Various Artists - Live at the 101: Club Sandwich

Here is Club Sandwich from 1981, the third and final (for now, at least) vinyl rip from 101 Records' series of budget-priced live compilations. All the songs were recorded at the 101 Club in St. John's Hill, Clapham. The previous two LPs posted here each had two or three bands that went on to greater fame. On Club Sandwich, though, only one band broke through: The Fix added another X to their name to become chart-toppers The Fixx. The song included here, "The Strain", appears on some versions of their Shuttered Room album. The full Club Sandwich track list is as follows:

01 Repro Central - Ring-a-ding
02 The Fix - The Strain
03 Rock Salmon and the Pomme Fritts - Fast Cars
04 Victims of Pleasure - Slaves To Fashion
05 Nautyculture - Someday Sunday
06 Rainbow Remipeds - Tropical Milk
07 Rank Amateurs - Games Up
08 The Edukators - Electric
09 Daddy Yum Yum - Mind Over Matter
10 The Mistakes - Jukebox
11 Malchix - Demons of Light and Sound
12 Repro Central - God Don't Bleed

After The Fixx, the Rainbow Remipeds produced the largest catalog of the rest of the bands here, though mostly as simply The Remipeds. They had a horn section and played the melange of rock, funk, jazz, dub, and Latin music commonly known as "postpunk" and most often associated with Pigbag. The Remipeds don't quite have Pigbag's wit and energy, and their calypso accents in "Tropical Milk" are in questionable taste, but if you like the genre then you shouldn't miss them. They reissued their only album, The Tahiti Syndrome, in 2005 with bonus tracks. Check the album webpage for samples of all songs, and be sure to check out the opener, their signature tune "Hawaii Five-O." The Remipeds MySpace page has loads of videos which could keep you busy for half an hour or so. Rock Salmon and the Pommes Fritts and Daddy Yum Yum both contribute decent rockabilly tracks (the later featuring an accordion). I can't find any information on Rock Salmon, but Daddy Yum Yum left a bit more of a trail. A Brighton band, percussionist Willi Kerr describes their music as "thrash skiffle." Kerr and Dave Simner are now members of the "Old Time, Hillbilly and Hellfire Gospel" band The Curst Sons. Repro Central got two tracks on the album, though they are not noticeably better than the other nine bands. Rank Amateurs sound more than a bit like the Police, and the rest of the bands play competent new wave that is good for a listen but not particularly memorable. If nothing else, Club Sandwich is a fantastic time capsule, a snapshot of the bread-and-butter of new wave as opposed to the most popular stuff that is remembered today. Get the vinyl rip here or here.

(I thought for a long time that was Jim Skafish on the cover, but according to the fine print on the back it's Rick Mann.)

Various Artists - Live at the 101: Band'its at 10 O'Clock

Here is another album from 101 Records via Polydor, documenting live performances at Clapham Junction's 101 Club. Also from 1980, the track listing on this one is:

01 The Scene - All People Go Mad
02 The Hit Men - She's All Mine
03 The V.I.P.'s - Causing Complications
04 The Piranhas - Yap Yap Yap
05 Real To Real - White Man Reggae
06 Holly and the Italians - Chapel of Love
07 Electric Eels - Thoroughly Modern
08 Jane Kennaway & Strange Behaviour - Catch Cool
09 Thompson Twins - Squares and Triangles
10 Huang Chung - Baby I'm Hu-Man
11 Comsat Angels - Independence Day
12 Wasted Youth - Jealousy

