Barbel - One Horse Planet (1989)

Formed in 1984, the band included Greg Milton (guitar, bass, vocals), Roger Synek (drums) – both form A Formal Sigh – Ali Williams (keyboards, formerly with Flo & the Frets), Dave Surtees (guitars), who left some time later. Later they were joined by Dave Morgan (formerly with the Jactars) on bass, so that Milton could switch on second guitar and focus more on vocals.
After some demos the band finally released a much awaited MiniLP in 1989:

One Horse Planet (1989)

1. House By The Airport
2. One Thing
3. See For Herself
4. Cough It Up
5. Hip And Her Cheek
6. Puddingbag Lane
7. No Money

barbel – one horse planet

Shiny Two Shiny - Waitng for Us (1983)

A few weeks after the release of the Mini LP Shiny Two Shiny issued a single:



Waiting for Us (1983)
- Waiting for Us
- Ritual Hate




In 1984 the band contributed a song for the Zulu compilation (Moment to Moment, see post below), and in 1985 the single Waiting for Us was issued on the compilation Goodbye to All That. By this time both members were going their separate way.

sts – waiting for us

Shiny Two Shiny - Halfway Across the Rainbow (1983)

Shiny Two Shiny consisted of Flo Sullivan (a.k.a. Gayna Florence Perry, Gayna Rose Madder, later Flo & the Frets) and Robin Surtees (later Benny Profane). The duo started their musical career in 1980 with This Is This (with Mark Peters) which some time later metamorphosed in A Formal Sigh (with Greg Milton and Roger Synek, both to join Barbel), relseasing a couple of songs on Merseysound cassette compilation. In 1982 Sullivan and Surtrees using electric and acoustic guitars, synthesizers, organ, drum machine, tambourine and some percussion released a MiniLP.

Halfway Across The Rainbow (1983)

- Waiting for Us
- Through the Glass
- Razzamatazz
- The Boy from Ipanema
- Wake
- Susquehanna
- Concentration
- Grey

sts - halfway across the rainbow

(see also http://www.bubbyworld.com/Gayna/Gaynafront.htm )

Zulu Compilation (1984)

Zulu Records were formed in 1981, mainly as an outlet for releases by Pink Industry (former Pink Military). The label was run by Jayne Casey and Ambrose Reynolds, and concentrated on the alternative, experimental part of Liverpool’s musical output.

Zulu Compilation (1984)

A1 Urban Jazz Ritual - Car Crazy
A2 Frankie - Love Has Got A Gun
A3 The Project - Leaves In The Wind
A4 Bart - Situation
A5 Levi Tafari - Liverpool Experience
A6 Ambrose Reynolds - Lee Harvey Oswald (Pt. 2)
A7 Shiny Two Shiny - Moment To Moment
B1 Benjamin Zephaniah - The Boat Is Sinking
B2 Pink Industry - Stand Alone
B3 Mark Davies Markham - It All Sounds The Same To Me
B4 Forget The Whimpering Child And Become The Warrior -Left You Lying
B5 Philip Renshaw - Lake Victoria
B6 Wrecked Career - Screaming Drowning
B7 S.T.F.O.T.P.A. - The Kremlin In Flame

Urban Jazz Ritual: Avantgarde percussion-based group formed by Kif Cole (who also played for Royal Family & the Poor and Delado)

Frankie, of course, Frankie Goes to Hollywood.

The Project: The Project was actually the temporary musical project of Mike Keane after Royal Family & the Poor and Legend Agency, to which also contributed Ambrose Reynolds (tapes, bass, percussions). From this moment on the future releases by the Royal Family and the Poor were also known as the Project – Phase 1, 2, 3, etc.

Bart: Psychedelic three-piece band with African and Indian influences.

Levi Tafari: Jamaican born singer and poet, who later set up various projects with Eugene Lange and Jennifer John, such as Oduduwa, Griot Workshop, Black & Blue, and also with Delado, the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, Urban Strawberry Lunch. In 1986 he joined the Ministry of Love.

Ambrose Reynolds: At the time of the compilation with Pink Industry.

Shiny Two Shiny: Flo Sullivan and Robin Surtees (ex This is This, A Formal Sigh) (see the relevant post, coming soon).

Benjamin Zephania: Rap and dub poet, not Liverpool resident, though.

Pink Industry: Jayne, Ambrose and Tadzio.

Mark Davies Markham: One of the young Liverpool ‘rock poets’ in the tradition of famous predecessors Liverpool Scene, he was the singer of Orders from Above (with Carl Moogson).

Forget The Whimpering Child and Become The Warrior (a.k.a. Now Is The Time To Forget The Whimpering Child - Become The Warrior): The Liverpool band with the longest name is an electronic pop act consisting of Geoff Kelly (bass, vocals, former Afraid of Mice), occasionally joined by Steve Brown (drums, keyboards, former Jass Babies). The band opened up for Echo & The Bunnymen in the early 80's (1984)

Philip Renshaw: Singer-songwriter in the Peter Hammill tradition.

Wrecked Career: Avantgarde trio fronted by Jeff Turner (sax, percussion, violin, guitar, clarinet), who also played with the Royal Family and the Poor.

S.T.F.O.T.P.A. Local poetry-avantgarde artist


zulu

(Thnak to Klaus Schwartze)

Ambrose Reynolds - Greatest Hits (1983)

.

