Funeral Factory - Cold War Isolation Daisies (1989)

We were very sorry to hear of the passing of the Funeral Factory's Greg Kucheran earlier this month. We dug out this CD for a listen, and realized that we had never posted it (we posted the cassette version in our early days).

We're glad we gave this a listen again - we'd forgotten how great Kucheran's voice was. This is a sprawling, majestic work, and we're a bit ashamed that we didn't post the CD until now. Our apologies for making you live with our crummy tape rip for so many years.

Rest in peace, Greg.

Pill Crusher - The First Two Years: Space Brains Cosmonauts (2017)

Ever since Empty Heads called it quits this summer, we've been looking for something to fill that 90's-shaped, grunge pop hole in our hearts, and we think we've finally found just the thing. Pill Crusher play loud and melodic, and we quite like it. There's nothing quite like brutally loud guitars to drive away the self-doubt and loathing. Except bourbon. But that's for another time.

For now, you can grab Pill Crusher's tape via their bandcamp.

Pankbend - Danke Freundlicher Zuhörer! (2017)

While we're not overly-excited about the way that Craig Storm is consistently challenging our cassette storage capacity, we do appreciate the way in which he challenges our earballs. His latest project, Pankbend, is a collaboration with Janitor Scum's Arielle McCuaig, and it's a pretty good thing that kind of defies categorization. Electro pop punk? Maybe? These four songs bounce around from from noise to pop, swathed in synthy pads and bloops.

Highly recommended - and, at the time of writing, cassettes are still available from the Pankbend bandcamp.

Buzzard - Buzzard (1997)

Sometimes things show up in our email inbox with little/no explanation. This is one of those cases. We received an email with a j-card scan, six mp3s and the cryptic text: "Buzzard was a Disciple of Chaos whom after a Chaotic Death emerged from Under the Stares to a wild chorus of Negative Feedback."

So, as we sit here puzzling over what it all means and listening to this blend of skate rock and hard core, we'll direct to you the download.

CCPS Miscellany: Age Of Electric - The Latest Plague (1990)

Thanks to Robert McGregor, we're kicking things back into gear with a release that takes us across our province's eastern border. Sure, Age of Electric were a Regina-based band, but they have some pretty serious ties to Calgary - parts of this tape were recorded here with Shane Connelly/Frank Slide and had a pretty big following here. Especially at the Live Wire.



Plus, in recent years Age of Electric frontman Todd Kerns has been playing with Ian Grant and Reed Shimozawa.

So, instead of over-thinking this, we'll just point you to the download.

Bog Bodies - Beyond the Blonde Climax (2017)

We keep buying Bog Bodies tapes in the hope that one day we'll get used to their roller coaster of drum machines, processed vocals, guitars that sound like anything else, and random samples. But we haven't.

Still, "Fishnet Gusset Protuberance" reads like a band name that Mark Igglesden would come up with. So that means we're either getting closer or... something.

Looks like the physical tape is sold out, but you can get the download from the Bog Bodies bandcamp.

Hugh Man - How Did You Find That Goo? (2017)

Ever go to a show at Tubby Dog, and realize that pretty much all the bands on the bill share one or two members? That was the night we got this tape. Hugh Man has two members in common with Tiny Baby - and they also share a similar aesthetic. Yup, this is another batch of loose and fun songs, most of which you could polka to. Which we suppose makes them fairly distinct from a lot of other bands right now.

Get the download from the Hugh Man bandcamp, while we rearrange our tape shelves to fit all these new cassettes.

Tiny Baby - Tiny Baby (2017)

Tiny Baby is made up of people from a bunch of bands we like - Lunatique, Blu Shorts, and, uh, Singing Lawn Chair. So, of course we like this tape. These are sloppy, loose, fun songs that don't take themselves seriously - we don't think. Hey, we've been wrong before - it's better to pad these posts with a bit of uncertainty.

Get this baby from bandcamp.

Singing Lawn Chair - Never Mind the Buckets (2017)

Finally! Something we've actually seen in the live!

