Poplydia - Poplydia (1993)

We really don't know/remember much about Poplydia, all we have is a vague association of these guys with the mid-90s Britpop scene in Calgary. The missing j-card isn't helping. We believe guitarist Craig McCaul went on (eventually) to play with the Cape May.

The liner notes of the Play compilation tell us that "Poplydia singlehandedly disprove Pete Townsend's theory that good musicians can't make good rock music."

Them's fightin' words!

Merkins - The Merkins

We had been emailing with former Merkins drummer Jeff Sulima at the tail end of the summer, in another ongoing saga of a band member who hadn't kept a copy of his bands tapes. Thankfully, the CJSW archives have ended that dilemma, and we're pleased to present this first tape from the Merkins.

We remember the Merkins for two main reasons: their name, which caused much mirth for the permanent adolescents among us here at the CCPS; and the band's musical ability. The drone-y songs on here are a bit muddy, but so's our memory.

Get wiggy!

Calliope - Calliope (1994)

We're still pretty pleased that we haven't yet had a cease and desist from Universal Records for posting Zuckerbaby's debut album a few months back. Never ones to play it safe, we're pleased to present tonight's tape, which is sadly lacking any cover art.

However, there's a wealth of internet knowledge out there, reminding us that before they were Zuckerbaby, Reed Shimozawa and Andy Eichhorn headed up the "groove oriented" Calliope.

We have our own suspicions about what that's secret code for, but we'll leave it to you to listen and decide for yourself.

Purge - Purge (1994)

We know nothing about this, other than it came from Donovan's plastic bag. It sounds very much like you expect early 90s alt-rock to sound like. You can almost see the flannel shirts.

But you can get it here.

Kilgore Trout - The Trout are Out II (1993)

Just before we run off to put our head in a watermelon, we thought we should share another tape. We haven't had too much (any?) representation from the folk scene here in our collection, so this tape from Kilgore Trout is a welcome addition. We have vague memories of Kilgore Trout, so thankfully Northern Journey fills in the blanks for us:

The Calgary musical troupe Kilgore Trout describe themselves as being composed of "working stiffs and students." Lori Hogg is a general practitioner studying to be a psychiatrist, Bob Brennan is an engineer working on a Ph.D., Gail Korchinski is a systems analyst, Kari Strutt and Jackie Bell are writer/editors. They are joined by their passion for music. The material on their debut album, One Voice Starts..., is drawn from a variety of sources from traditional ballads to the Trout's own brand of "folk and roll." The soaring vocals, frequently joining in two-, three-, and four-part harmony, highlight the group's solid songwriting. Kilgore Trout disbanded in 1996.

Go fish!

Glider - Popsicle (1994)

We may have been a bit flippant (Us? Flippant? Ha! Never!) when we posted Glider's Umbrella EP. While we're not quite sober enough right now to take back what we said back then, we will say that this tape has got us in a pretty good mood. We actually didn't realize there was a second Glider tape until Donovan Watson flipped it our way (at a skatepark! in a Safeway bag! fantastic!).

Get it here.

Church of Doug - Cigarettes Whiskey and Wild Wild Women (1988)

We're mildly jealous of our friends over at Golden Rock right now, because they've been the lucky recipient of a bunch of tapes that had been carefully stored in the trunk of a car. You should pop over there and grab the live Legendary Few tape they've posted, as well as this - the solo offering from sometimes-Golden Calgarian Doug Smith. We're told that each of the actual cassettes was customized by Doug himself; the copy originally obtained by Golden Rock (via the Coughin' Nails' Murray Grieg) boasts the scrawl, "watered down 3 for 1 drinks are Satan's ploy to destroy live music--Rev. Doug '88."

We really like the Golden Calgarians, but they were a vinyl-only outfit. It's good to have an excuse to talk about them.

Shinolas - Passin' the Gasoline (1997)

We had every intention of giving the CCPS team the month of August off, and taking time to bask in the sun/drown in the rain, but a surprise package in today's post has us scrambling to assemble the troops and post this newest addition to our archives. Now, we've been accused (quite correctly) of shamelessly gushing over anything of the garage rock persuasion. What can we say, we like what we like. And we LOVE the Shinolas.

