY OPERA

internet and social media, and we’ve had to catch up quickly. We’re still lagging behind on that front!

More than one writer has said that you were the band that never got the break they deserved back in the day. Do you think this is true, and if so, what would you do differently if you could go back?

No, I don’t think it’s true because you make your own luck, and it just wasn’t our time. To paraphrase John Lennon, life’s something that happens when you’re busy making other plans. There’s nothing that we would have done differently. I’m a great believer in the here and now, and maybe this is our time.

The Patron Saint of Heartache is a gorgeously crafted album. When you recorded it, did it feel like unfinished business or the opening of a new act?

I suppose it did feel like unfinished business but also, playing songs that were thirty years old wouldn’t have been our endpoint anyway so, it was inevitable that we were going to record new stuff with this line-up.

The album seems to be built, in part, around lyrical narratives of everyday lives, is there an overall message that you are trying to tell the listener, or are

I see you’re working with A Turntable Friend Records in regards to this new album. How did this relationship come about, and how is that going?

We knew Ulrich Hoffman from A Turntable Friend Records was a big music fan so, we just sent him some music, and it was as simple as that. The relationship was built on our mutual passion for the same music. We work on a sort of gentleman’s agreement, which fits us well.

Ulrich and Shauna from Shameless Promotion PR have been amazing throughout the pandemic. Between them both, they have gone the extra mile and been an absolute credit to themselves and to us.

Where do you find inspiration, or is it a case of you just know it when it arrives?

You just know. When we play together, we feel comfortable with each other musically and socially, and there’s no desire for us to not be inclusive of each other’s abilities. These days, we don’t feel we have to rush to write a song every minute of the day like we did back then. We can now think about what we’re doing and have a better view of the bigger picture rather than throwing a couple of chords together and sticking a melody over the top.

Obviously, gigging the album might be quite tricky for a while yet, but do you have any plans for what happens next for Candy Opera?

That’s right, it’s looking tricky, but we are all still in touch with each other and still creating music. For us, it never stops. Obviously, in lockdown, writing is the main form of creativity so, we’ll just carry on doing what we do. Hopefully, at the end of this pandemic, we can go out again and be stronger and all the better for it.

4

*BLOOMFIELD*

E

ureka, California - Had he traveled abroad, the ghost of Jack the Ripper would not be out of place here. A Victorian-era seaport town on the northern coastnnicknamed the city of salt & fog. The Old Town area, as it’s called, is filled with traces of the era. On F Street, there is a gallery that was once a drug store; upstairs on the second floor was a brothel. Catty corner to this former house of pleasure sits Old Town Coffee, a place with its own delights. For years, every Thursday night, music would ring out onto the sidewalk at the weekly open mic. A core dozen or so folkies, rockers, and poets are holding it down while the videographer recorded it all. You could cut your teeth on learning the ropes of live performance, share some “new shit,” or polish your set. It was as open mics should be, supportive with a great sense of community. As with most things recreational, Covid-19 has put a halt on the gathering.After a few weeks off, friend and musician Xeff Scolari had the idea of taking the open-miconline. “Months before Covid wrecked all our fun, I had been thinking about a way to recreate the open mic experience in an online setting, but I was thinking more in terms of an app. And then when Covid hit, it just clicked that there was an easier way to do it with Facebook live streams,” he said. On March 27th, 2020, the inaugural Shelter n Play set sail. Starting at 6 pm on Friday nights and going for two to three hours, depending on the night, performers

shelter n play Mike Ivan

live stream for 10-15 minute sets. Outlaw folk, indie, psych, classical, flamenco, rock, it’s all here. Players have joined and streamed from New Orleans to New Mexico, Eureka to Eugene, Pittsburgh to Los Angeles, and even Taiwan. All levels and styles are welcome. As of this writing, the group has grown from a few friends to 865 members. Behind the scenes on the admin side, Xeff, photographer, and artist Emily Reinhart and fairy godmother Linda Faye Carson keep everything running smooth.

