Do Easy - This Can't Go On Forever (1987) C90

Here's another Do Easy tape which was really just a collection of stuff rather than anything intended to be listened to as an album of any description, and it's actually a C60 but I found Improvisation 1986 and Pause on the end of another tape, and they seem to have been from around the same time as the rest of this stuff, so here they are.

 

The first four tracks, which you may notice sound marginally less shambolic than the remainder, were intended as demos for some sort of 12" EP I had a vague plan of recording - seeing as how I had free access to a studio and Brian Eno's old EMS suitcase synth and everything. The idea would be that I'd re-record them without all the screw-ups at some point, then cut a disc and become rich and famous, but I had no money to pay for pressing or any of that shit so I lost interest. I was experimenting with perfect pop, like all those dudes in the pastel suits, whilst additionally influenced in equal parts by the Apostles and Nocturnal Emissions' Songs of Love and Revolution album (an influence which extends to a few of the other tracks on this tape), and it's probably significant that Slowing Down is basically a rewrite of That Was Then but This Is Now by ABC, although I didn't notice it at the time; and yes, I know the lyrics are fucking terrible.

 

Steve McGarrigle played trumpet and almost certainly aided with programming on the first three tracks. Pete Avery sang backing vocals on Slowing Down, which was a bit of a mistake on my part - having backing vocals both louder and better than the main vocals, but never mind. Charlie Adlard, he of Soul, the Cosmic Rays, and who now draws The Walking Dead comic (and is as such probably the man to blame for why you can no longer turn on the telly without seeing zombies) played drums on Fucking Bastard and fire extinguisher on Lies - which was inspired by a dream I had featuring a Target Doctor Who novel apparently called Lies. The cover was predominantly yellow and featured Sea Devils drawn by Chris Achilleos. Ian Elliott is the gentleman with the Newcastle accent who can be heard enthusiastically agreeing that Steve Kütz is a fucking bastard on the song of that name, for that's who it was about, because I'd shared a house with him and the guy was a pain in the arse, quite frankly. Possibly ironically, Steve Kütz plays bass on Garreth is a Pervert, which was just the three of us mucking about. I guess he was less annoying that day.

 

Do Easy was never really intended to be anything but me and whoever else could be bothered, but Garreth Roberts probably came closest to making it a duo. He features on this tape on Fucking Bastard, Groove 1889, Garreth is a Pervert and Lies, and most of the singing which obviously isn't me was by him. I later re-recorded Groove 1889 for the Illyana Rasputin tape but Garreth failed to show, so I still prefer this version. Smilin' Paul Mercer sings on Decay. Improvisation 1986 was performed by Steve McGarrigle, Garreth Roberts, and myself - the TBM department at Maidstone College of Art was built in such a way as to make a sort of natural arena of the roof of the ground floor printing department, formed by the four inner walls of our own first floor department. Garreth, Steve and myself were bored so we set up a load of percussion instruments out there and just banged away for a bit, and I recorded it.

The woman you can hear laughing on Surveillance II achieved brief infamy a couple of years earlier when she appeared accessorised with her dead grandad's false teeth on the front page of The Sun newspaper as an example of why punk rock was an affront to common decency and all that good stuff.

Download the fourteen tracks by clicking on this link.

Tracks:
1 - This Can't Go On Forever
2 - Human Fly
3 - Slowing Down
4 - Fucking Bastard
5 - Groove 1889
6 - Garreth is a Pervert
7 - Your Arms
8 - Lies
9 - Who You Are
10 - Spit Hop
11 - Decay
12 - Surveillance II
13 - Improvisation 1986
14 - Pause

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Do Easy - Italia 1912 (1986) C90

This wasn't so much an album as a tape of bits and pieces which eventually filled up, at which point I decided it probably would be an album if I ever got around to doing a cover, which I didn't. The title probably refers to some Futurist thing which had caught my attention and which I liked because it sounded exotic and mysterious, or possibly ominous. You know how it works, I'm sure. The er... title track wasn't actually the title track up until last week. Both tracks six and fourteen had self-consciously wacky titles up until I digitised the thing and decided to change them, or at least disguise them in the case of PJWFY-F, which originally stood for PJ Wears Fluorescent Y-Fronts.