Ambrose Reynolds, originally with the O’Boogie Brothers (1976-1977) – with Ian Broudie (guitars), Frazer Henry (guitar), Jon Moss (drums), Dadid Knopov (vocals), and Nathan McGough (vocals, later Royal Family and The Poor - started contributing to the Liverpool music scene by shortly playing with one of the earliest line-up of Big in Japan (October 1977) - together with Jayne Casey, Bill Drummond, Kevin Ward, Phil Allen and Ian Broudie - then substituted by Holly Johnson on bass when he joined the Walkie Talkies (ex Ded Byrds) – with Denise D’Arcy (a.k.a. Denyze D’Arcy, vocals, sax, later Zale Out, Fragile Friends, ), Dave Wibley (a.k.a. Dave Wibberley, guitar, later Fire, Evad-Flab)), John Moss (drums), David Knopov (vocals, later Hambi & the Dance, Knopov’s Political Package, also collaborated with ex Teardrop Explodes’ Mick Finkler) and Wayne Hussey (guitar, later Foxglove, Dead or Alive, Sisters of Mercy, Mission) – where he was a full member from June 1978 to November 1979. At this time Reynolds started collaborating with various musicians. In 1979 he played bass with Jaqui & Jeanette for the first Street tot Street compilation. (According to Pete Burns this track was originally meant for him. He remembers: ‘I rehearsed with Big in Japan for a while and we did a great set, and then the producer Noddy Knowler was doing a compilation album for Open Eye Records and he asked me to contribute; he asked Ian Broudie and Clive Langer to do a tack with me but then they gave it to Jeanette Landry and Lori Larty’ Freak Unique, 72). In the same year Reynolds and Burns managed to collaborate: according to sources, in fact, Reynolds played bass on Nightmare in Wax’s song Black Leather (with Mick Reid (guitar), Martin Healey (keyboard) and Phil Hurst (drums) (although Burns does not mention this in his autobiography). In 1980 he played with Michael Keane of Royal Family and the Poor and was featured (although uncredited) on one of the songs that the RF&TP recorded for the Factory compilation A Factory Quartet (the song is Death Factory, where Reynolds played guitar). In 1981 was with Holly Johnson in Hollycaust - Frankie Goes to Hollywood (with Phil Hurst, Steve Lovell), apparently without recording anything.

In this period Reynolds began experimenting with tapes, radio archive material from America, mainly from the ‘60s and connected with well-known assassinations. This resulted in the album Greatest Hits, released in 1983.


Greatest Hits (1983)

A1 Holy Mackerel - Lee Harvey Oswald
A2 Bring Us Together - Richard Milhouse Nixon
A3 Get The Gun - Robert Fitzgerald Kennedy
A4 Kent State - Richard Milhouse Nixon & The High School Bums
B1 He's Dead Alright - John Fitzgerald Kennedy
B2 White America - Martin Luther King
B3 A Violent End - Martin Luther King
B4 Automatic Pop Shot Guns
B5 Assassin's Bullet - Edward Fitzgerald Kennedy

After this solo project, Reynolds joined Jayne Casey in Pink Industry – which continued experimenting with sounds and samples (Tadzio Jodlowsky joined on guitars). In 1988 he formed Urban Strawberry Lunch, with Liz Carlisle (vocals), Karl John (drums), Andy Escott and visual artist Mark Hill.

ambrose reynolds - greatest hits

Frankie Goes to Hollywood - Early Demos

Holly Johnson remembers:

‘At this time [1982] Sounds, a pop-music newspaper, printed a family tree of Liverpool bands in which Frankie Goes to H§ollywood somehow appeared. This was the band that had never played live, with the line-up of Steve Lovell, Ambrose Reynolds and Holly Johnson. We decided to take this name, one I had created for my old band, as the name for the new one.’
(A Bone in My Flute, 142)

When the band turned from Sons of Egypt to Frankie goes to Hollywood, they already had some songs in store which would never appear on vinyl nor were they ever performed for radio sessions, but were only part of the band’s earliest live sets (in 1982). Besides the songs already there in the Sons of Egypt’s repertoire (like Bring on the Violins and Is Anybody Out There, see post below) FGTH had also demoed a couple of other songs, among which:

Drum up Some
Living in Limbo

fgth – early demos (II)

(see also: http://www.steveirving.entadsl.com/FGTH/html/fgth_history_1-2.html )

Frankie Goes to Hollywood - Kid Jensen Sessions (February 1983)

‘It was Christmas 1982 and Frankie were the most talked about band on Merseyside […]. Things looked bleak. Worse, Frankie were being overtaken by other Liverpool bands such as The Lotus Eaters and The Pale Fountains in the race for contracts.
In Liverpool at this time was a Tube researcher looking to interview Dead Or Alive for a Tube special on Liverpool. But finding Pete Burns inactive, Mick Sawyer sought out Frankie saying that The Tube would make a video for them. “Frankie were just an averagely bright rock band,” muses Sawyer. “They had a lot of unfinished ideas and an image only The Tube would touch.”
The video was shot in the city’s State Ballroom — now a disco — and stands as one of the most eloquent documents of the original, unretouched Frankie, with Holly delivering a near-monosyllabic version of “Relax”. It was a memorable day. “All the Tyne Tees cameramen spent most of the time with their lenses up the Leatherpets’ crutches,” recalls Holly.
Radio interest was beginning to pick up again, with John Peel repeating his session and Kid Jensen commissioning “Welcome To The Pleasure Dome”, “The Only Star In Heaven” and “Relax 2” for his early evening show.
(Kevin Sutcliffe, from The Face, December 1984)

In February 1983 FGTH recorded a session for Kid Jensen ( DJ on Radio One). The track-listing for the session was as follows:

Jensen Session (February 1983)
- The Only Star in Heaven
- Welcome to the Pleasuredome
- Invade My Heart
- Relax 2 (Shoot in the Right Direction)

When it went out on the air, unknown to the band someone - someone with influence - was listening: record producer Trevor Horn. The rest is history.


fgth – jensen session

(see also: http://www.zttaat.com/article.php?title=138
http://www.x1fmradio.com/musc/artists/Frankie%20Goes%20to%20Hollywood/biography )

