Coughin' Nails: Live at the Westward Club (1988-89)

Murray Greig of the Coughin' Nails sent in ten live songs, recorded at the Westward Club. The first two tracks are from 1988, the rest are from '89.

Track listing:

For the Love of Ivy (Jeffrey Lee Pierce/Kid Congo Powers)
Gears of Love
Green Door (Bob Davie/Marvin Moore)
Kaleidoscope Lobotomy
Mr X
Pandora's Sin
Ptarmigan (Gerald V. Casale)
Pumpin' for Jill (Iggy Pop/Ivan Kral)
Road Runner (Bo Diddley)
Talk About Me (Screamin' Jay Hawkins)

The band:

Bob Firmston: vocals
Murray Greig: guitar
Colin Forsyth: guitar (on 1989 tracks)
Case Caulfield: bass
K.C. Halas: drums

Thanks tonnes for digging this up, Murray! There's lots more to come from the Greig archives in coming days, too.

Get nailed here.

Legendary Few: Live (1986)

Another one from the Murray Greig archive/car trunk, and it's a killer: a 20-song set from Th' Legendary Few, live from the legendary-ish stage of either the Ace of Clubs or the Westward Club. (Anyone know which?)

Th' Legendary Few were:
Bill Firmston: vocals
Jon Sawyer: guitar
Rob Joyce: guitar
Brent Beatty: drums
Doug Boland: bass

Track listing:

Lute Suite in D Major (Bach)
[title unknown]
Better Days
Poo Poo Pee Pee
High School
I Know Your Name
Can't Judge a Book (Diddley)
Little Pink Dot
The Witch (The Sonics)
Diggin' the Scene on Campus
I Go to Pieces
Frenzy (Hill/Stevenson)
You're Gonna Miss Me (Erickson)
Bedlam for Boris
Christmas Cookies
She's A Little Cruel
That's Love
Thirteen Minutes to Wait
River Deep Mountain High (Spector/Barry/Greenwich)
Surfin' Bird (Frazier/White/Harris/Wilson)

Thanks, yet again, Mr. Greig!

Legendary, indeed!

Li 150's: "Destiny" (1989)

We've been trying to get our dirty hands on the Li-150's tape for a while, and have yet to connect with a guy on a scooter who claims he has it for us. So, in the meantime, we'll re-post this track from Golden Rock.

"Destiny" appeared on the compilation Oh God, My Mom's On Channel 10!, released on 12" vinyl by Nardwuar the Human Serviette Records (CLEO1).

[Courtesy of Rocks in My Pocket.]

Get it here.

Vindicators - The Vindicators (1989)

According to the venerable Wikipedia, this 12" was the last release by Montreal's Og Music. We're also told that this was the first album cover that Tom Bagley did for a band that he wasn't in. So, for every ending, there is a new beginning.

Whatever. Here's Golden Rock's transcription of the back cover:

I
If I Were You (Carlson/Dunn/The Vindicators/PROCAN)
24 Hours Everyday (The Headstones)
Early in the Morning (Carlson/The Vindicators/PROCAN)

II
I'm Gone (The Magic Mushrooms)
No Worries (Carlson/The Vindicators/PROCAN)
Searching For My Baby (The Haunted)

Chris Carlson—Vocals, Guitar
Bryce Dunn—Drums
Daaren Boreham—Guitar, Vocals
Colin Forsyth—Organ, Guitar, Vocals
Dave Mariacci—Bass

Gerry Timmins—Drums on "Searching"

Produced & Engineered by Shane Connelly at Inear Sounds, Calgary

Thanks to: Val, Ben, Brent, Glenn, Paul, Kent, Nardwuar, Soul Shack, What Wave, TomB, Mr. & Mrs. C. Roli

Vindicate this!

Salmon Breath: "Cadillac" (1988)

"Cadillac" appeared on the compilation It Came From Canada Volume 4, released on 12" vinyl by Og Music (OG17).

From the liner notes by Del Picasso:

SALMON BREATH are sort of sick country-rockabilly from Calgary. They're Sid Garbitch, vocal, guitar, and Poly, drums, but they don't sound like Deja Voodoo.

Nope, they sure don't!

Vindicators: "Thinking of Birds," "You're Too Much" and "Hate" (1989)

One of the Calgary bands we've never been able to get enough of is the Vindicators. Thankfully, Golden Rock collected their compilation-only tracks for us to enjoy.