Contributing to the Community - In addition to an open mic, the event has grown into a weekly benefit for the local food bank. “Early on, Emily and I were wanting to use this platform for charity,” said Xeff. “I saw a news article about our local food bank, Food For People Inc., after the first lockdown hit. They had an unprecedented showing of people needing help. We were discussing it when Linda Faye Carson came to us and asked if we’d be into making an ongoing benefit for Food For People and helped us get it off the ground. That’s why she’s our fairy godmother.” So far, the event has raised $5,230.

Portrait of the Artist - When the first lockdown hit in the spring of last year, the Humboldt Arts Council created a show of pandemicinfluenced artwork by local artists. Resident Shelter n Play artist and visual storyteller Emily Reinhart created beautiful

charcoal portraits of players on birch wood and hung them with old guitar strings. A long-time documenter of area musicians at the Old Town Coffee open mic, Emily’s project, Remotely Immersed in Music, featured local as well as international players. Taken from the show notes, she says, “I’ve taken my income that I normally spend on coffee shops and restaurants, and redirected its flow toward keeping musicians and the art scene alive in these times of being denied live gigs and exhibitions. I have been hiring musicians to team with me on weekends so that the world can enjoy both music and art simultaneously, safe from all of our socially-distanced homes! The musician I hire for the day play a two-hour set while I create my charcoal pieces.”

This intimate collaboration of canvas and sound continues on the weekends. She hopes to involve more artists and musicians in this process, tune in and check out this unique event.

Giving back-Throughout the summer and fall, master guitarist Angel A. Fagas could be found streaming live classical guitar lessons for free. Angel has been a guitar instructor in Eureka for decades and is considered by many to be a local treasure. He’s traveled the world as a classical and flamenco player. The lessons are still there.

Occasionally, he will join in and serenade us with a set from Taiwan.

It’s been a dynamic evolution of an open mic group. As for any goals, Xeff said, “My main goal is to keep our flock of musicians happy until life can resume, and then the goal is for us all to meet in person and have an epic live show as a farewell to Shelter n Play.”

Until then, the weekly event is a great way to continue to work on your craft, connect with other players, and give back to the community. It’s helping some folks through this difficult time in multiple ways. If nothing else, for those of us who do it, it’s something to look forward to. And right now, that means a lot.

Shelter n Play (Facebook Group #224856781967115) Schedule * Wednesday 12 pm PST Sign-ups for open mic * Friday 6 pm PST Open mic * Weekends EmArt A weekly collaboration of art and music for a couple of hours - covers and original songs alongside live art production. emilyreinhart.com

THE LAISSEZ FAIRS 10,000 TOMORROWS/ FIELD TO FIELD (HYPNOTIC BRIDGE)

The year 2020 didn’t offer much in the way of hope.

So with the news of a new single by The Laissez Fairs, there was a bright spot after all. John Fallon and Joe Lawless offer up another master class in songwriting on their latest single, 10,000 Tomorrows, combining their talents to create this psych-rock gem. 10,000 Tomorrows opens with a pastoral folk vibe before descending into a psychedelic dreamscape. The B-side, Field To Field, is a moody, trippy raga affair.

Chiming guitars dominate both songs. This vinyl 45 is a must-have for fans of classic psych-rock.

JOE NORMAL & THE ANYTOWN’RS STUCK IN A JOB/ LIVING IN THE BOROUGH (BIG STIR RECORDS)

The Los Angelesbased group Joe Normal & The Anytown’rs latest single, Stuck In A Job, captures the everyday grind with streetwise lyrics set to a quintessential power pop raveup. The group mixes it up on the B-side Living In The Borough with acoustic guitars and strings without losing energy or groove. The deeply personal lyrics of Living In The Borough takes this song to another level.

Both songs stand out, and either one could easily be the A-side.

The Analogue Collage Art Collective Cut & Paste Art of Ruigoord, Holland, celebrates its ten years of existence with the book Cut & Paste Art 20102020. A book with more than 140 of the best collages made during ten years of collage sessions and collage parties.