Big In Japan - Some Demos

(BEFORE STARTING, LET ME JUST SAY THANK YOU TO OUR FRIEND RObert POland FOR ALL THESE YEARS OF GREAT MUSIC. )


Here are Holly Johnson’s memories of the band:

‘At 17 I played in my first band, Big In Japan, which was already formed when I joined. Jayne and Kevin Ward were both vocalists, although Kevin had been doubling as bass player. Bill Drummond played rhythm guitar, Ian Broudie lead guitar, and Phil Allen was on drums. (Phil's brother Steve, a.k.a. Enrico Cadillac Jr, was the lead singer of Deaf School.) Big In Japan had started by using Deaf School's equipment and rehearsing in Eric's. Anyway Kevin wanted to be free to sing, so the band had to find a new bass player.


I was approached by Jayne and Bill. Jayne knew that I wrote lyrics and poetry, and that I played the acoustic guitar and sang. Perhaps she also realised that I needed a distraction from my situation in the Gambier Terrace bedsit, I told them that my lyrics were perhaps a bit whimsical for the kind of thing their band was doing, but the truth was I was really too shy to show them my work. I was familiar with only one song of theirs, the band's theme tune `Big In Japan', which actually I thought was dreadful, though I understood the tongue-in-cheek aspect of it.
Still, I felt that it might be fun. Also I knew it was a way of getting in to Eric's for free. Being a bass player in a New Wave band had never been part of my big plan; but it could be a kind of apprenticeship.

I went through a series of little auditions - one with Ian Broadie with my acoustic guitar. Ian checked out my playing ability, which compared to his was pretty minimal, but I did quite a good rendition of Jacques gel's 'Amsterdam' - Bowie had sung this song on a B-side in the early Seventies. The next audition was with Bill and Ian in Eric's. One day they gave me Kevin's bass guitar, a blue Fender Music Man. It was hell to play, but somehow I managed to perform a piece they taught me. Bill and Kevin were ten years older than I - they seemed ancient - and Jayne was twenty one. I think the nearest in age to me was Ian who was about eighteen, and by far the most accomplished musician and arranger. My obvious advantage to the group was that I looked like a male mirror image of Jayne, with my shaved head dyed blonde and the black eye make up. It gave the band a strong visual identity without a doubt.
I learned the songs by rote, in the manner Kevin had played them, not really understanding the musical style or the function of the bass guitar that much. I did manage however to have an influence on the lyrics.

Jayne would say let's write some lyrics,' so I would dictate lines that I had already written back at the flat to her, adapting them to her personality, since she would be singing them. I often rewrote lyrics to existing tunes. 'Suicide A Go Go', 'SCUM' and `Nothing Special' were written in this manner. Looking back, I think they are some of my favourite lyrics.’
(A Bone In My Flute, 91-92)

‘So as in all groups politics started to rear its ugly head. The first target was Kevin, Jayne's on-and-off boyfriend. Bill Drummond and Jayne got together and somehow managed to get Kevin voted out of the group. I remember being quite shocked at the way Jayne helped engineer this. She claimed that Kevin tried to undermine her; maybe he did, I might have been too young to notice things like that. Bill had a theory that in matters like this, pop groups had to be ruthless. It was a bit like the popularity contests that I thought I'd left behind in school. Next it was Phil Allen's turn.

The Spitfire Boys' drummer `Budgie' was one of the best in town at that time, and somehow Phil was out and Budgie was in. I didn't mind that much as Budgie had been my friend. Budgie was nice and one of the least homophobic musicians. […’](ABIMF, 95)

‘Meanwhile, Big In Japan were getting a bit of a reputation. Paul Morley, a freelance journalist for the NME, came over from Manchester to interview us. It took place in Eric's club one afternoon. He asked his usual awkward questions. `What do you hope to achieve by all of this?' and `What will you do when it's all over?' I think Bill answered that he would like to take a trip down the Amazon. I replied flippantly that I would like to open a chippy.

This small article enabled us to get further bookings up and down the country. We played some polytechnic or other, supporting Penetration. […] We also supported The Buzzcocks when they played the Mountford Hall in Liverpool. We only did a few numbers as we were drenched in spittle from the audience. A similar incident happened at Preston Polytechnic. Cans of lager were hurtled at us on the stage by ignorant students: we ducked these for two numbers, and left the stage.

Our visual presentation depended on the contrasting characters in the band. Bill would wear his kilt. Jayne would wear yellow nappies over a black leotard suit with a plunging neck Line. She had always had a heavy decolletage and used it to its best advantage. On her head she would wear a yellow terry- towelling nappy that she had transformed into an Arab headdress. She had her black eyes, black lips, and black toenails that showed through her open-toed platform `fuck me' pumps, worn to compensate for her small stature. Budgie had his shock of blonde hair behind the drums and Ian was just Ian in his John Lennon specs. I was wearing a tartan dinner jacket (Jayne found it for me in Layla's shop '69a'), and black footless tights or my tartan trousers. It was not really a punk look like all the other bands of the period, so we didn't really fit in. The music wasn't punk either, and we would often get in trouble with audiences who were there to spit and pogo.’ (abimf, 99-100)

‘My position in Big In Japan was shortly to end. I never knew exactly why. The band's politics had just swung in another direction. At the same time the music scene in Liverpool was moving on. Lots of the people who had been in the audience of Big In Japan shows stopped sneering at us for a moment and formed their own bands, thinking, 'We could do better than them'. Echo and The Bunnymen was one example. Their first show at Eric's was chaos - they only had one song and played it for twenty minutes. The drum machine was the only thing that could play. Another new band was The Teardrop Explodes - Julian Cope stopped just talking music and started playing it. Even Pete Burns eventually started to try and get in on the act. […]