So it's a pretty happy day when head Shinola Pete Link surprises us with this, which is either the second or third tape of four that the guys did. You'll want to grab this for a couple of reasons: first, "Bad Libations"; second, "Kiss Me With Filthy Lips"; third, "Ironic Seducer"; and fourth... uh, because it's gonna be a rainy few days ahead, and you might as well hunker down with some garage rock.

We have a very funny Shinolas-related (barely) story that we'd like to relate. We were meeting a donor at Tubby Dog a few months ago, and on seeing the pile of tapes we had in front of us, the proprietor of Calgary's finestest hot dog establishment asked (snidely), "who do you think you guys are, Tom Atkinson?" We shuffled a copy of Pigeonhole to the top of the pile of tapes. The proprietor shook his head in pity and walked away.

These are the things that we here at the CCPS endure to bring you the goods.

Day After Tomorrow Band - Because Sometimes it Hurts to Breathe (1999)

In an odd coincidence, Chris vanderLaan contacted us just as we were getting ready to post this. He tells us that there were two batches of this tape, one batch that was blue and was okay, and one that was clear and was "the worst dub job of all time."

Guess which batch this is from!

Guilt Trip - Guilt Trip (2000)

Here's another from the archives of Casey Lewis. What can we tell you about this? Not much, unfortunately. But this page over at Interpunk has a bit of the story.

Get their tape here.

Corta Vita - The Corta Vita

We're not sure of the year of this tape, but we're going to suggest 2000 or 2001. Recorded with donor Casey Lewis, this tape is full of angular, scream-heavy punk. What the kids sometimes call screamo, we're told.

Again, this is only what we've been told.

Serial Heroes - Hi-O! We're Serial Heroes! (1995)

A while back, we posted a Serial Heroes tape that Dan Izzo found for us. Casey Lewis unearthed another for us! It's much as you'd expect. Raw and gritty.

Kind of like the bacon and pancakes we had at the mall's Stampede breakfast this morning.

Zuckerbaby - Zuckerbaby (1997)

Since Zoo Story took us down to the bottom of the alphabet, and since we just made reference to them, here's another thing we'd forgotten existed in tape format. Zuckerbaby bested the Primrods by not just getting signed and recording a record for a major label, but also getting it released. You have heard that unreleased Primrods record, haven't you? Wait, we've managed to get distracted by our love for the Primrods again. Primrods, Primrods, Primrods.

Sigh.

There, that's a bit better. Where were we?

Oh, right. Zuckerbaby. This quartet played radio-friendly, alt-power pop. And they had good haircuts. This is the first of two major label releases they put out. Apparently, once you get on a major label, it gives you the power to make insanely long and bewilderingly-folded j-cards for your tapes. So insane and bewildering that we can't fold it up again. If anyone out there knows how to fold this j-card up again, please let us know.

Please, Universal (or whoever owns the rights to this now), don't sue us!

Kush - Peppermint (1995)

Another Jeff Kushner release, this one falls right between the two we've posted already. This one's more of the same psych-pop goodness. Big Bang Theory's Case Caulfield plays bass on this, Zuckerbaby's Reed Shimozawa contributes guitar. The four quick songs on this kind of leave us craving more.

Or maybe we're just craving a Peppermint Aero.

Mediaucracy - New Western Empire

This tape comes to us via Casey Lewis, without the jcard. We managed to steal the artwork from elsewhere on the interweb, saving us from the no jcard tag. But we still don't know much about these guys - the contact on the tape is Mark Vermin, who we think is/was/will ever be Mark from Inquisition/Martyr Index.

But we're a bit damaged after Sled Island. We're not sure about much right now.

Silent Terror - Cowcore

We can't quite put a date on this one, but we believe this is from some time in the mid- to late-80's. Silent Terror also appear on the legendary Calgary Compelation, We believe there's a link between this band and Six Feet Under, but we can't verify that right now - one of our favourite sources, the esteemed but neglected Punk History Canada, has taken its band info pages down due to hacking issues.

Get it here.

Everymen - POW! Right in the Dink (1995)

'



Before we're forced to fire our research team, we'd like to provide a tape that we do know something about. The proprietor of Echo Base Studios, Mr. Casey Lewis, was good enough to pass along a pile of tapes. So we'll lead with his old band, the ever-lovely Everymen. 13 (or 14?) tracks of solid power pop-driven punk.

We must have caught Casey in a nostalgic mood - he reminded us of the days when the Everymen were kings of the Calgary Multicultural Centre. Good times, no?