"Thinking of Birds" (Vindicators PROCAN) appeared on the compilation Mister Garager's Neighbourhood, released on 12" vinyl by What Wave and Og Music (OG21).
From the liner notes:
A fine example of young minds warped by over-exposure to 60's punk records. Chris Carlson—vocals and guitar, Darren Borehan—guitar, Colin Forsyth—organ, Ben Sherazi—bass, Bryce Dunn—drums. In What Wave #16.
"You're Too Much" appeared on the compilation It Came From Canada 5, released on 12" vinyl by Og Music (OG25).
From the liner notes by Del Picasso:
The VINDICATORS are Canada's second-best-known 60s-garage trash teens. They formed in Calgary a couple of years back, playing farfisa-driven 60s covers and originals. They're singer-guitarist Chris Carlson, guitarist Daaren Boreham, organist Colin Forsyth, bassist Ben Sherazi, and drummer Bryce Dunn.
"Hate" appeared on the compilation Oh God, My Mom's On Channel 10!, released on 12" vinyl by Nardwuar the Human Serviette Records (CLEO1).
Chris Carlson and Ben Sherazi went on to Big Gulp, while Bryce Dunn skipped town to join the Smugglers. Daaren Boreham stayed here and formed Pussy Monster and one of Calgary's best ever garage rock cover bands, the Gaye Rage.

Get vindication here.

Color Me Psycho: "Black Corvair" (1987) and "What's Your Phobia?" (1988)

In addition to releasing a bunch of amazing records by Deja Voodoo, Montreal's Og Records made a massive contribution to our country's record output with its five It Came From Canada compilations. Our pals in Colour Me Psycho were included on two of those compilations, and we're presenting the tracks here (if you want to find the full albums, they're out there - and Google is your friend (this time around (maybe))).

"Black Corvair" appeared on the compilation It Came From Canada Volume 3, released on 12" vinyl by Og Music (OG13).
From the liner notes by Del Picasso:
Calgary's Color Me Psycho play sweaty 80s-style garage rock in the tradition of such great groups as UIC and the now-defunct Enigmas. Aleister Hex (vocals/guitar), Edgar Allan Crowe (bass/vocals), John Rodent (keyboards), and S.P. Larkin (drums) recorded "Black Corvair" at R&L Studios.

"What's Your Phobia?" appeared on the compilation It Came From Canada Volume 4, released on 12" vinyl by Og Music (OG17).
From the liner notes by Del Picasso:
COLOR ME PSYCHO are one of Calgary's rockin'est bands, with a tough, sweaty sound that borrows from the 60s, 70s, and 80s. They're working on an LP. Aleister Hex, vocal, guitar; Edgar Allan Crowe, bass, vocal; John Rodent, keyboard; S.P. Larkin, drums.

We believe that it's former Golden Calgarian Dan Hayes playing keys on these two tracks. But we might be wrong.

Og!

Enemy Mind Feel - Wintermute (1988)

Yesterday's Enemy Mind Feel post seems to have roused the sleeping giant that is Golden Rock, and prompted them to post a tape that they've been using as a pillow for the last two years. Yep, turns out Ken Kittlitz sent them this tape years ago, and they've just remembered it. Their sloth is our gain, perhaps? 'Cuz now this is a CCPS post, rather than a Golden Rock post. That's the way hostile takeovers go!

This was released on cassette with customized j-card artwork (two samples above). No drums on this, which makes the version of "Church of the One Electron" on here no less compelling that that on their 7" single. Speaking of compelling, check out the liner notes:

Enemy Mind Feel is Calgary's first "cyberpunk" band. They live the "cyberpunk" lifestyle: anarchistic computer geeks by day, rock gods by night. Their twisted brand of noise/punk/no-wave rock makes even the most seasoned listener cringe with delight. The band members believe that Armageddon will come in a blast of feedback.

Enemy Mind Feel has been together for 9 months, and has placed select live dates in Calgary. The first performance occurred after the band had been together for only a week. As a means of developing new material, they regularly do improvisation performances in the studio, during gigs, and on live campus radio.

Thanks to Ken Kittlitz for sending this to Golden Rock. Next time, though, skip the middle man!

Enemy Mind Feel - Halflife 10,000 Years (1989)

 

We're picking up a Golden Rock post that we're hoping to get some more context on shortly (in the form of a tape! Hooray!). For the interim, we'll just leave this here for you to enjoy.

Because some nights, that's just all we can pull together.