The book features work by artists who appeared in the Second Scene, Aja Waalwijk, Mrtn van der Horst and Pytr Baum. The edition is limited to one hundred numbered copies. The price of the book is $40 - including shipping costs.

Contact: mrtn69@gmail.com

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FRED ABONG Our Mother Of Perpetual Help

This is Fred Abong’s latest solo album. He is best known for his time in Throwing Muses and Belly, as well as playing in the Kristin Hersh trio before spending a few years in Academia. The album opens with the first single, The Minit, a slow and carefully strummed rumination of how life has gone wrong and sounds like he’s singing it in the middle of the night as Fred sits in a candlelit chapel baring his soul. The title track OMOPH is next, and they reduce it to initials as the slightly distorted electric guitar acts as colour against the acoustic guitar as Fred sings his praises for Our Mother Of Perpetual Help, who he may see as his patron saint, and this is bruised and burnished by Fred’s gravelly vocals.

Worm is an almost Bob Frank style dark tale of a friend Fred thinks of as a Worm, haunting and rather downbeat. Kissing Carnival sounds much darker than you’d imagine a song about a Kissing Carnival to sound as the lust-filled lyrics slowly unfold, and the desire is held deep within.

Electro Panic is so fraught with the danger of things being too electro that it’s totally acoustic as he climbs the walls and searches for some absolution from the panic rising within him.

The Lock needs to be opened with the keys to your heart. This continues the album’s feelings of late-night despair and despondency, at just how far apart he is from the lover he may still live with, but Fred feels Locked out from their love. Cork is wallowing in the pain of a relationship breakdown that comes after that Cork has been pulled and all the red wine has

The former Throwing Muses and Belly bassist Fred Abong releases his latest album, the downbeat and dark Our Mother Of Perpetual Help. Review: Simon Phillips. Photo: Kristin Hersh.

been drunk, the sparseness and feelings of being in an emotional wilderness slowly come through. In Bed maybe a dark, sad tale, but thankfully not as sad and dark as Lou Reeds The Bed, as Fred looks at his lover and hopes things will be ok once more and they can be happy together In Bed. The second single off the album Invisible Man is next and is downbeat and a touchingly dour look at what it is like to be treated as if you’re invisible by someone who used to treat you like their main focus. There are two videos for this single, including one shot by Kristin Hersch. The album closes with Capital P that opens with the line you spell my name with a capital P, which is an odd way to spell Fred and shows just how far the relationship has fallen to pieces, and this sounds like he really should have walked away by now but is still holding out for a little chance of redemption and reconciliation no matter how little chance there is of it happening. This album is one of those downbeat dark albums that will be perfect in certain circumstances. Find out more at fredabongmusic.com/ fredabong.bandcamp.com/album/our-mother-ofperpetual-help

BABY BIRDS

(ARTIFICIAL HEAD RECORDS)

The opening track, Don’t Tell Me How How To Die, sets the tone for this six-song cassette.

A dark cacophony of Post Punk/No Wave. Heavily fuzzed guitars and the relentless repetitious motorik drum machine runs throughout each song. Baby Birds offer up electronic, experimental tones on Divine Beast that takes things to another level. Closing out this release is the twentyone minute epic Waves of Luminous Bodies, capturing the krautrock movement in full flight.

Recommended for fans of Killing Joke, Chrome, Narcons, ROUGH SLEEPERS, Searing Arrow. facebook.com/ArtificialHead

Cactus Flowers Incantations (Artificial Head Records)

Does the pandemic got ya down? Feeling bored? Need a pep in your step? Then you’ll want to check out the latest offering from Cactus Flowers out of Texas. Their new album, ‘Incantations’ is a well-blended musical escape from what the world is right now. It’s exciting and passionate with a sound like none other. A combination of genres reminiscent of early 2000s metal, groovy and psychedelic rhythms and melodic vocals from frontwoman Jessica Murillo make this record anything but boring. Boredom and pandemic blues will be thrown out the window after just one listen. This nine-song record will leave you coming back for more.

