Merry Christmas! ...A Day Late.

yes, there are 700 dollar christmas albums. no, I don't have them. But Merry Christmas from me and the lovely bossa nova blondie.

*new info* Thrash Metal Day! Unknown Demos By... Forte / Dark Alliance / Bastard Sons

***the recording for Forte is not correct at the moment, I am working on redoing it. More info below.***

Three unknown thrash metal demos for offer here. Before I start the post, let me riff for a moment. You know I like to keep my genres extremely varied, and sometimes I think I should do separate blogs for all the different types of posts I tend to do, or maybe a cassette demo site and then a vinyl site, but really, since the very beginning, the purpose of the site was to post music that I found digging through the worlds various junk bins that is either unknown or unavailable, and that has some merit worth posting, whether it be just excellent and unheard music, or something relevant or interesting to the digging world or digging in general, or even if its just something worth lots of dough to collectors. As I sift through more and more stuff, I've broadened my post inclusions to more formats and more genres, but I still rarely post more than 5 or 8 items a month, so I think I'll keep on going with the current format for the time being, until perhaps I just have too many one offs and weirdos to crowd out the big hitters. But, I've come to find that there's always at least a few people who end up appreciating such stepchild obscurities and oddities. So if you're a frequent visiter to my blog here, thank you, and I hope you continue to enjoy the content. And if theres a string of posts you just aren't that into, don't think I've completely lost it, your forte is probably coming down the pike very soon. Trust me, I know whats mega, and what the majority seeks, and indeed I have some to unleash yet, but hey, my thrash demos need love too...

Here we have three lovely thrash demos, all pretty much utterly unknown, the first by Forte from 1992 out of Dallas TX. The second by Dark Alliance from 1991 out of Duncanville TX, and the last by Bastard Sons from 2004 out of San Marcos TX, I have no images for this release at the moment. I'm no expert, but for being unknown, I think these are pretty darn good, er, i mean rad. Listen to the Dark Alliance tracks and see if you have any interest, I think the Forte album is probably the best thing here, and it's also the only full length.

Forte - S/T (1992 Demo LP cassette) -- (A and B sides in an uncut mp3) ***new info: this track is not properly recorded, my apology, it is at the wrong speed, and I need to cut it into tracks, I will do that and repost it.

Bastard Sons - S/T (2004 Demo EP cdr) -- in a .rar

Dark Alliance - S/T (1991 Demo EP cassette) -- download tracks individually...
Murder Earth:

Political Idiocy

Gerry Van King - The King's Crowd Pleasers EP (demo cassette)

Say hello to Gerry Van King. Street Funk musician extraordinaire, aka The King of Sixth Street. Gerry ruled the beer district of Austin TX with his unique lo-fi Prince-on-nitrous-style funky love musings throughout the late 80s and 90s. His tapes are surprisingly hard to find for living in Austin, I wish I could find an entire album from this era, if there is one, but this 4 track EP will have to do for now. His melodies and rhythms are kinda hypnotic in a weird way. And yes, he's kinda off-key, and kinda off rhythm, but its all GERRY VAN KING. Boo ya.

Gerry Van King - The Crowd Pleasers EP - (Private demo 1990)

Ultra Tape Find: The Whip Pets - S/T (6 track Demo)

My first true unknown minimal synth tape! This is one of Austin's few attempts at the minimal synth genre, an underground scene in Europe and the U.K. mainly, but also some in areas of California, usually more dance-oriented, and then some in Manhattan, which were usually more experimental. I must say, the french/german/italian/netherlands coldwave stuff is my favorite type because of how dark and intense it is, with especially good synth work, actually the UK is just as good really when you consider they put out gems by the likes of Solid Space and Those Attractive Magnets. Hell, Canada had it's fair share of minimal/synthpop acts too, like the unbelievably good Broken Tables 12" - Images of You. Anyway, back to Austin. I had found a couple other synthy-new wave tapes from Austin and some 7"s that have a kinda synthpunk feel, kinda like the Cardboards (if you don't have the cardboards EP, 'greatest hits vol 2' get it,) but nothing that ever approached a truly minimal synth pedigree. I'm sure there are others from Austin, and I hope I continue finding them, but this ungoogle-able gem from 1989 is one of the most exciting things I've found on tape by far. No, it doesn't reach the glorious heights of Nine Circles (again, if you dont have it, get it.) But, it's gloriously lo-fi, it's unknown, and it's from Austin, and they do have a kraftwerk inspired track called Metropolis Man... beep bloop brrp.

So here's the deal. I am still doing some behind the scenes work with this, so for a short while I can only put up some samples, but very very soon I will have the entire tape up. Besides, if you don't like it, at least this way you didn't waste time downloading the entire .rar, and if you do like it, just check back in a while and it will be here. There are 6 tracks on this release, here's 4 clips.

The Whip Pets - Metropolis Man


The Right


The Dance


Fact and Fantasy

MC Gee Wiz Gotz Da Phunk, Sounds From The Underground, and some Waldo Tapes....

My Tapes haul from San Antonio last month, yarrrr! I put a marilyn manson tape in there somewhere, see if you can find it, like wheres waldo...