Huevos Rancheros - Live at the Night Gallery (2000)

We're going to zip forward almost 20 years in the Brent Cooper story to this video, which we've, er, borrowed from Rock Is Dead. 

It looks like this is video from the Huevos Rancheros (RIP) 10th Anniversary show at the Night Gallery (RIP). The video is great - a bit wobbly and kind of distorted, just like our favourite memories of Huevos shows. We weren't at this (sadly), but wish we had been - about three quarters of the way through the set, Graham Evans re-joins the band... on second guitar! Also, the Dino Martinis' Pat McGannon is on keys. We're not sure who shot the video, but clearly someone from the scene. 

Here's great little clip, that ends with Coop giving the proto-douchebags in the audience a lesson in how to behave at a rock show:

Rock is Dead has the links to download the full video - all links were working at the time we posted this. It's a big download, but well worth the bandwidth.

Well, the link was working when we wrote this, at least. Since then, the American Government has decided that file sharing is bad. So you can watch Part One, Part Two and Part Three of this on Youtube. Until the American Government shuts down Youtube. 

will... - causa sui (1983)

Quite possibly one of the best things about a good night at Broken City is the fine selection of tunes that Djewel Davidson plays. In fact, it's pretty noticeable the nights when he's not there - the music in between acts just isn't the same. 

But one of the things we've never heard him play is this almost 30-year-old LP featuring a cover photo of very young Brent Cooper (or is that Bruce McCulloch?). There's something questionable about using William Blake poetry as lyrics, but we're going to overlook that lapse in judgement in favour of the contributions that both Davidson and Cooper have made to the scene.

Thanks again to Golden Rock for transcribing the back cover:

Side AFunky Babylon 3:39
Live in Animation 3:24 (davidson/King/Cooper) 

Side 1The Empty Cabinet 3:29
The Final Reward 3:15
The Garden of Love 2:51 (Wiliam Blake/Ducky King) 

the will... are:
Peter the kid Balkwill: Banging and Thomping
Brent Cooper: Rude Noises
d.jewel davidson: Painful noises
Ducky King: Low pitched noises 

Don Pennington: Noise control 

All songs written by d.jewel davidson and Ducky King, except where noted otherwise.

Get funky here.

Cryin' Helicopters - "Go West Young Bee" and "Move" (c.1984)

Since we've been talking Cooper, we think it's time to go back to the Golden Rock archives for this. These are two songs from Ken Kittlitz's '86 mix tape, again re-mastered by Cheeba. Big thanks to both fellows!

The Cryin' Helicopters were one in a string of bands featuring guitar whiz Brent J. Cooper (falling somewhere between his stints in The Will... and the Ted Clark Five?), best known for his work in instro outfits Huevos Rancheros and the Ramblin' Ambassadors. In fact, Huevos recycled "Go West Young Bee" on a 7" (b/w "Girl from N.A.N.A.I.M.O.," Top Drawer, 1994) and the Dig In! album (Mint Records MRD-007, 1995). More info on the Helicopters, and hopefully more tracks, to come soon. In the meantime, might we suggest you buy the fabulous new Ramblin' Ambassadors disc, Vista Cruiser Country Squire?

Update 07/30/2008: Not surprisingly, walking music encyclopedia David Veitch remembers the Helicopters roster:

Brent Cooper - guitar
Dave Stevenson - drums
Dave Hatfield - bass
Tom Wolfe - vocals

Stevenson, Veitch notes, also did time with Cooper in The Will... Hatfield and Wolfe were formerly of Grey Nun.

Go West!

Color Me Psycho - H+R Block Recordings w/ Live @ The National (1985)

O Canadarm! has a bunch of early Color Me Psycho recordings, collected under the rubric "H+R Block." Why? According to CMP frontman Aleister Hexxx, "We used to practice at the H+R Block in a Forest Lawn strip mall in the off-tax-season. We had to move after we practiced during work hours one day (we had a show that night at the U o' C), causing a dentist next door to file a complaint (and probably a few teeth he hadn't planned on)! The H+R Block stuff was done over the course of a weekend towards the end of the summer of '85. We had only been playing for a few months at that point, and there are lots of sucky tunes that got dropped right away after we started playing out more. Playing out is always the best way of sorting out what works and what don't."

Yes, it looks like some of these are the same version that we previously posted here. But we don't mind duplication in this case, because appended to the practice set is a live show from the National Hotel. 