I visited Jayne one day at her […] new basement flat in Grosvenor Terrace. She burst into tears and told me that the boys in the band didn't want to work with me any more. I was a bit stunned, but didn't think that it merited such histrionics. In fact I was disappointed that Jayne had allowed this to happen; her position in the band was quite important after all. It may have been due to my indifference to being a bass player, though years later Jayne claimed a bit of homophobia was involved. I didn't know, and couldn't care less. […]

The next incarnation of fig In Japan (with Dave Balfe as bass player) did not last long. They had started to rehearse in The Open Eye, a bookshop/cafe-cum-arts-centre near Mathew Street. After about three months they decided to split up and that was to be almost the end of fig In Japan. I was invited to play the bass for a few songs at the farewell concert, which I did.
A few months after this fill Drummond and Dave Balfe decided to start up their own independent record label and Zoo Records was born. The first release was an EP of Big In Japan demos, `From Y to Z and Never Again' (ABIMF, 107-108)

As to the earliest incarnation of the band Pete Burns (who also claims to have ‘rehearsed with Big in Japan for a while and we did a grat set’, Freak Unique, 71) remembers:
‘At the time, there were the Spitfire Boys - Paul Rutherford and Budgie - and there was Big in Japan. And on the stage with Big in Japan was this man wearing a gypsy bandana, with beaded hair and a tuxedo, with a fan, just standing to one side. He was older than the others, and it turned out to be Griff, the bass player in the Spitfire Boys. Big in Japan used to use him as a stage presence, and he seemed very sophisticated.’ (FU, 79)

Here is a couple of demo versions of BiJ’s songs:

- Don’t Bomb China
- Goodbye

Bij – some demos

(pictures, copyrigth to the original authors [Hilary Steele])

Steve Allen - Singles 1985-89

Steve Allen (a.k.a. Enrico Cadillac, picture on the left (c) Alan Perry ), after Deaf School was in Original Mirrors (1978) with Ian Broudie (former Big in Japan) and provided back vocals for Clive Langer’s Boxes albums (see posts below) and for other artists (i.e., The Tremblers). Only much later, in 1984 he was back on the scene with a string of singles, often recorded with the collaboration with Italian producers - hence the label of Italo-disco usually associated to the products of Allen’s solo career. The first single was released in mid-1984:

- A Letter from My Heart (b/w live version)

Later the same year another single was released:

- Message of Love (b/w instrumental version)

In 1986Allen formed the Perils of Plastic, with Steve Nieve (former Attraction). The group released a couple of singles (Ring a Ding Ding and Womanhood, both in 1986). In February 1987 Steve Allen under his name released another single:

- Love Is in the Air (b/w instrumental version)

In 1989 another single was issued, the last of the decade .

- Lagoon Girl (b/w Carribean Dream)

steve allen singles

Clive Langer & The Boxes - Splash (1980)

The first vinyl release by the Boxes was not warmly received by the press. Clive Langer, who by 1979 had already successfully produced Bette Bright, Madness and the Teardrop Explodes, put his experience and focus into re-vitalizing his solo project. In 1980, after a support tour with Elvis Costello, Clive Langer and a new line-up for the Boxes – including Ben Barson on keyboards, James Eller on bass, Martin Hughes of drums, the brass section of the Rumour, plus Steve Allen and Bette Bright on backing vocals – released a couple of singles (namely Splash (A Tear Goes Rolling Down) b/w Hello and It’s All Over Now b/w Lovely Evening), both of which were to be included in the band’s first LP (except for the b-side Lovely Evening, already featured on the first 12”):

Splash (1980)
- Hello
- Never Wanted You
- Ain’t Gonna Kiss Ya
- Hope And Glory
- Best Dressed Man
- Half As Nice
- Splash
- It's All Over Now
- Burning Money
- Take You Down
- First Thing In The Morning


(For all Madness fans out there, this is where the sound that was to become distinctive of the band was born, experimented with and developed.) After his time with the Boxes, Clive Langer started his collaboration with Alan Winstanley, as one of the most appreciated and productive partnership of producers of the 80s.

clive langer - 1980


(see also http://www.langerwinstanley.com/ )

Clive Langer & the Boxes - I Want the Whole World (1979)

Clive Langer full-member of the Deaf School since 1974, also collaborated with the early Big in Japan in 1978. In 1979, after both acts disbanded he started working with some friends as Clive Langer and the Boxes. The first-line up of the Boxes included, besides Langer himself (vocals and guitars), Deaf School friends Bette Bright and Steve Allen (backing vocals), Budgie (drums, former Spitfire Boys, Big in Japan) and Ben Barson (keyboards, brother of and main influence for Mike Barson, keyboard player with Madness). In March 1979 the group released their first 12”:

I Want the Whole World (1979)
a1. I Want the Whole World
a2. Lovely Evening
a3. I Know I
b1. Those Days
b2. Simple Life

clive langer & boxes (1979)

Bette Bright & The Illuminations - Rhythm Breaks the Ice (1981)

In 1981 Bette Bright went back to collaborating with former Deaf School bandmate Clive Langer, and the new line-up of the Illuminations featured all of Langer’s backing band, the Boxes, namely Ben Barson (keyboards, brother of Mike Barson from Madness), James Eller (bass), Martin Hughes (drums). Other members were Ian Broudie (guitar) and Joe Allen (drums). With this line-up Bette Bright & The Illuminations released their first album (on Korova) which features the three singles released since 1980:

Rhythm Breaks the Ice (Sep. 1981)
- When You Were Mine
- On A Night Like This
- Hello, I Am Your Heart
- All Girls Lie (Bette Bright)
- Take What You Find
- Talking Whispers
- Thunder And Lightning
- Shoorah Shoorah
- Some Girls Have All The Luck
- Tender Touch
- Hold On