'What shall I call this one?' I asked Steve McGarrigle.

'PJ Wears Fluorescent Y-Fronts,' he quipped in jocular fashion, and thus was it so.

Anyway, here we have three tracks of Steve and myself rehearsing with Peter Jones in preparation for the gig which was recorded on the previous tape. Steve plays trumpet, some keyboard, and programmed most of the the Yamaha RX15 drum machine for these rehearsal tracks and elsewhere on this tape. Also the piano coda - I suppose you would call it - of Italia 1912 is actually myself trying to play one of his compositions. It's what was on the tape which I recorded over, which is why you hear it at the end, so when I was mixing this thing I guess I thought fuck it, and left it going. Peter Jones, or PJ of the alleged fluorescent underwear, played either bass or keyboard on the rehearsals for the live set, but I can't remember which - probably keyboard.

Talking of live material, track five is an eighteen minute live improvisation. I set up a load of instruments, or at least things which generate noise, on the three landings of a stairwell in the illustration department at the art college. The idea was that anyone who happened to be passing could join in and make a racket, and the three performers, whoever they were, would be unable to see each other, so no-one would know who else was contributing to the sound. According to the inlay card, the performers, aside from myself, included Martin Smith, Mark Orphan, Steve McGarrigle, Peter Avery, Brendan Mooney, and Martin de Sey. I recognise Martin de Sey hooting away at the end, closely followed by some comments from Kirsten Butler and Charlie Adlard - the Walking Dead guy. Brendan Mooney is the one who turns the thing into Johnny Kidd and the fucking Pirates, the little bollix. He ended up as guitarist in Dave Vanian's Phantom Chords, as a point of probably negligible interest, although it links my rock family tree to the Damned, which is nice.

By the way, the more observant members of my huge fanbase may notice that some of this material actually predates that which appears on the previous tape, but I don't think I filled this tape until afterwards - in case that one's keeping anyone awake at night. 

The rest of the tracks were things recorded in the college sound studio, which was fairly nicely equipped with several four-track reel-to-reels, a Wasp synth, an old EMS suitcase synth bequeathed to the college by Brian Eno, a mixing desk, vibes courtesy of Bob Cubitt who was one of our tutors and something to do with ...And the Native Hipsters, and a brand-spanking-new Ibanez harmoniser. Mostly I was just fucking around, seeing what I could come up with. Some of these tracks ended up as soundtracks to videos. Gaze Upon the Doom That Was Foretold! was er... inspired by the cover of an issue of 2000AD comic; and Live in Fear was Jane Hanley and myself just seeing what we could come up with. Jane sings and plays the flute on that one, which is possibly why it's a bit easier on the ear than the rest of this crap. According to my notes, Paul Mercer did something on tracks seven and thirteen, although I've no idea what. Maybe he was stood in the corner of the studio making balloon animals. That's the sort of thing he used to do all the time, that and the Punch & Judy at the weekends. Oh how that man loved to make us smile.

I'm kidding, by the way. I don't really think it's crap. Actually, considering some of the clunkers I've posted here, I mostly quite like this one.

Download all fourteen tracks by clicking on this link.