Aleister Hexxx thinks this show was around Halloween '85: "I'm thinking we'd played the ACA H'we'en dance the night before, which went smashingly, and I faintly recall being a bit put off by the not-so-enthusiastic National crowd." Our favourite moment in the set is their cover of Fire's "My Father's Name Was Dad."

It looks like O Canadarm!'s link is still active, so you can grab the download from them (or here, if you're lazy).

Color Me Psycho: Demos (1987)

Direct from Aleister Hexxx, six songs recorded in the summer of '87. (Note to CMP completists: "Two Towers" doesn't show up anywhere else.) "The demo was done at the same place as the LP (exactly a year apart)," writes Hexxx. "I actually prefer a couple of the demo versions to the LP ones ("Give Ya the Gears" has more spontaneity for sure). It was all fun though." We also prefer these a bit, as well - the recordings are a bit beefier. Which makes us wonder if the LP was recorded to plywood rather than tape.

Track listing:

Sacred Valley Penetration
Mother's Worry
Two Towers
Six Foot Jane
Black Corvair
Give You the Gears

Also: thanks to Mr. Lärkin for the cover art!

Get CMP's demos here.

Golden Calgarians: Chicken on the Way (c. 1980)

One of the driving forces behind launching Golden Rock was to find lost CalgCon classics, those songs that were never released on vinyl or cassette, but found a home on the CJSW airwaves. Songs like..."Chicken on the Way," the Golden Calgarians' ode to the Calgary fast food institution on the corner of 14th Street & Kensington Road N.W. [Since this was originally posted three years ago at Golden Rock, we've noticed another Chicken on the Way in Forest Lawn... what's that about? - CCPS]

It took a while to unearth this nugget, but here's "Chicken on the Way," in all its lo-fi glory. Dave Degrood supplied some details about the recording: That's him on bass, Bruno singing, and Jeff Smith on drums (and on the skit portion). The guitarist was probably Scott Fawcett, who left the band just before they recorded their debut, It's Fun to Be Alive, putting the recording date around 1980. Dave's not sure where the song was recorded, but it's possible it was in the CJSW studios. (We vaguely remember hearing that DJ Wah might've been involved. Walter? You out there?) The song was written by Scott Fawcett.

Big thanks to Ken Kittlitz for sending this one in. Ken played guitar in Enemy Mind Feel, and was a longtime CJSW DJ. Back in '86, he had the foresight to make a mix tape of his favourite local stuff. Even better, he kept that cassette for over 20 years. More to come from the Kittlitz Tape in future posts. Thanks to Cheeba for cleaning up the audio.

The above clipping (no byline, photo by Brodylo/Morrow) comes from the March 1986 issue of the short-lived Calgary magazine:

Golden Bruno
In 1978, when Geoff Smith and Bruno (“just Bruno”) were students at Queen Elizabeth High, their rock band was called The Remains, perhaps a not-so-coincidental bastardization of their idols, The Ramones. Two years later, morbid punk names died and The Golden Calgarians were born.
As the contradiction in their latest album title Savage Love suggests, they play to mixed reviews. They have been described as “raunchy and loud” and “tight and passionate.” Montreal loves them.
Doug Smith plays guitar and Dave DeGrood handles bass. The raunch is Bruno, 25, lead singer and lyricist. His good looks have made him successful as a nude model at Alberta College of Art.

[photo caption] Just Bruno: Golden Calgarians' raunch component from 25-year-old singer.

Get your chicken here.

Remains: unreleased rehearsal recording (1980)

As the CCPS is taking over the archives from Golden Rock, we see no better place to start than with the band that helped give that blog it's name, the Golden Calgarians. or, in this case, the band that eventually spawned the Golden Calgarians.

Before changing their name to the Golden Calgarians, The Remains were the pride/scourge of Queen Elizabeth High School (some backstory here.) Dave Degrood (Remains/GC bass-man) sent in a Remains practice recording, which includes a few songs that showed up on GC LPs. Dave notes that the session features original guitarist Scott Fawcett, "who unfortunately quit just before the first album."

The set list:

Ballad of Blood Beach
Deviation
U.I.C.
TV Clone
I'm Sick
[unknown]
Into the '80s
Send Your Children
(You're Stepping on My New) Boots
Highway

This is pretty great, raw stuff that makes a nice companion piece to the Sandwiches tape we posted last week. Where the Sandwiches are lean and angular, the Remains are raucous and fun, even in this early form.