NOVEMBER BRISTOL ARCHIVE RECORDS UPDATES
Sorry we didn’t have an update in October but we are just starting to catch up with the backlog of wonderful music we are preparing for your listening pleasure
We are always on the look out for great pics of great bands from 1977 to 1985 so please don’t sit on them at home – share them with the outside world. Please email [email protected]
All the updates below should be live on the site by Sunday 8th Nov – please keep checking back – www.bristolarchiverecords.com
NEW RELEASES: World Wide on all digital platforms now…
ARC116 THE SIDNEYS - ‘Wave Bye Bye’
All recorded pretty much live by Steve Street at SAM Studios, Bristol … Autumn of 1984.
Joanna Swan, Wendy Partridge, Sarah Partridge … Vocals, Bill Stair …. Bass, Nick Pullin … Guitar, Thomas Brooman …. Drums, Kenny Lacey … (Kenny Bongo Man)
Mastered by Steve Street July 2009
Childhood friends Joanna Swan and Wendy & Sarah Partridge first trod the boards as the Spicettes, backing vocalists for Bristol’s egregiously named neo-soul combo The Spics. When that group fell apart, the three reinvented themselves as an acappella trio, and The Sidneys burst onto the scene – or at least the space outside the Pompidou Centre, where they learned that busking in Paris was more financially rewarding than gigging in Bristol.
Despite this, they decided to expand The Sidneys into a full band, eventually arriving at a lineup of: guitarist/philosopher Angelo Bruschini, percussive genius/raconteur Kenny Lacey, drummer/business supremo Thos Brooman and bassist/future mandolinist Bill Stair.…………
ARC118 THE INANE – ‘The Only Fun In Frampton Cotterell’
Tim Rippington - Vocals, Guitar, Rob Pursey - Bass, Vocals, Dave Squire - Keyboards, Vocals, Melodica, Phil Cox - Drums
What did your first band sound like? Not the first proper band you had, where everyone had learned to play their instruments and write songs, but your first ever band. Well, this was ours. We called it The Inane, because frankly we couldn’t think of anything else. People thought we must be a hard-core punk band until they met us. Our band started in the early 80‘s, an amazingly inspirational time for people who just wanted to get up and play music. Our heroes were the Clash, Joy Division/New Order, the Postcard scene, the Fall and their off-shoot the Blue Orchids. It all shows. We were all 17 except for our drummer Phil, who was a mere 14 years old when we first started rehearsing. We grew up fast, playing our first gig at the legendary Stonehouse before it was demolished, and recording our first demo with producer Steve Street not long after.…………
This LP was entirely compiled from old cassette tapes, so the quality is somewhat variable. The studio recordings were all made at the original SAM studio in Backfields Lane. From memory, tracks 1 and 2 were recorded on 16 track, the rest were recorded on 8 track. Tracks 4-6 were recorded first, in 1982, tracks 7-11 recorded in 1983 and tracks 1-2 in 1984. No one knows when or where the live recordings were made, probably it was the Bristol Bridge some time in 1983.
The 4-track recording of Bad Education was an attempt to capture a song that was first learnt for the Battle of the Bands Competition at Trinity Hall. The organisers insisted that every band did a cover version, so true to our ambitions we learnt this little-known song by Blue Orchids.
THE PRIMATES ARC115 – ‘Live at Barton Hill Youth Club 1977’
Recorded live by Simon Edwards in 1977 at Barton Hill Youth Club, Bristol
Mastered by Steve Street July 2009
Line up:
Johnny Britton – Guitar, Voice, John Shennan – Bass, Voice, JJ – Drums
The Untouchables ARC117- ‘Walk The Dog’
The album we believe was recorded live in SAM Studios by Steve Street in 1978 or 1979.
Mastered by Steve Street 2009
WHITE HOTEL ARC120 – ‘WHITE HOTEL’
After returning back to Bristol in early 86 I started putting together a new recording set-up, which included a few bits of the then new cutting edge ‘midi’ gear. Linn sequencer, Drum machine, DX7 keyboard & a Mirage sampler.
After having gone on a tangent working for other people now felt like the right time to try out some writing.