POW!

Boozehounds - Getting Drunk (1993)

We don't know anything about this one (a recurring theme here at the CCPS, no?). Even the title is a matter of debate - You Make me Sick (cover) or Getting Drunk (tape label)? The tape label wins out, because someone miscounted the ballots.

Update: Edmonton madman Chris Zuk slid us a copy of this tape with a different cover (the second image above), which confirms the name of the tape, as well as giving us a year - and a hint of who recorded this, at least.

We make ourselves sick.

Free Admission - $6.00 Cover Charge (1994)

This is another tape that Brad Windsor passed our way. We'd like to be able to tell you more about it, but Googling "Free Admission" is a pretty pointless exercise.

Dear All Future Bands: please make your names more Google friendly, 'kaythanksbye.

Societies Criminals - Mario Andretti (1993)

So many questions tonight. Is the poor grammar in this band's name intentional? Is it a francophone thing? Why Mario Andretti?

So, so many questions.

Ivy League - We Gotta Stop Doin' Shit Like This

Stop doing shit like what? Like losing j-cards? We don't know anything about these guys - it's from the magic bag of tapes that Todd and Dan passed us. All Dan can tell us is:

"If I recall, that band was a couple dudes from Wrong Floor. Not Rob, but a couple other dudes. I remember seeing them at Carpenter's Union Hall with Non-Prophet, but I don't think they were actually around for too long. I hate it when cassettes don't have liner notes!"

So do we!

Weekend Terrorist Society - PC = Stoopid WTS = Smart (1998)

We think this is a Darren Preston band. Pre-Porter Hall? We're not sure. It doesn't even have a track listing. And we'd rather go find something in the way of an alcoholic beverage rather than read their manifesto.

'Cause we've been working for the weekend.

Rebel Young Republican - Tales of the North American Proletariat (1996)

A commenter has saved us a bit of trouble in tracing this band's lineage. Guitarist Darren Preston previously played in Non Prophet, and then went on to Porter Hall - replacing Jeff Caissie when he moved south (if the Gauntlet is to be believed).

Unfortunately, that's all we can do right now.

Get RYR here.

Smash the State - Smash the State (1996)

From the title, you maybe expect something from the great punk discography and compilation series. Or maybe something connected to Vancouver's DOA. You'd be wrong on all counts, but we would certainly not be disappointed in you. We don't expect you to know everything. (And we hope you don't expect the same of us.)

From our pal Dan Izzo:
I never actually saw Smash the State play (I think they only did one or two shows), but they gave me a copy to play on my radio show, and then called in and threatened to beat me up when I made fun of them on the air. It's actually better than you'd expect, in a Ramonesy sort of way. John Wenkoff (He always preferred "Johnny Forgotten". I have no idea why, since I can't think of a punker last name than "Wenkoff". It's even punker than "Izzo"!).

Smashy smashy!

El Caminos - The Betrayers

We're not sure how wise it is to start AND finish your day with Kamil Krulis (we'll see YOU down at the Palomino tonight for the 3rd Annual James Muretich Memorial Fundraiser, featuring Kamil and his Sublinguals). But we've never been ones for sensical endeavours.

Brad Windsor gave this to us, but we're not sure of its origin (again, we're lacking a j-card here). We think, based on this old VOX article, that the pair of 7" singles never happened and the four songs were released on this tape.

We're also thinking that, based on the photos in the article, that the good-looking drummer is Mr. Mike Bressanutti. But we're not sure.

But then, are we ever?

Update: we've been reminded that the Bobby Torpedo/Kamil Krulis adventure after the El Caminos was the Betrayers (with Kara Keith, among others). Which makes us suspect that this tape is a split deal, maybe the first 2 tracks are El Caminos, the second 2 Betrayers? If anyone has the art, we'd be super-thankful.

Bad Housekeeping - Macho Rock Onslaught (1988)

Finally! Big thanks to Brad Windsor for passing this gem on to us. We're going to steal straight from BeATroute:

This one had it all, Mexican wrestling masks before wrestling was cool, outrageous costumes, 'The Brothers Pontez', the KISS thing and all the front you could ever handle in the form of one Kamil Krulis on lead vocals. I still haven't fully recovered from witnessing this band live.

You gotta hand it to Kamil: 20 plus years later, he's still more front than you can handle.