Tracks:
1 - Protein Suppressant
2 - Cover of a Magazine (rehearsal)
3 - Something In Me Isn't Right (rehearsal)
4 - Salute the Future! (rehearsal)
5 - Maidstone College of Art, Maidstone 22/10/85
6 - Italia 1912
7 - Gaze Upon the Doom That Was Foretold!
8 - Live in Fear
9 - This Says It All
10 - In Control
11 - Tachyon & Neon
12 - Hello David
13 - Galley Slaves
14 - PJWFY-F

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Total Big - Rehearsals 9 & 10 (1986) C90

There's not really much that I can say about Total Big which I haven't already said here, here, here, or here. If you liked the last four tapes, then you'll probably like this, and you'll probably like the other four of these things I still have left to digitise. If you didn't like any of the last four tapes, then this one is almost certainly unlikely to change your mind. It was all recorded in the kitchen of Hollytree House, Otham, Kent. The first sixteen tracks are from our ninth rehearsal which occurred on Saturday the 22nd of March, 1986, concerning which my diary of the time records:

We had a Total Big rehearsal, and Charlie came around to watch a load of Doctor Who videos. We went to Ian Elliott's party after that. It was okay but there wasn't enough dancing.

Charlie was Charlie Adlard who draws the Walking Dead comic and is as such now rich and famous. If anyone gives a shit I think we probably watched Warriors of the Deep and subsequently spent most of the time laughing like drains.

The remainder of the tracks were recorded on Saturday the 29th of March, 1986. The day began at Chris's house in Sittingbourne. Apparently I had fallen asleep on the sofa watching Catch-22 while Carl bleached his hair.

This morning we watched some episodes of Blackadder II on Chris's video. Then we went to the flea market and I bought a pair of sunglasses with white plastic frames and saw Mandy who used to go out with Paul. Then we went to Carl's mum's house in Hoo where his two sisters provided the entertainment with a display of wrestling. After that we went to Craig's house, and then we visited Paul for a bit and came home and had another Total Big rehearsal. Garreth and Steve came round. Carl and Chris left, and so did Steve, but Garreth stayed the night.

Garreth really did spell his name with two Rs. He isn't famous so far as I am aware, and he still has my fucking drum machine. He ended up in the Spinning Pygmies with me and Carl. Frankenstein is a New York Dolls cover. I was briefly obsessed with the song and even adopted it as my showbiz name for a time, not that anyone noticed.

The still is from a video we made for Keep Your Dreams A'Burnin'.

Download all twenty-nine tracks by clicking on this link.

Tracks:
1 - Sex From Behind
2 - He Writes the Songs
3 - Rock Sandwich
4 - Keep Your Dreams A'Burnin'
5 - Call It What You Want
6 - Are You My Mother?
7 - Cold Sore Herpes
8 - Louie Louie
9 - Sister Ray
10 - Falling in Love with My Voice
11 - Hail Fellow Well Met
12 - Ugly Baby
13 - Rock & Roll
14 - I Own the World  
15 - Why Did You Forget My Name?
16 - I'm Not Losing Sleep
17 - Cold Sore Herpes B
18 - Keep Your Dreams A'Burnin'
19 - He Writes the Songs
20 - Rock Sandwich
21 - Are You My Mother?
22 - Call It What You Want
23 - Hail Fellow Well Met
24 - Frankenstein
25 - Louie Louie
26 - Sister Ray
27 - Here We Come
28 - Keep Your Dreams A'Burnin'
29 - Total Big & the Nutty Rhythm

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Total Big - Rehearsals 5 & 6 (1986) C90

Here we are - yet more Total Big, this time from the point at which we just about had a set and were starting to sound like a band. I'm not really sure what else I can say about this stuff which hasn't already been said in the course of previous blog entries - for which please refer to the index as linked below.

Both of these rehearsals occurred at Hollytree House, Otham, Kent, probably in the kitchen - the first sixteen tracks were on Saturday the 18th of January, and the rest were on Saturday the 8th of February, both in the year of our Lord, 1986. I don't have any corresponding diary entries of particular interest to either of these dates, although on Friday the 17th of January I wrote:

I actually remember what happened today. I paid Charlie some petrol money and him, me and Garreth went over to Chatham to shoot some videos with Glenn. We drove around trying to find a spot, only to find out that the portapak wasn't working. We went to a pub in Gillingham for some food, and Glenn told us he has become a born again Christian, which was a bit of a shock. We went back to Maidstone and we all bought cap guns.