I have determined that The Scene is an early name for the band Giants, who released "All People Go Mad" as a single in 1982. Giants featured guitaris/songwriter Gordon Reaney and singer Paul Cox. The Hit Men soon consolidated their name to The Hitmen, the first band on Ben Watkins' road to fame. The Hitmen's two albums are also available on this blog (with "She's All Mine" appearing on the first); see here. The V.I.P.'s formed at Warwick University in 1978; lead singer Jed Dmochowski left in 1980 to pursue a solo career, the rest of the band forming Mood Six. See below for a vintage video of "Causing Complications." The Piranhas went on to some success, with their song "Tom Hark" becoming an enduring football anthem (I am told). Real To Real included a pre-Depeche Mode Alan Wilder. Holly Beth Vincent/Holly and the Italians had a couple alternative hits with "Tell That Girl To Shut Up" and "Dangerously." I can't find any information on the Electric Eels (they are definitely not the 70s punk band from Ohio); the "Thoroughly Modern" songwriting credits are for Methane Wernick and Mad Molecule, which I am pretty sure are aliases. They are obviously big fans of Eno-era Roxy Music, and their musical chops are far above most of the other bands included here. Jane Kennaway put out a couple singles and has a band now called A Different Kind of Honey. The Thompson Twins really date-stamp this record with a live version of their single "Squares and Triangles" and its repeated chorus of "one-nine-eight-o," bearing little resemblance to their later hit material. Wang Chung appear as Huang Chung; Sheffield's Comsat Angels put in a version of "Independence Day," a song they later recorded for two different studio albums; and Wasted Youth's "Jealousy" sounds like a twisted remake of "Crimson and Clover." Get the vinyl rip here or here.


I've got one more Live at the 101 comp to rip and share, then it's on to other things.

Various Artists - Live at the 101: Warts'n'All

Here is one of a series of live albums released in the early 80s by the house label (via Polydor) of the 101 Club in St. John's Hill, Clapham. Each of the albums contained tracks by several up-and-coming bands recorded live at the club and was released at a budget price in a rough cardstock sleeve with tabloid-style graphics. From 1980, this compilation includes:

01 Album Intro
02 Thompson Twins - Physics & Chemistry
03 Thompson Twins - Slave Trade
04 Jane Kennaway & Strange Behaviour - Atmospheres of England
05 Philip Gayle - Hermaphrodite
06 Deaf Aids - Heroes
07 Local Heroes SW9 - Competition
08 Local Heroes SW9 - Stabbed in the Heart Again
09 Deaf Aids - Bristol Stomp
10 Jane Kennaway & Strange Behaviour - Scratching at the Surface
11 Philip Gayle - The Ambassadors
12 The Mechanics - If I Make My Own Bed
13 The Mechanics - Higher & Higher

Unless you have heard these early Thompson Twins tracks before, chances are you won't recognize them as the same band who performed "Doctor, Doctor", "Love On Your Side", or even "In the Name of Love"; they sound like a punk-influenced new wave band! David Bowie-ish singer Philip Gayle later achieved some chart success as Philip Jap with his Trevor Horn-produced single "Save Us" (and the Tony Mansfield-produced "Total Erasure"); his lone solo album is quite good and is available on the Off the Record blog. The third and final act on this record to have managed to put out an album is Local Heroes SW9, whose members included Kevin Armstrong (later of the Passions) and sometime Thompson Twin Matthew Seligman. Jane Kennaway put out a couple singles and appears to have a band now called A Different Kind of Honey; Deaf Aids also released just two singles; and I can find no mention of the Mechanics other than on this album. They are more bluesy than the rest of the bands, but work up a nice groove on the original "If I Make My Own Bed" and then encourage an audience singalong in the cover of "Higher and Higher." The only information I have on the band members is that the songwriting credit is for Terry Quinn.

About the rip: the pressing is not great: there is noticeable surface noise and an above-average amount of clicks and pops. I removed as many as I could, but some remain. Also, the sound quality on side 2 suffers from the 29-minute playing time; levels (and general sound quality) are lower than on side 1. I have normalized the levels, but the quality is what it is. It's no worse than FM radio, at least. New links: Get the vinyl rip here or here. More Live at the 101 albums to come.