Serial Heroes - Same Olde Shit (1995)

Dan gave this to us at Tubby Dog. We don't know much/anything about it.

But what we do know is that Tubby Dog looks like they're hosting a pretty fantastic party in a few weeks.

Oh, wait - we found Dan's note to us about this one: Another Randy Rudland band. According to Johnny Wenkoff these guys were "The ONLY punk band in Calgary" at the time. I think Chris Holman and Jay Sinclair were in this band, too.

Someone else told us that it wasn't Chris Holman, it was Jay Walters.

Get Serial Heroes here.

High Bias, Low Filter - July 1996

Randolph Hitler and the Alcoholocaust - Randolph Hitler and the Alcoholocaust

What do we have tonight? No year, no j-card, nothing.

It's gotta get better than this.

Update: we got the artwork. Hoooboy, glad we didn't hold our breath for this one.

Non Prophet - Non Prophet (1994)

The thing we most want to know about this tape is this: what's up with the creepy, disembodied head on the inside of the cover?

We need to know!

Lucas - Lucas (1997)

More fun from the all-ages scene. At least we have a year on this; however, we returned this to Todd and our Research Assistant didn't think to make note of Lucas' membership. We're going to force him to listen to Brass as punishment.

Get Lucas here.

Joule - Joule

We'd like to be able to tell you more about Joule. They're held up as one of the better hardcore from the era - but they're so hardcore that, despite the exceptional packaging of this tape (the above patch plus a chapbook) - we're still left pretty much in the dark about who these guys were. There's a Radio3 page and even a myspace for them, but, hey, if you're not even going to include a tracklisting on your tape, we're not going to be able to say too much about you.

Get it here.

Life After High School - Life After High School (2000)

This is another one that comes to us via Dan Izzo and Todd Harkness. In 2000, releasing a tape wasn't retro cool like it is today - it was just plain wacky.

From an old, old article in f-word:

The buzz: Andie is known to be one of the more melodic bassists in town. While the band prides itself on breaking record numbers of strings and telling bad jokes on stage, Life After High School provides a sweet mix of indie pop and emo songs. "People think that we have high energy, (are) really personable and connect really well. They sense really good energy," says Andie. "And it's hard to genre us because we're such a crazy mix."

Three quarters of this band carried on as Beija Flor.

Crazy!

Travis Davies and the Ekseptions - Travis Davies and the E.K. (1998)

Okay, so we remember the Ekseptions - but we're not clear why this came out as Travis Davies and the Ekseptions (or the E.K.). Mark Rudd we've seen on bass with the under-aged indie pop of Elmo's Dream - he'd go back to bass with Kara Keith's Falconhawk (rejoining Elmo's Dream bandmate/high school buddy Dave Alcock).

Get it here.

Delusions of Reality - Chocolate Moo (1990)

We don't know much about Delusions of Reality - apparently guitarist Mark Donaghy also did time in Bent on Barbi.

That's all we got tonight.

Wait! Mark got ahold of us recently, and gives this bit of background:

Here's a little history on the band - it was really one band, 3 different names as the bass players changed.

Delusions of Reality started out as The Dimension of Sound, and was formed in 1989, while we were in high school (Western Canada High).  The members were Chad Holtzman (vocals/ guitar), Rahim Gaidhar (drums), Alonso Menjivar (bass) and me on guitar.  We played originals and covers by bands like Sons of Freedom and The Cult, and gigged at parties and all ages venues, like Studio A Go Go.  Within the first year Shane Sutherland replaced Alonso on bass, and we changed our name to Delusions of Reality.

We played our first club gigs as D.O.R. in the summer of 1990.  The Westward Club was where we played most often, as well as The Republik, The White Elephant/ Night Gallery, The Warehouse/Underground, and anywhere else that would have us.  Some of the more noteworthy bands we opened for were The Melvins (Westward Club), and The Dwarves and The Supersuckers (Republik).  We were also supposed to open for Helmet, but the show was cancelled because the drummer had appendicitis!   We were still teenagers when Chocolate Moo was released in 1990.

In late '92 or early '93 Gord Adam replaced Shane on bass, and we adopted the Spy Lemon moniker, releasing the Spy Lemon One cassette in the summer of '93.  That year we also won a battle of the bands at The Republik, and our prize was opening the main stage at Infest '93, so you could say we got to open for The Ramones!  Of course we played at 3 o-clock on Friday afternoon for 30 people, and The Ramones came on a little later that night.