The album was produced by Clive Langer and Alan Winstanley, also producers with Madness, and it was via Langer, Winstanley and Barson that Bright got to know Graham MacPherson (a.k.a. Suggs), lead singer with the band. In 1982 they married and Bright retired from music.

bette bright - rhythm

Bette Bright & The Illuminations - The Captain of Your Ship (1979)

In January 1979, Bette and the Illumiations released a second single:


The Captain of Your Ship (1979)
a. The Captain of Your Ship
b. Those Greedy Eyes



After this, Bette Bright spent some time as a backing singer for the Dutch band Gruppo Sportivo (on the 1980 album Copy Copy). She also appeared in Malcolm McLaren's Sex Pistols movie The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle. Back home, she started to collaborate with old Liverpudlian friends and colleagues (Broudie, Langer, etc.) and in the period 1980-81 three singles were released, Hello, I’m Your Heart (b/w All Girls Lie, April 1980), When You Were Mine (b/w Soulful Dress, May 1981), Some Girls Have All the Luck (b/w Tender Touch, August 1981), the former of which made the Charts. All of them were then to be featured on the Illuminations’ first album released the same year.


bette bright - captain

Bette Bright & The Illuminations - My Boyfriend’s Back (1978)

After Deaf School, Bette Bright (a.k.a. Anna Martin, Anne Martino, Ann Murray) started her solo career backed by the Illuminations, a support band with a very fluid line-up which at the beginning included Henry Priestman (ex Yachts, later The Christians), Rusty Egan (ex Visage, Rich Kids), and Glen Matlock (ex Sex Pistols, Rich Kids). The first single was released in September 1978:

My Boyfriend’s Back (1978)
a. My Boyfriend’s Back
b. Hold On, I’m Coming



bette bright - boyfriend

(see also: http://www.myspace.com/bettebright81
http://www.merseybeat.co.uk/articles-details.php?cat=Mersey+Artists&id=377 )

Steve Lindsey (a.k.a. Mr. Average, Steve Tempo)

In 1978, after the split of Deaf School, Steve Lindsey went on to join Big in Japan (replacing Holly Johnson), although for a short period of time (and did D.F. colleague Clive Langer before him). At the same time he was working on solo projects, which materialized in March 1978:

Mr. Average (1978)
a. Mr. Average
b. Mr. Average Goes to Nashville

After the single, Lindsey put together the Secrets, with Ian Broudie (guitar, ex Big in Japan), Budgie (drums, ex Spitfire Boys, Big in Japan) and Dave Hughes (keyboards, from Dalek I Love You) which rehearsed for a while. No vinyl releases.
In January 1979, under the pseudonym of ‘Steve Tempo’, Lindsey returned a solo-artist and released a second single (Break it to Me Gently b/w I’m on Fire). Curiously, both songs were to be re-recorded and released by the Lindsey’s next group, the Planets (see post below)

mr. average

(Thanks to our friend Bas
See also: http://www.discog.info/planets.html)

Deaf School – Ding Dong (demo, 1974)

Here’s the story of the band told by journalist Paul De Noyer:

“They were formed at Liverpool Art College, John Lennon's alma mater, and, like Supercharge, thrived on the developing pub circuit. They were in the Bowie and Roxy traditions, which had been very big in Liverpool, but there seemed to be dozens of them on stage, like a low-budget cabaret revue. The focal points were a suave young crooner with a moustache, one Enrico Cadillac (Steve Allen, later with Original Mirrors, Perils of Plastic), and a sexy, upbeat girl in 60s styles called Bette Bright (Ann Martin, or Anne Martino, later solo artist, with the Illumination). A guitarist, Clive Langer (also part-time player with Big in Japan, later with the Boxes), looked serious and bespectacled, so you assumed he was the musical genius. There was a comedy vicar called the Reverend Max Ripple (John Wood), and another lounge lizard named Eric Shark (Thomas Davis). In fact there was a pile-up of competing looks to accommodate, and a corresponding jumble of musical elements, from Tin Pan Alley to Brecht/Weill cabaret to rock'n'roll satire.

Bette Bright (who was actually Ann Martin, from Whitstable in Kent) remembers: `We started a band that was supposed to be interesting, just kind of different. Originally there were a lot more people in the band - early on it was a bit ridiculous - but it gradually got more serious. Eventually the numbers kind of whittled down to. about eight.'

They won the Melody Maker's Folk/Rock contest in 1975, which led to a record deal with Warners and their 1976 debut LP 2nd Honeymoon. They were massively backed by the company at first, and launched in America with high hopes all round. However, this was also the year of punk rock, and Deaf School suddenly seemed wrong. I know I divided my time that year between Sex Pistols gigs at the 100 Club in London and trips to Liverpool, and despite my affection for Deaf School I recognised the problem. Theirs was a sort of provincial take on Kings Road camp, whereas the mood of punk was something harsher. Fey pastiche was making way for dirty realism. In the end they made a few more, largely unfocussed albums in the 70s, before dissolving.

Yet Deaf School had been a great thing for Liverpool in two ways. Firstly they were a compelling if chaotic live event, a hundred times more interesting than anything else available in the mid-70s. And secondly, they were the first young group to provide the scene with a post-Beatle focus. A new generation of music fans and would-be musicians found their earliest role models in Deaf School. Its personnel would be the germ of Mathew Street's revival.
Bette Bright: 'I think we were a really good band who happened at a really bad time. Punk came along and because we were so different to all of that - although all the time we were changing - we got lumped with this "art college" image, which is really unpopular. I mean, we were a really great live band. But with all that punk thing, the fact that you were Deaf School, you couldn't do anything right. You couldn't cross the road. It was terrible. And that used to really piss me off.