Living In Texas - Believe

I'm back! This time I bring you the final album by Living In Texas, Believe, released in 1991. It's a far cry from their great recordings of the mid-80s, mostly due to guitarist Daniel Glee's absence. Believe really emphasizes how much Glee contributed to the band's sound: his unique fusion of gothic, punk, and rockabilly styles made Living In Texas stand out. While Glee gets a couple co-songwriter credits, he apparently left the band before the recording sessions. Guitars on Believe are handled by former second guitarist Jeff Wallace and newcomer Claudia Pinto, plus various solos and extra guitar parts by Marc Sullivan, Steve Forward, and Laurent Roubach. A lot of the guitar work is disappointingly generic, in the manner of middle-of-the-road radio fodder. Only Stephan James's lyrics and singing provide continuity with the band's past, but even he has indicated that his involvement at the time was half-hearted. Judging by the number of people involved (in addition to the five band members and three extra guitarists, there are five more musicians credited for keyboards, percussion, and backing vocals) it sounds like the recording process was rather scattershot. The ten songs are good; the execution is hit-or-miss. But even if it is not the band's best work, it is still better than a lot of more popular music. Get the rip (from the Cent Pour Cent vinyl release) here or here.

This concludes my Living In Texas discography project, in the sense that I have ripped and uploaded everything I could find, including generous contributions from Stephan James and some helpful readers. If I unearth any more I will add those as well; likewise, if you have anything I've missed, please contact me (through the comments or at funderglass at yahoo dot com) if you would like to contribute some rips to the cause.

Living In Texas - Beautiful/Television 45

I haven't had any time for ripping lately, so this installment features another reader contribution. Marco provides us with the Living In Texas single "Beautiful" b/w "Television," which was released in 1985 on the French label Comotion Musique and did not appear on any of their albums. Once again this is the band in their prime, featuring the two-guitar lineup of Daniel Glee and Jeff Wallace. Marco has lovingly ripped the 45 at 320kbps and scanned both sides of the sleeve and both sides of the label as well! Get the archive file here or here. Thanks, Marco!

Onyx - Call of the Wild and Jet Set singles

Last July I posted a rip of a 1982 cassette by Onyx, an obscure Boston-area New Wave band. Their two 45s had long eluded me, but last week a generous reader provided me rips of them. (Thanks, Martin!) They are:

• Call of the Wild b/w S.O.S.
• Jet Set b/w Saturn 09

"S.O.S." and "Jet Set" appear on the cassette as well, but these vinyl rips obviously have better sound quality. "Call of the Wild" and "Saturn 09" round out the Onyx canon with more of the same sweet blend of minimal electronics and heavy basslines. Martin has also provided nice scans of the sleeves. The back cover of "Jet Set" contains the most information about the band I have yet seen: production and copyright credits are for Judd Stone and vocals are by "Beveur." The songs were recorded and mixed the The Loft in Boston and engineered by M.J. Klein. Web searches have turned up no more information on these people; does anyone out there know of them and their pre- and post-Onyx endeavors?

Get the vinyl rips here or here.

Living In Texas - An Assortment

Here are some more Living In Texas tracks from a CD-R compilation sent to me by frontman Stephan James (now known as Stephen J. Munson of Spacegirl and the Cowboy). The eight songs in this batch come from three records:

My End of Heaven (1983)

• My End of Heaven
• Awaken

God Bless America (1984)

• God Bless America Part 1
• God Bless America Part 2
• The Day of All Days

The End of the Beginning (83-89 compilation?)

• Mexican Nun
• I'll Always Remember You
• She Lives Inside My Head

If you were a fan of Living In Texas, or if you have come to know them through this blog, you know what to expect and these tracks will not disappoint! I am tantalized by the possibility that the 2-CD The End of the Beginning collection may hold tracks yet unheard (and unshared); anyone have that? There is still more Living In Texas in the queue; the next to appear will be the 1991 album Believe. In the meantime, grab this set here or here.