In late '93 Rahim and Chad decided they'd had enough of rock music, so they re-cast Spy Lemon as a jazz fusion band.  Gord and I were out.  I'm not exactly sure how things went after that, but basically the band fizzled out soon after.

What happened to everyone?  As you know, Gord is a fixture on the music scene in Calgary.  Chad is a well respected jazz/blues/pop session guitarist in Calgary.  Chad also went on to play with Bjorn Again for about 8 years...really!  Rahim moved to Vancouver in about '94.  Shane stayed in Calgary until 2010.  He played with Thomas at the Wheel, Cosmic Charlie, and most recently, Heather Blush.  I played with Bent on Barbi for a year in 95/96, moved away from Calgary for years, came back for a while and played with the reggae band Activate, and now live in Halifax.

So there you have it.

Consumer Identity - Consumer Identity (1997)

How about a bit more of that mid-90's, all-ages hardcore to get your morning started right?

Six Feet Under - Lost (1987)

And here's our third (and final?) six. Six Feet Under have a quick write up at the venerable (but sadly neglected) Punk History Canada. We'll let you go read that, so we can get on to more important things, like recovering from the awe of having seen Jon Sawyer and Chris Temple on stage together last night.

Get deep-sixed here.

Six Digit Fix - Six Digit Fix (1995)

One good six deserves another. Or something. This one's from Josh, who says he rescued this from the discard pile at the public library. How great is that?

We'd only heard Six Digit Fix on the Play: 28 Tunes That Say Howdy compilation. Pete Charuk was in the stupendously good Quitters and the Stoics, Doug Collins was in Ded Soles. This doesn't quite live up to that pedigree.

Maybe we were expecting too much?

Everymen - Bryan Went Down to Reno (1998)

We're trying to make up for yesterday's less-than-impressive post. So here are all-ages mainstays The Everymen. Drummer Casey Lewis did a short stint with Knucklehead, before he and Colin Hess went on to the Failure.

We're still marveling at the cover art, but you might want to head straight to the download.

Various - This is a Lame Ass Tape

We don't know anything about this compilation or any of the bands on it. We're not going to try to find out anything about them. You would better spend your download time today checking out, say, the Quitters or maybe some Primrods.

Seriously, don't bother downloading this unless you're desperate.

Rusty Nails - Rusty Nails (1992)

He wave another marginally acceptable release here on the CCPS, thanks to Josh for passing it along (and a couple of other readers for suggesting its inclusion here). Those of you whose eyes are open at whatever ungodly hour you're reading this will note that the address for these lovely lads is in Vancouver. But our research assistant has turned up a posthumous myspace (another!) which indicates these guys got their start in Calgary before moving to Vancouver in the early 90's (before this tape was released). Our research assistant also tells us that Rusty Nails drummer Pat/Paddy Duddy now plays in BC/DC.

Grow your hair and rock out!

CCPS Miscellany: Pal Joey - Demo

This one gets flagged as a questionable inclusion on this blog. Pal Joey were an Edmonton-based outfit (someone's set up a posthumous myspace that you can -and should - check out).

But a few things about this tape that Dan Izzo passed our way make us want to include it here. First, it likely has our old pal Lorrie Matheson playing on it (we believe - and memories are a bit foggy this morning after a night of Mustache Rock - that Lorrie joined Pal Joey after Fire Engine Red split). Second, Trent Buhler apparently played in Ninth Configuration (we didn't know this - we thought Ben was their bass player?). Third, the tape label (the j-card is MIA - and we're pretty fond of parenthesis this morning) has a contact phone number with a 403 area code, which while not being necessarily a Calgary number, we know one thing - it's not an Edmonton number.

And finally, it's a really good listen.

Knucklehead - Keep Yer Hands Off My Sister (1994)

We like it when we get to direct you to wikipedia for info on the bands we're profiling, because (a) it means we don't have to make stuff up and (b) we can snark about other peoples' writing.

That article definitely needs some citations.

Simon's Pet Iguana - Simon Says (1994)

Dan Izzo has passed this one onto us. Handsome Dan confirms our suspicions by noting, "I used to see them about three times a month at the Black Lung."

Dan also says one or more of these guys went on to form Downway. We have no idea what he's talking about.

And if you don't know where the Black Lung was, you weren't there.