Singing Lawn Chair is (at least live) one person with a keyboard and a drum machine. And a whole lot of introversion. We're trying to find a way to describe this tape that makes sense, and we're struggling - this tape bounces from low-fi guitar-based stuff, to low-fi atmospheric synth pads, to... uh, stuff.

We wish that Singing Lawn Chair had a bandcamp we could point you to, so you could help us figure this out. But they don't. They're playing tomorrow night at Tubby Dog - maybe we'll see you there, and we can talk afterwards to figure this out?

Torture Team - Torture Team (2017)

Here's another impulse purchase from that trip to Blackbyrd - and again a band that we haven't yet seen live. Sheesh, it's like we never leave our office/pit of despair.

Torture Team sits well alongside CCPS faves Aiwass - gothy synths, drum machines, minimalist guitars, and yelping vocals. We've been listening to a lot of CanCon new wave over the past year, and we hear a lot of that influence here (in a good way, 'natch).

Get tortured at their bandcamp.

Erector Set - 2017 Demos (2017)

We picked up this tape as an impulse purchase at Blackbyrd a few weeks ago (pro tip to all you record stores: putting tapes at the counter is a sure way to part the CCPS from its paycheque), and haven't yet managed to catch Erector Set in action. We're pretty sure the band is fronted by PMMA's Ryan Kostel, and we're definitely sure that this is a more straight-up hardcore affair than PMMA. Which means we REALLY want to catch these guys in action.

Get it from the Erector Set bandcamp, if you're too lazy to go record shopping.

Vanta - S/T (2016)

We don't know how this 2016 release by Vanta snuck past us until now. We've seen this trio a couple of times, and recognize their guitarist from Racket. So, imagine Racket was given a whole bunch of amphetamines? That's pretty much what Vanta sounds like - ramshackle bursts of snotty punk.

Get it via the Vanta bandcamp.

Blu Shorts - Blu Wave Music (2017)

Well, now that everything is mostly back up and running here at the CCPS, we're going to get to the big pile of tapes that's sitting in the office.

First up is this one from the recently departed Blu Shorts, a great testament to how good these gals (and guy) were. They pulled the punk of Hag Face into an arty corner of outer space - a mighty fine corner.



Get it from your local record store (maybe?) or the Blu Shorts bandcamp.

Kentucky Fried Chlidren - Unreleased

In our never-ending quest for excess, we have this gem today - which we forgot that we had tucked away. We honestly don't know why we never posted this - maybe because we're idiots?

Anyways, Pat Rae tells us this is the songs from the tape we posted the other day, plus a bunch of other things that were otherwise unreleased, apparently from a session with Brad Simm.

Thanks to Pat for the pictures with the track list for the first 14 tracks. We'll let you make up titles for the rest of this.

Kentucky Fried Children - Another Heavy Metal Massacre (1994)

Well, nothing like a new tape to drag you out of the painful loop that is relinking nearly 1000 posts.... Pat from Kentucky Fried Children got us this tape, something folks have asked for over the years, but we've never been able to get our hands on.

Good things come to those who spend their evenings relinking posts, we guess.

Interstellar Root Cellar - Interstellar Root Cellar (1997)

Almost six years ago, we posted a tape of alternate mixes of this, Interstellar Root Cellar's first CD. Good things come to those who wait - we've got the actual CD now!

And, as is becoming de rigueur, a VOX article from December 1997!

And, as (almost) always, a download link!

Curse of Horseflesh - Burning Up the Jade (1997)

We were listening to thee fantastic (yet, terrifying!) sounds of Baron Mark Von Frankenstine and his exceptional Radio Free Transylvania on CJSW a couple of weeks ago, and couldn't quite place a very familiar song. Was it Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet? The Ramblin' Ambassadors? The Sadies? Nope, it was the one and only Curse of Horseflesh.

In its lifetime, Roto-Flex put out two CDs. We already posted Nothing Beats a Royal Flush, and considering our love of all things Al Charlton, it's weird that we didn't post this as well.

Hey, would you believe we have a VOX article to go with this post? From March 1997, even!