That would be Glenn from Konstruktivists and Charlie who now draws The Walking Dead (and whose band of the time have featured previously on this blog), for those of you with a taste for obscure industrial music-comic book crossover trivia. Talking of industrial music, one channel of Chris's tape deck was on the fritz so there's a couple of tracks which sound a bit like Controlled Bleeding. It wasn't on purpose.

Chris recorded the original tapes, by the way, then edited each one down to a single side of a C90 of just the stuff which sounded like a song, so that's what you have here.

Download the thirty-two tracks by clicking on this link.

Tracks:
1 - Are You My Mother?
2 - Rock Sandwich
3 - I'm Not Losing Sleep 
4 - Something Stirs
5 - I'm Not Losing Sleep
6 - Reggae
7 - Simon Says
8 - Wake Up, Sleepyhead
9 - Bob Hope
10 - Ouch!!!
11 - Rock Sandwich
12 - He Writes the Songs
13 - Are You My Mother?
14 - Call It What You Want
15 - Wobblin' and a-Hollerin'
16 - Simon Says
17 - Ouch!!!
18 - He Writes the Songs
19 - Rock Sandwich
20 - Are You My Mother?
21 - Cold Sore Herpes B
22 - Call It What You Want
23 - Untitled I
24 - Untitled II
25 - Louie Louie
26 - Sister Ray
27 - Wham
28 - You Won't Let Me Down
29 - He Writes the Songs
30 - Rock Sandwich
31 - Are You My Mother?
32 - Call It What You Want

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Soul - Demo Tape (1986) C15

Soul comprised Karl on vocals, Martin and Terry playing guitar, Min on bass and my friend Charlie Adlard on drums. I don't remember the surnames of the first four and didn't think to ask, although in any case people can sometimes be a bit funny about the past - shameful or otherwise - turning up on a website after twenty years, as though the simple acknowledgement of once having existed in some form will immediately transform your bank account into a playground for unscrupulous Nigerian gentlemen. I remember Charlie's surname because we were friends at Maidstone College of Art, and even were this not the case, he's difficult to avoid due to having become the third most famous person in the universe (behind Donald Trump and Bob Carolgees) as artist of The Walking Dead.

Anyway, Charlie and Karl were originally in a Shrewsbury based band called the Magic Roundabout, and - oh fuck it. I may as well just quote what Charlie said:

Soul was kinda formed from the Magic Roundabout - only in the fact though that I was friends with Karl and we were in that band together in Shrewsbury on the art foundation. Then he moved to Worthing and met the other guys. I joined after those four got together. After Soul ended, it was just Karl and Terry who moved to London. The other two stayed behind, and I joined them after completing my degree. And IF was formed with new bassist Ben…

I had forgotten about IF, Charlie's later band, until he mentioned them, although probably because I never saw them live. I have a vague memory of staying at their shared flat one night somewhere in north London, having travelled down from Coventry for the UKCAC comic convention, which is probably neither here nor there.

I saw Soul a few times, and Total Big - for whom I played guitar - supported them on at least one occasion, some pub in Worthing and possibly also something or other at the art college. They were a big, wide-screen rock band, as bands involving Charlie have tended to be, and they were terrific, and somewhat wasted on an art college audience which didn't really mind what you played so long as at least one of the band had a flat top and was wearing one of those German military issue vests like people from muscular Sheffield-based funk bands. One of the first things Charlie and I turned out to have in common was a shared appreciation of Simple Minds, even the stadium-filling stuff you're probably still not allowed to like in certain circles, and Soul therefore sounded pretty damn great to me. The only thing missing from this unfortunately short demo was Raphael, which I vaguely recall as having been one of their best songs.

Whilst we're here, I should probably mention that Charlie is still very much at it, and these days occupies the drum chair - as we musicians call it - for the Cosmic Rays. Their album is available in all sorts of formats here, and is a cracker.

Download the three tracks and cover by clicking on this link.

Tracks:
1 - My Fireworks
2 - The Answer to Everything
3 - All Over Your Face

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