Powerful vocals, hard bass lines, euphonic guitar riffs, and a diverse drum style make it easy to listen to this album over and over again. Do yourselves a favor and check this one out.

Karla Doolittle

The Roogs The Roogs I magine if Ennio

Morricone had taken a different approach to Leone’s iconic Spaghetti Western soundtracks and decided to invent dream-pop while scoring them. You can’t imagine such a scenario? Well, give The Roogs debut album a spin, and you’ll get some idea how that might have sounded.

Courtney Davies and Steve Gerdes are perhaps better known as half of the tribal-industrial band Fourwaycross. Still, with that long-serving outfit currently on the shelf, the duo has come back to the musical fray as The Roogs, a band whose sonic spectrum is as impressive as it is unexpected.

Songs such as opening salvo Wildebeest wander down some trip-hop infused, chilled dance grooveways.

At the same time, at the other extreme, the ghosts of their former incarnation are allowed to bubble to

the surface, It’s Gods Own being a slab of white-hot guitar noise wrapped around a pulsing bassline. In contrast, percussive additions are allowed to skitter across the surface of a locked downbeat. I Still See You takes a pop approach but warps it into something more interesting, edgier, more urgent while Approaching Storm takes the form of a brooding and slowbuilding instrumental, one which mirrors the tension and charged atmosphere of its title.

It’s an album of contrasts. Ethereal voices are balanced against bombastic bass lines, incendiary; industrial noises follow lilting pop pastures, futuristic soundscapes sit alongside primal sounds. Thankfully, no one worries about genres anymore; otherwise, you would find yourself either struggling to find the right one or applying almost every label you have ever heard of or perhaps making a new one up altogether.

There you go. That’s a fun game to keep you occupied. Let me know when you have found the answer.

Dave Franklin

BEAUTY IN CHAOS OUT OF CHAOS COMES...

Is a song ever truly finished?

Can there ever be a definitive form, one that can’t be improved on?

Isn’t there something to be gained from revisiting, reimagining, reclothing music which is already close to your heart? These are all the sorts of questions that must concern Michael Ciravolo. In trying to answer them, he has created a new album full of alternate versions, remixes, and new sonic experiments under the name of Out of The Chaos.

Although the songs will be familiar to anyone who keeps even a cursory eye on his ever-fluid project, it is the way that the previous musical limits are stretched, made over, reconstructed, which is the neat thing here.

Sometimes this might be just a gentle reframing of what has gone before; sometimes, it’s an opportunity to build a complete sonic anagram.

Usually, it’s a clever balance of the two approaches.

So now, not only do you have a band made up of many musical guests and collaborators taken from the great and good of the rock and alternative community, you have a second wave of outside input and aesthetic addition from those given the task of finding new routes through the original sonic territory. And the results are glorious.

The example can see the scope that the album runs through of Stranger, a Kat

Leon vocal collaboration which appears here in four different versions running from haunted understatement to graceful electronica and then from glitchy slow-dance vibes to raw, cavernous, industrial high drama. Who knew that you could get so much mileage out of the same song. Michael Ciravolo for one!

It’s a Who’s Who of the great and good of the darker and more rock-orientated end of the music scene. The likes of The Mission’s Simon Hinkler and The Wonder Stuff’s Mark Gemini Thwaite can be found adding tasteful guitar moments, the likes of John Fryer and Tim Palmer ride the desk to explore new possibilities and new potentials and vocals run from Curse MacKey’s epic sonics to Cinthya Hussey’s intimate grace.

I’m surprised that more artists don’t take such an approach. Why rush to find the next melody, the next clever chord progression, when you can revisit your existing back catalog and ask new collaborators to sow fresh sonic seeds in that already fertile territory?

Someone once said that a good song is one that can be played on an acoustic guitar, simple and unadorned. I would also add that a great song is one which seems to be able to be resurrected in many guises and many forms to live again. It all seems very Buddhist!