I remember from the Stonehouse days another fine Bristol band called TVI’s, I had been impressed by their singer & main writer John Kelly. I had briefly played one show with TVI’s back in Oct ’80 at the Berkley Rooms, so I called him up to see if he would be at all interested in a collaboration.
He was and we started working together in early 87.
John handled most of the vocals, I had always enjoyed his voice & he was also a superb lyricist/poet. I was more than happy with this as I was now getting deeper into the production side of things. We wrote quite a number of tracks together, they all started sounded much more cinematic & cerebral with various keyboards & piano featured quite a bit.
We decided to call ourselves ‘White Hotel’ after the infamous D M Thomas book.
Trouble was we took rather a long time getting the ‘right’ demo tape finished & out to people. In-fact we never even got to play one gig together.
When we finally did get the demo tape out we got very good interest from Atlantic Records in NY.
But as with so many record companies they were a bit unsure of jumping straight into a deal.
They decided to fund us for some additional demo tracks to try & convince them.
In the end Atlantic decided not to go for it.
Disappointed we decided to call it a day & move on after having come so close.
Alan Griffiths
VIDEOS:
We have added the The Pigs video shot at the reunion gig at The Thunderbolt earlier this year
PICTURES:
Many new pictures added to the individual releases but we always looking for more – please get in touch – we are still working on a book on the scene 1977 – 1984 but we need more fab pics and the input of some of the top photographers in Bristol during that era.
Please get in touch [email protected]
Next Batch of Releases:
OUR VIOLENT HOUR
ROYAL ASSASSINS LIVE
GARDEZ DARKX LIVE
STARGAZER LIVE
CREATURE BEAT LIVE
CREATURE BEAT ALBUM
STEREO MODELS
NEWS:
The Stingrays to support The Fall at the Metropolis Bristol
Its just been confirmed that we will be supporting The Fall on November 23rd at the Metropolis on Gloucester Road in Bristol. Looks like a good venue, should be a great night.
The Best of Fried Egg Records (Bristol 1979-1981) will be released on cd first week of Feb 2010. Its hould start to appear for presale on Amazon, Play.com, HMV etc in the next few weeks.
Thomas Brooman CBE has agreed to write the sleeve notes for another cd release of his favourite tracks and bands from the Bristol Recorder, Wavelength Records era – can’t wait!
Avon Calling 2 is currently being compiled by Simon Edwards (Heartbeat Records) for cd release in the spring 2010 with sleeve notes from the great man him self….
The track listing looks like being as follows subject to the bands approval:
1 SOCIAL SECURITY STELLAS GOT A FELLA/CIDER
2 SOCIAL SECURITY SELF CONFESSION
3 EUROPEANS TO BE AGREED WITH STEVE
4 GLAXO BABIES BECAUSE OF YOU
5 GLAXO BABIES STAY AWAKE
6 APARTMENT BROKEN GLASS
7 APARTMENT RETROSPECT
8 PRIVATE DICKS YOU GOT IT
9 PRIVATE DICKS WANT SOME FUN
10 SNEAK PREVIEW MR MAGOO
11 SNEAK PREVIEW I CANT GET OUT
12 JOE PUBLIC LETTERS IN MY DESK
13 JOE PUBLIC FASTER
14 ART OBJECTS WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO
15 X – CERTS PEOPLE OF TODAY
16 48 HOURS TRAIN TO BRIGHTON
17 TVI’S DANCER
18 VITUS DANCE ANY TAKERS
19 DIRECTORS EMPTY PROMISES
20 DIRECTORS SHOWCASE
21 SEAN RYAN SUICIDE MAN
22 STEREO MODELS SO LONG
23 UNKNOWN MIGHT AS WELL ENJOY YOURSELF
And finally we have another compilation cd being compiled with sleeve notes by Shane Baldwin (Vice Squad) called ‘Bristol – The Punk Explosion’ – more news on the release date later this year.
FUTURE PLANNED RELEASES:
EITHER / OR
ANIMAL MAGIC
RESTRICTION
THE STARTLED INSECTS
STATIK SOUND SYSTEM
NECROMANCY
THE GAS TAPS
FIVE YEAR PLAN
TEMPLE
ANANDA MAYA
THE DIRECTORS
THE POSERS
CLAYTOWN TROUPE
That’s all folks.
Mike and the team.