`The way we went about things I don't think we'd ever commercially have been successful. When we started out it was the pub bands like [Ian Dury's group] the Kilburns that we really liked, and we only set our sights at about that level. And a lot of the time the record company wanted us to compromise, for example to change the name because the BBC wouldn't play us. It got to the stage where there was a lot of talent in that band that couldn't be used. It was better to split up and let people continue along their own paths.'

They were in fact an impressive nursery for talent. Steve Lindsey, who liked to call himself Mr Average on account of his semi­detached Bebington upbringing, went on to form the Planets. The drummer Tim Whittaker (later Pink Military, Lori and the Chameleons, Galeforce and Sex Gods) was a gifted artist and, as a drummer, hugely admired by local players like the Bunnymen's Pete De­Freitas. Sadly, he died in 1996. Steve Allen, the former Enrico Cadillac, would later found Original Mirrors with Ian Broudie, and is nowadays a music industry big-shot, having become Senior A&R Director at WEAlLondon's Eternal label, where his successes have included Eiffel 65. Clive Langer would become one of the best-known producers of the next decade, working with Madness, Teardrop Explodes and Elvis Costello (with whom he wrote the immortal `Shipbuilding'). Bette Bright went on to make some fine pop tracks, in her inimitably excitable vocal style, including `Hello I Am Your Heart'. `When You Were Mine' and `My Boyfriend's Back'.

(Du Noyer, Liverpool Wondrous Place, 113-114)

In 1976 Steve Lindsey remembered:

“We started in Jan. 74 with 4 Bright sisters, 2 guitars, Ernie and Max. Our 1st gig was in the summer and we lost one Bright sister, and added drums, bass and a two-piece brass-section, violin and 3 more singers incl. the now famous Shark. So we were 15! – One year later […] we were 12 incl. Hazel ‘Hotlips’ Bartram & M. Evans (journalist, DJ, Ex Livpool Scene) who combined within made up our strongest brass section ever! – 9 months later we have lost Roy, one of the original guitarists, and have at present only one Bright sister. Sandy Bright has left to follow her own solo career. – So D.S. is an ever changing band, the sound changes as people come and go.”

Here is one of the earliest song ever recorded by the band (early 74) in their second line-up (13 people), including Enrico Cadillac, Eric Shark and Bette, Ann and Sandy Bright sisters on vocals, Roy Holt and Clive Langer on guitars, Max Ripple on keyboards, Steve Lindsey on bass, Tim Whittaker on drums, and Ian Ritchie, Hazel Bartram and Mike Evans playing brass

Ding Dong (Allen, Langer)

See also:
http://seedyroad.com/seedyroad/deafschool/deafschool.htm
http://www.nme.com/artists/deaf-school

http://www.myspace.com/deafschool

Zorkie Twins

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Birkenhead based rock-punk act operating out of Buckley/Hawarden and Chester during early 1980s. The Twins were Mike Kendrick (vocals ,guitar) Colin Miller (vocals, guitar), Paul Bedford (bass), John Roberts (drums). The first release dates from 1979 and was a track on the Skeleton Ep compilation Blank Tapes Vol. 1:

- Sooner or Later

In 1980 The band released their first single:

Mr. Simpson (Jan. 1980)
a. Mr. Simpson
b. From Now On

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Towards the end of the same year the Zorkie Twins provided another track for another Skeleton Compilation, A Trip to the Dentist:

- Little Arthur

After the split of the band in 1981, all the members except from Kendrick went on to form the Rhythm Squad.

zorkie

(see also: http://www.myspace.com/zorkietwins )

Virgin Dance

After the split of Modern Eon, the band’s drummer Cliff Hewitt formed the Virgin Dance, with Edwin Hind (vocals, later Picnic at the Whitehouse), Kenny Duggan (a.k.a. Kenny Dougan, guitar), Dave Knowles (keyboards) and Graham McMaster (bass). This line-up lasted for a few months (1982-83): they released one single (Are You Ready b/w Facts) on Probe, in June 1983, which went straight into the independent chart, and was re-recorded and re-released one month later; they also recorded a Peel session (with Lorraine Gardner replacing Knowles on keyboards). Around this time McMaster and Knowles left (the latter to join Here’s Johnny), and were replaced respectively by Bernie Putt and Dixie. This second line-up, having established their status in the musical world by supporting the Eurythmics on tour, put out two singles (No Disguise b/w Against the Tide, 1983, and Desire b/w Make Love, 1984). In 1984 Putt was substituted by Barry Cowell on bass and Virgin Dance released their fourth original single (The Dream is Over b/w Rainy Days) and a new version of their early single Are You Ready (b/w Night Call).
Eventually, in March 1985 an Lp was released collecting all the band’s singles and b-sides (except for the very first single’s b-side, Facts).



Against the Tide (1985)


A side:
- Are You Ready (For That Feeling)
- Rainy Days
- Make Love
- The Dream Is Over (We Can Make It) (Megamix)
- Against The Tide
B side:
- Desire
- Night Call
- No Disguise
- Farewell Claire
- The Dream Is Over (We Can Make It)

virgin dance

The High Five - Peel Sessions (1983-84)

The High Five recorded three session. The first was recorded in the very early days of the band, in June 1982, even before their first privately released demo (August 1982). This session would be later be released as a bonus on a seven track demo tape (April 1983) collecting the two demos previously issued by the band (August 1982, March 1983).
The second session was released in May 1983. The band (with Mark Braben on keyboards) was helped out by Hamish Cameron (Keyboards, Harmonica). The tracklist was as follows:

Peel Session (23/05/1983)
- Cold Steel Gang
- On The Banks
- Hand On My Heart
- Big Village

In March 1984 the High Five (aided by John Hughes on piano on the track Working For The Man Only) recorded their third Peel session performing their forthcoming single and related b-sides.