Dave Franklin

Tombstone In Their Eyes Collection As the album title suggests, this is a collection of Tombstone In Their Eyes earlier releases and was recorded between 201519. The music has been Re-Mastered and, in some cases, re-mixed. So if you already have The Fear EP, The Bad Clouds Ep, The Nothing Here Ep, or the Sleep Forever LP, you’ll already be familiar with the material on this double album. For the rest of us, this is a good introduction to Tombstone In Their Eyes.

The album opens with the doom-laden intro to I Want To Fly that falls away before the vocals come in and then starts to rebuild again like Kyuss with vocals. It has a bit of a desert rock feel to it as it builds to an allencompassing freakout.

Sleep Forever is slow, psychedelic, reflective hazy, almost House Of Love style song that will eventually grow on you even if it doesn’t immediately grab you.

My Head Is Fighting Me is like you’ve woken up in the middle of the day, and all you can think about is do you start smoking before breakfast or at least have breakfast before the first toke of the day and that internal battle to see if you’ll make it or not.

Separate sounds like Sacred Miracle Cave and feels like a maelstrom of slightly claustrophobic Psyche rock.

Always There is super slow, heading for a breakdown shimmering spacey and a bit like Viva Saturn.

Happy is as mordant a tune with that title as you could wish for a soundscape of sadness to help you through the pain and sorrow and make you happy.

Another Day is a reverbdrenched indie rock song with elements of the Lucy Show or The Moodists as they try to find a way to improve.

Gone Again is a slow doomy stoner rock about everything going to hell once more, and is there any chance of things working better for once.

Fear, in this case, is not a man’s best friend but sounds like someone in a casket has recorded the vocals. This has a very closed angsty claustrophobia about the sound of the vocals, and the music accentuates that.

I’m Already There has some very Crazy Horse style guitar lines set against the reverbladen vocals, and if this were sped up by maybe 10 to 15 BPM, it would be more of a Brit-pop song, but thankfully they keep things slow and ponderous and nice and dark.

I Can’t See The Light reminds me of a good bit of Sunray but with some searingly psychedelic guitar as you wonder how much echo there was in the vocal booth.

Shutting Down is a perfect theme for songs to be about in 2020. No matter when this was recorded, it has one of those almost elastic bass lines holding everything together as they slowly mark the passing of someone whose Shutting Down and hopefully not giving up.

Bad Clouds feels like they are on the point of collapsing but somehow managing to keep going with an achingly familiar guitar line that might be from an old Drop Nineteens song, but I’m not sure.

Take Me Home almost sounds like a song by Irish band September Girls, but obviously, with male vocals, this soars quite a bit as they try to lift us up good and

high just as the tambourine really starts to hammer out the beat against the grinding guitars.

Everybody’s Dead sounds like the music for the title sequence at the end of a particular bloodspattered western as the only gunslinger still standing staggers off into the sunset.

Once the guitars really kick in, it has more of the Sacred Miracle Cave meets Kyuss style feel to it.

Silhouette sounds like you should be listening to this while leaning against a wall trying to make your own Silhouette disappear as the guitars start to go off and a miasma of sounds keep you trying to get further away from you own shadow.

Take Me Away, thankfully, isn’t lyrically followed by in a silk-lined box and sticks loosely to the band’s sonic formula and has a good psyche desert rock sound to them being Taken Away and not to be put out of their misery.

You’re To Blame, and in this case, you really are if you haven’t bought all of Tombstone In Their Eyes previous releases that made this compilation a must; this has the loud, quiet thing going on, and they swear they will never feel the pain of your ignoring them this long.

The album closes with Nothing Here, it has to be said, doesn’t add anything different to the rest of the album, and is another reverb-drenched slice of Psychedelic slightly doomy stoner rock.

