By 1985 the Liverpool scene was quite stale. Music creators and consumers alike felt the need of "something fresh to liven up the Liverpool music scene" (Blast Off, Feb. 1988). The Sex Gods, in the mind of their founder members, were probably meant to fill this creative gap.
The original Sex Gods started off in late 1985 / early 1986 as a vague idea of fun born out of the disillusionment Pete De Freitas resented from the whole Bunnymen’s experience. The nucleus was formed by De Freitas himself, Tim Whittaker (ex Deaf School, Pink Military, Lori & the Chameleons, Gale Force), and Jake Brockman, in the Bunnymen’s rehearsal room. When the tension within the band exploded, De Freitas flew to New Orleand (pictures on the left), taking along the Bunnymen road crew of Tim Whittaker, Andy Eastwood (ex Crash Course, The Eye Of…), Steve ‘Johnno’ Johnson (ex Wah! Heat, a.k.a. Johnny Cult, ex Ellery Bop), plus Tim O’Shea (of Send No Flowers). The whole idea of the trip to New Orleans, in De Freitas’ words (1986) was the need “to get away on holiday and come back with more than just memories having spent a lot of money and very big hangovers [but rather] with something positive”. The idea was to work “totally off chance” and was partly inspired by the film The Dice Man, a culty lunatic semi-religion called Bokanism, and the weird notion of “the duck” – which stood for anything which is ridiculous, insane and irrational.
The band was occasionally joined by the Bunnymen’s on the road guitarist Mike Mooney (later Spiritualized) and sax player Mars Williams (Psychedelic Furs). This flexible line-up hung out, occasionally worked on songs, and allegedly documented the whole experience on super 8 film and in a book called The Godlogs.
In fact, the trip turned out to be less inspiring than planned, and all about not eating, not sleeping, ingesting vast quantities of LSD and alcohol, and crashing cars and motorcycles.
Mars Williams remembers that: “[De Freitas] was singing, and also decided that he wa going to play guitar. We rehearsed a bit in the house, wrote and worked on songs, and then we went into the studio and recorded some of it. The thing that was really bad about the band was that Pete should’ve been playing drums, because he was a great drummer, and the guy that was playing drums [Whittaker] wasn’t. And Pete was not a good guitarist, so who knows what he was trying to do. It was more like Pete’s friends hanging out” (1998).
As De Freitas’ finance dwindle, members of the Sex Gods begun drifting home one-by-one, each expressing concerns about De Freitas’ mental health.
Back in Liverpool, Whittaker left the band and De Freitas moved to the drumming stool, occasionally bringing in his brother Frank (Woodentops) on bass. During the summer the band recorded some songs inRockfield, but this line-up wouldn’t last for long: by the end of 1986 the Sex Gods lost both founder members, as De Freitas rejoined the Bunnymen for good.
New members Eastwood (on vocals) and Johnson (on guitar) were joined by Mooney, first on bass, than on guitar, by Gary Dwyer (ex Teardrop Explodes, at the time occasionally playing with Black) on drus, and by Carl Washington (ex Wah!) on bass. Because of all these names and connections the band gained a cult status even before having released anything.
Only much later the band, signed to Island recorded, and after a couple of singles, the band collected all their material onto an Lp. The record company refused to release an album under the name of Sex Gods and the band opted for Balcony Dogs (taken from one of their songs), while the album was titled Trip (possibly referred to the experience/s in New Orleans that got things going)
Balcony Dogs - The Trip (1988)
1. Fluency 3
2. Wheel of Fortune
3. Good Little, Bad Little
4. Shot to Earth
5. Drug Planet #7
6. Balcony Dog
7. Charlene's Dream
8. Rings of Saturn
9. Underworld
After the split of the Balcony Dogs, many of the members joined the Divine Thunderbolt, formed by Tim Whittaker, featuring Jake Brokman, Andy Eastwood (vocals), Kate Milner (vocals), and at some point Pete and Frank De Freitas and Mike Mooney
Balcony dogs(All quotations from Chris Adams’ Turquoise Days)
Four-piece rock band including brothers Mark Parry (on drums) (later Ellery Bop, Western Promise, Ministry of Love, Steppin’ Razor) and Paul Parry (on bass) (later Steppin’ Razor). Other members, at various times were J. Johnson, Anderw Wilson, McCusker, Andy de Foxx (later Touch). To Parry, Johnson, Wilson and McCusker is credited to group only (?) single:
I Remember Lucy (1978)