Peel Session (03/03/1984)
- 100 Tons
- Walk Them Back
- Working For The Man
- Hard Line


high five peel

The High Five - Singles (1983-84)

At the beginning there was the Crash Course. The band was active only for a short period of time (end 1978 beginning 1979) and was formed by Andy Eastwood (vocals, later Sex Gods, Divine Thunderbolts) and Rob Jones (drums), who were soon joined by Mick Reid (guitar, later Nightmare in wax), Peter Cunningham (bass, later Divine Thunderbolt) and eventually by Pete Wylie (guitar, previously Crucial Three, Mystery Girl, Nova Mob, later Wah!). The band (who shared a flat in Penny Lane) recorded a live Ep which was never recorded, and was the main act at Eric’s the night the Bunnymen played their first gig (on whose request Eastwood provided the three-note part on Farfisa to Monkeys).
In January 1979 the Crash Course was already history and Jones and Wylie started Wah! Heat. Rob Jones remained with the band until 1981, when he formed the High Five with Paul ‘Asa’ Hayes (vocals, guitars), Phil Jonese (bass) and Steve Burns (keyboards), replaced in 1982 by Mark Braben (guitars, keyboards). The band (with Western Promise and the Farm) entered the elite of Liverpool’s ‘political’ bands (NME, 25 May 1985).
High Five released three privately produced demo tapes, almost all of the songs on them to be subsequently released on vinyl.
The first official release dates from October 1983:

Cold Steel Gang (b/w Are You Happy)


In August 1984 the second (and possibly their most acclaimed) single came out:

Working for the Man (b/w Walk Them Back)


In September 1984 one of their song (already featured on the band’s first demo in 1982) appeared on the compilation A Secret Liverpool:

- Turning

The High Five, with an extended five-piece line-up (with Tim O’Shea on guitars, former Send No Flowers) finally released an Lp in 1986 (Down in the No Go).

high five - singles (1983-84)

(see also: http://www.myspace.com/thehighfiveliverpool )

Sons of Egypt - Some Demos

The path that led Holly Johnson from being a solo artist to leading Frankie Goes to Hollywood has been quite complicated. After the split of the first line-up of FGTH (including Ambrose Reynolds and Steve Lovell) Johnson was quite active and productive in the underground musical scene. Among the relics of the period 1980-1982 are the demos recorded with the Sons of Egypt.
Here are his memories of the time:

‘Steve (Lovel, ndr), Buddy Mate (a boy working in a Virgin Record shop, ndr.) and I started rehearsing in ‘The Ministry’, a well equipped rehearsal room […]. Our band was to be called WIN (World Intelligence Network), a name taken from the puppet series ‘Joe 90’. Eventually however, Steve and I decided that Buddy’s bass playing wasn’t slick enough. Rather guiltily, we sacked him’ (A Bone in My Flute, 139)

‘A few months after we asked him to leave our group, Buddy Mate formed his own band, out of a group of young scally teenagers. His still-at-school girlfriend Julie played keyboards, Brian Nash (Nasher) played guitar, Buddy played bass guitar, Peter Gill (Ped) played drums and Ged O'Tool (Mark's brother) sang. They used to rehearse in The Cells, a disused prison behind the Hollywood Club in Duke Street, ten minutes' walk away from my flat. I used to go down the hill and watch them rehearse and I even named them - The Dancing Girls.

Eventually, at a friend's suggestion, I replaced Ged as the singer. They thought I was hip as I'd had two singles out on the Eric's label and had been in Big In Japan, a group that some of them had seen as kids at Eric's Saturday matinees. Nasher had a job as an apprentice electrician with the council, and Ped, having just been made redundant from Hygena, had used his redundancy money to buy himself a better drum kit. They were all around sixteen or seventeen years old. I was an `old man' of twenty-one or twenty-two.

I tried to rewrite the songs that they had, putting new lyrics to their backing music. We eventually got a spot on a local Granada TV show as `Sons Of Egypt' which became our name for some unknown reason. `Shake, Shake' was one of the songs [Bring on the Violins was the other, ndr]. The performance was quite good, but the songs in general were not.’ (ABIMF, 141)

‘I had realised I needed to get a live band going if I was ever going to attract record company attention. Eventually Ped and I decided to leave Buddy's band and form another with Mark O'Tool as bass player. We felt a bit guilty leaving Buddy in the lurch, but we knew that his bass playing and his attitude were holding things back.

Almost on the first rehearsal we wrote `Love Has Got A Gun`. a song that appeared on the first Frankie Goes To Hollywood album. […] Quite a few songs were bashed out, just like this, by the three of us Sometimes we would drag the equipment out into the sunny yard at the back of the building. Anyone who joined the band late ­would have to accept that we had written most of the songs.

At this time Sounds, a pop-music newspaper, printed a farn tree of Liverpool bands in which `Frankie Goes To Hollywood’ somehow appeared. This was the band that had never played ­live, with the line-up of Steve Lovell, Ambrose Reynolds a7, Holly Johnson. We decided to take this name, one I had create for my old band, as the name for the new one.