Simon Phillips

Find out more at, tombstonesswc.bandcamp. com/album/collection facebook.com/ TombstonesInTheirEyes

The Silver Beets Halcyon Days I always maintain that the job of a single is to advertise a forthcoming album. I know it’s an old-school notion, especially in this age where today’s artists seem to feel the need to spew forth every and any sonic endeavor as soon as the paint is dry. But if I am right and singles are the tasters and teasers for the fulllength platter to follow, then We Mattered (Once Upon A Time) and particularly Girlfriend should be looking at a fairly hefty Christmas bonus. Never has a brace of singles made me anticipate the arrival of an album so keenly? Well, not for a long time anyway.

But the danger also with such a tactic is that said singles could also be part of a front-loaded PR campaign, that once you get beyond their obvious charms, what follows as rewarding, that they have shot their sonic load too early. I’m here to report that nothing could be further from the truth in the case of The Silverbeets’ Halcyon Days. In fact, the buoyant jangle of We Mattered coupled with the dark groove and inherent humor of Girlfriend only begins to describe the ground that the band covers musically.

Cool, Like David Suzuki is a cool (natch!) and a clattering slice of frenzied alt-pop, Unnatural Selection is a stomping, stamping, sweary rant, and One Melody rounds the album off on a euphoric and

meandering high, all swirling guitars and 60’s grooves.

The band’s more considered side is demonstrated by songs like You Still Look So Beautiful and Never Trust The Government, the former an intimate and delicate love song, the latter a strange slice of pastel-hued, skewed and skittering, anarcho-pop is that still a thing? Let’s assume it is. (Note to self: find out whatever happened to Chumbawamba.)

If this album proves anything, not that albums have to, it is that The Silverbeets are able to maintain their high sonic standards across the full length of an album. And that, after all, is what you always hope a band is able to do. I would even suggest that rather than bother to echo the two singles sent out to test the water, the band proceeded to head off along numerous different musical tangents. Why keep rewriting the same sort of single when there are so many more musical paths to explore? Why indeed? And that is The Silverbeets in a nutshell.

Dave Franklin

strangely addictive too, but then it is that element of danger and desire which is always appealing. Here Rani Sharone, the project’s captain, and driving force, take those aspects to their logical conclusion and perhaps a bit beyond.

Sharone is no stranger to such sonic underworlds, fronting dark cabaret, artrockers, Stolen Babies, and sharing stages, collaborating and performing with everyone from Puscifer and Marilyn Manson to PIG and Stabbing Westward.

And it is a world that he understands perfectly, if this single is anything to go by, one perfect blending dark waves of tribal beats, throbbing and bubbling synths, and raw-edged sonic shards to form a platform for his understated vocals to dance upon.

The Fever is the sound of the likes of Depeche Mode or The Sisters of Mercy handing their heyday baton. While it comes from music, which will be why many people initially check Thrillsville out, it is heading, keeping those music fans more than happy to settle in for the ride.

Dave Franklin

Thrillsville Say Goodbye to the Light Ahead of a new EP, Say Goodbye to the Light, Thrillsville delivers a cool slice of dirge-disco, one part industrial edge, one part gloom-beat is that a thing let’s assume it is one part sultry and twisted electronica. It’s a dark and sullen affair, one which is

Chris Goheen gets straight to the point. No bullshit. Smell Of Decay is Goheen’s vision. Heavy riffs and apocalyptic lyrics fired off like a machine gun. Smell Of Decay’s latest release, Time To Die, is making inroads into the metal scene in Europe.

HEAVY! THRASH! DEATH METAL! Where does Smell Of Decay fit into the current metal scene?

A better fit for Europe’s metal scene.

What are your influences, and how do they influence you when writing for Smell Of Decay?

Sepultura, Death, Metallica, and Obituary facebook.com/smellofdecay75

are my influences. I like the sound, uniqueness.

What are you currently working on?

New music.

What do you have planned for 2021?

Putting out a new full album.

For those who haven’t heard Smell Of Decay, describe your sound?

Old school thrash/death metal.

Who did you work with on your latest album?

Studio musicians.

Straight to the point.

Photo: Michell Sekeras