Yeeha! Or something.

Puritans - Marquee Themes (1997)

We might as well hop from a soundtrack to a band whose members have recently gone on to making soundtracks of their own. Yeah, we're grasping at straws for some sort of narrative continuity here, but earlier this year Bob Keelaghan put out a set of tracks from his score to the films Intersection and Inside the Ku Klux Klan.

We've talked about the Puritans (formerly Shoutin' Abner Pim and the Puritans) a lot here at the CCPS (most recently on what is probably the final installment of our Unspooled podcast), so we'll hand things over to the September 1997 issue of VOX:

We're skipping the usual download link for this one, since you can still get this via the Shoutin' Abner Pim website and CDBaby.

New 1-2 - Infully Visible (1997)

Oh boy! An excuse for us to invoke the name of the Primrods! The double-guitar attack-ack-ack-ack of the New 1-2 was a pretty special thing. Especially when the lead track gleefully steals lyrics from Public Enemy (for no apparent reason).



That said, we're still puzzled by the final track and its electronic loops.

It should be noted that this was released in an era when VOX had not only dropped down to the smaller format that would ultimately lead to its ruin transforming into the Calgary Straight, but also when the paper doubled down on including both a cover story AND a lead record review from local bands:

Not that we're complaining, though.

Knucklehead - Another Neurotic Episode (1997)

We're going to stick with Melodiya CDs for a bit, since there were a few that came out in 1997. We sometimes forget how many releases the guys from Knucklehead put out in their time.

We hoped to pad this post out with an article from our VOX archives, but VOX had a bit of a blind eye to stuff from the all ages scene, being run by a group of 80-year-old alcoholics.

Edit: we found a Knucklehead article from the Sept 97 issue of  VOX. It was across the page from an article on the Puritans, so, uh, we missed it. Like VOX, the CCPS sometimes has a bit of a blind eye to stuff from the all ages scene, being run by a group of 80-year-old alcoholics.

Still, just grab the download.

Beyond Possession - Repossessed (1996)

While we're into CDs, it seems like a good time to revisit some others that were released over 20 years ago, and therefore (according to CCPS rules) okay for posting.

We'll start with this compilation of Beyond Possession's recordings. It includes their LP, single, and some demos from 1989, released to coincide with the series of reunion shows the band did in 1996. Yup, we've posted all of the material on this at one point or another. But we love the chase of completion.

Don't you?

Nerbus Rex - Nerbus Rex (1995)

In the box we got from Frank Slide was this CD from Metanoia Records - which was surprising, since we had no idea that Metanoia had put out CDs. Huh. We learned something!

Nerbus Rex play a big rock and roll that somehow sidestepped grunge, with a sense of humour in some places.

Get Rex'd.

Rogue Pope - Rogue Pope

Well, hot damn! Sometimes you give up on ever finding a tape, and then it lands in your lap, completely unexpectedly. This Rogue Pope tape has been on our increasingly small list of holy grails for a while, so we were overjoyed when a rip of it showed up in a box of tapes and CDs from the legendary Frank Slide/Shane Connelly. We've wondered if this thing really existed - we only have a CD and an index card with notes, but we'll take it (the photo of Cal is stolen from Lorrie Matheson's facebook, and may or may not be part of the original j-card).

The only Rogue Pope we had heard prior to this was "Castles in Spain" from the Play compilation - these songs maybe have a little less of the psych influence of that track, leaning more towards the big, two-guitar rock of the Daggers, the band Brad Paffe would start shortly after this. We like how much Gregg Baekeland's vocals remind us of Djewel Davidson in places.

Go Rogue!

Leather Jacuzzi - Slander, Lies and Soda (2017)

We're going to get about as far to the other side of the spectrum from yesterday's Hermitess tape with this one. Leather Jacuzzi are back with a second tape, this time delivering a four-song blast of tongue-in-cheek hardcore. We have to admit, part of us loves this just because of how close it gets us to a SIDS reunion.

We're going to mix things up, and send you to the Leather Jacuzzi cdbaby page this time.