We tried out a few guitarists from the echelons of Mark’s family. There were two brothers who could both play, Vinny and Ged, the latter becoming the guitarist for the first performance, though neither was a very important part of the sound which was dominated by the rhythm section. Ped and I had tried to get &­ guitarist from The Jazz Babies (a.k.a. The Jass Babies, Rob Boardman) to join, but without success. I played maracas while singing at these early rehearsals to fill out our sparse sound. We eventually also added a girl singer, Sonia M (a.k.a. Sonya Mazonda or Mazunda), to do backing vocals. She also added visual interest. She was a short rotund girl of Eastern extraction who told us she collected semen and urine samples in a clinic in the Liverpool Royal Hospital. She had a red satin dress that she had made herself, with a small padded devil's tail safety-pinned to the hem at the back. She was the kind of girl whose stiletto heels came from wire baskets outside shoe shops. Her voice could be described as overpowering. Her style was rather `Frank 'n' Furter Goes To Kwik Save'. (ABIMF, 142-143)

Songs of Egypt recorded several versions of 'Shake Shake' and a few other songs which would then be part of the early FGTH's repertoire. Here you'll find:

- Shake Shake
- Untitled 1 (Is anybody out there)
- Untitled 2 (Bring on the violins)

sons of egypt

Watch the band’s performance on Granada TV here

Roy White and Steve Torch - Some Recordings (1980-84)

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In 1977 Roy White was singing and playing with the Liverpool punk act Berlin, with Johnny ‘Riff’ Reynolds (guitar, later 3D), James Mealy (bass), Gerry Garland (sax, both later Victims of Romance, Bamboo Fringe), and Roy Banks. The band toured quite extensively, and got some positive reviews by Melody Maker and Sounds, and at a certain point was even about to be signed by Decca. When the record company dropped them for Slaughter and the Dogs, Banks left and was replaced by Brian Rawlins (later Liverpool Express, 3D, Keep it Dark) and the band changed the name to Fun. This ‘progressive rockband’ had one track released on the compilation Street to Street Vol. 1 in 1978, which was also their swan-song.
In the meantime, Steve Torch, a former engineer for Open Eye records, was working as a solo artist, and released one single (Live in Fear b/w Smoke Your Own). White and Torch worked together for the first time when Fun became Victims of Romance, and Torch and Hambi (former Tontrix) were added to the line-up. The partnership between the two became more solid when, in the same period, they collaborated with Jayne Casey (former Big in Japan , later Pink Industry) in the Pink Military (White and Torch are among the personnel playing on the Pink Military’s Blood and Lipstick Ep, Sept. 1979).
In 1980 Roy White and Steve Torch released as a duo (plus session musicians) their first single (Who’s Asking You? b/w Stand Alone – the latter in the folder here attached) on Open Eye. The single did not impressed the public and the press, and the duo would probably have disappeared if Chrysalis hadn’t decided to reissue the song with a different production and a different b-side:

Who’s Asking You? (b/w Guess Who, 1980)

In the following years W&T released a series of singles:

Parade (Don’t Sleep with Him) (b/w Man to Man, 1982)

Let’s Forget (b/w No, Not I, 1983)

Miracle (b/w Heartbeat, 1983)

.

.

Bury My Heart (b/w Whatever Happens on Sunday, 1984)

.

In 1984 White and Torch also recorded a Peel Session performing four songs performing their latest single, a couple of b-sides from previous single releases (No, Not I and Heartbeat) and a new song: Don’t Be Shot (the song in the folder is taken from a TV show).
According to the press, the duo managed (or at least tried) to combine the Bacharach and David sense of the melody and the Walkers Brothers’ sensibility for ballads with a Bowie-like voice.
In 1985 the due split and Roy White started working as a solo artist (mainly with the support of the same session musician who had worked with White and Torch, namely Jim Mealy (guitars), David Levy (bass), Charlie Morgan (drums),Jackie Robinson (vocals)).

white and torch (1980-84)

(see also:
http://www.boredteenagers.co.uk/berlinpage2.htm
http://groups.msn.com/DexysMidnightRunners/whiteamptorch.msnw
http://www.myspace.com/thetruemen
http://raidingthevinylarchive.blogspot.com/2007/08/white-torch-or-david-essex-showcase.html )

This Island Earth - Some Recordings (1984-85)

In 1978 John ‘Strange’ Hawkins played bass and provided vocals in the reggae-punk act Activity Minimal, with Tim Level (guitar, later Dead or Alive) and Joey McKechnie (drums, former Luglo Slugs, later in Manchester based Passage, then in Benny Profane). In 1980 – after McKechnie, first, and Lever, then, quit to join Modern Ean (with former Luglo Slugs members Alix Plain and Danny Hampson) – Hawkins was among the founding members of the Systems (see post below), whose first line-up included Tony Elson (drums, later Visual Aids, Precautions, Island of Dance), Mike Read (keyboards), Kevin Chapman (guitar, vocals), then substituted by Andy Warren (then I-Lands). After one single and the demise of Warren, Jem Kelly (former Psychamesh, later Wild Swans, Lotus Eaters), Kevin Brown and Mike Nelson (ex Neutral Cover-Ups) joined the act and released a second single before the band definitively split in 1981.
Hawkins and keyboard player Kevin Brown continued to write songs together and in early 1983 decided to include in the line-up Mark Griffith (guitars), Rachel Furniss (vocals), and steve Brown (drums, former Jass Babies, later Afraid of Mice and Here’s Johnny), under the name of This Island Earth.
This Island Earth released their first single in October 1984:



See That Glow (1984)
a. See That Glow
b. Fireflowers



In 1985 a second (and final original) single followed, Take Me to the Fire (b/w Pearl of Love). From 1987 to 1989 several re-issues of the two singles were released. Even though This Island Earth seemed to have enough material (sources mention the existence of a variety of demos recorded before 1985, i.e. Heaven, Different Places, Drive, Walk On Light, Calling You, This Situation, and maybe others like Your Blue Eyes, As Big As All Outdoors, Feelings Go On Forever, This Island Earth, Man Who Could Work Miracles, To Get To You, What Is It That Tells My Heart) the band never got to release an Lp.

this island earth