Anyway, back to business. This cd was a really interesting scam in the early 90s, theres a surprising amount of info on the net about it, mostly old ass message boards, so this guy basically tracked down unsigned artists and sent them a letter saying he thought they were awesome and that he was connected in the music industry, and that for 600 bucks or so you could send in a track you made a picture and a small writeup about your band/artist and he would include it in a "sounds from the underground" compilation. He would then press 50 cds of the comp for each artist, send you 40 copies of the cd to do as you pleased, and he would take the remaining 10 and send each one to a "prominent" major label dude, and soon you'd be on your way. In theory. From what I've heard, he basically threw the rest in trash, or never even pressed the other 10, and theres like 25 artists on each cd, so your one track is buried beneath a mountain of other crappy amateur artists. Sadly, I'm sure there were a few legit guys on the comps with talent, I think he made them from 1991 to 1996, but they would inevitably be lost in the other garbage. As far as I know, theres only a couple bands, of about 400 artists that payed for the service, that really made it on some level after this. one is a power metal band called Catch-22. That's the only one I'm sure of. But this brings us to our featured track from this compilation...



MC Gee Wiz - I Gotz Da Phunk(1996) , I think if Mr. Wiz had released his own demo EP instead of being the last track on a compilation of terrible rock bands from California, he might have had a better chance at success. But for all I know he's still rocking the mic today. If you're out there MC Gee Wiz, throw me a bone and sell me your demo tapes from back then, I know you gotta have some tapes somewhere. I'll put em up. Word.


M.C. Gee Wiz - I Gotz Da Phunk (1996)

No Sisters - EP (Demo Cassette 1987) New wave / synth funk

Not sure what the groups name implies really but it is basically an unknown demo tape from a group called No Sisters, from Austin, Texas. Not sure if they have any other releases, not sure of anything about them actually. I do know they have that same kind of sound as Extreme Heat, I also think it is cool that more people are getting interested in Felt Nun, though sadly this happens a while after I sell the tape, but anyway, I will repost that tape up soon for you guys. Anyway, like I was saying, this band reminds me a lot of Extreme Heat, and they both happen to be from Austin, it seems like there was some kind of small new-wave-synth-funk scene going on in central Texas in the late 80s. Isn't bad motha goose from Austin too? And of course there are bands like the Pool, which have that kind of sound, I can't think of any others at the moment, but you get the picture. Not for the feint of heart or the overly serious listener, or those afraid of indulging in a bit of campiness now and then. Long live the glittery pirate shirt and hair-sprayed man mullet with faux British accents. I think in the UK this kind of movement was akin to the New Romantic genre and the pop funk revival, epitomized in bands like ABC. I really love ABC. But whereas over there the basis was more dance-pop oriented, the traditional rock and blues structures were still employed in the Texas scene, and for that reason ABC beats the shit out of No Sisters, but, that's not to diminish the awesomeness of this tape find and it's utter obscurity. raer!

No Sisters - 4 Track Demo EP (1987 Austin, TX)

Conrad Schnitzler - Contra-Terrene (1987) Cassette

Not much introduction needed for this awesome find. This is a late era Conrad Schnitzler (of Cluster fame) full length cassette only release. It's not the most beautiful music he made, but its very interesting experimental stuff and most certainly needs to be heard for anyone into the history of krautrock, prog rock, new york avant garde, or early electronic fans. It's quite rare but I couldn't believe this wasn't readily available on the net being Schnitzler, but here it is now. More awesome tape releases to come, look out.

Okay, I know the Conrad tape can be kinda daunting, especially since there are no tracks, just continuous sides of experimental noise blurbs, so I have pulled out selections from my 3 favorite blurbs for you to hear:

Contra-Terrene. 1987. New York Private Pressed Cassette.

Yet another Paler Shade of White find... Ultra obscure DIY Disco track by the infamous DONDINO! (Dondino - S/T Cassette 1980)

Ohhhh yeah. Dondino goes balls out in popped collar and sequined jacket style, full force pompadour action and analogue keyboards in the coke fueled late 70s Vegas-Disco casinos with this gloriously lo-fi synth-disco version of "You'll Never Find." Reminds me a lot of the other Paler Shade of White compilation tracks that I posted up a while back. Okay, maybe a little more cheese and somewhat less 'actual' dancefloor potential, but damn it, the man can bring down the house, and with a cheap casio keyboard and budget-inn backup band no less. I love this stuff. More to come later. I'm going cassette crazy. DIY forever!


You'll Never Find:

Marj Snyder - My Lifetime Now LP (Discovery Records) 1972

Quite Rare and quite excellent 1970's Christian femme-folk with mostly all the tracks written by Marj. She has a nice voice and she uses a lot of layering effects that remind me a little bit of Linda Perhacs, not near as psychedlic or experimental though. Marj doesn't seem like she would have such a cool Christian folk album based on the cover, but covers can be very misleading, as we all know. Consider the massively rare femme-folk LP by Robin, for instance. A jewel if there ever was one, delicate, ethereal vocals about the universe and lost loves mixed with off key cavernous folk strumming. But enough about Robin, this post is for Marj! The two albums are pretty similar actually, Marj is a little bit less home made and less spooky-glimmering freak folk sounding, and this has a few more obligatory traditional gospel tracks, but overall this is a very satisfying listen, and deserves high praise amongst the christian folk collectors. Go Marj.

Marj Snyder - My Lifetime Now (1972)

Sugar Bear - I Love You So 7" (Ovide 1969) *Re-Post

Hello friends, I noticed that for some reason my Sugar Bear Post from ages ago was missing, I don't remember why I took that down or if it was deleted by accident or what. Anyway, I'll probably never know what happened to the post but I can remedy the situation pretty easily....

This is the sinlge most impressive and expensive find I ever came up with. And it was located in a box of 99 cent 7"s that were very dirty, but mostly in good shape still, located at a mainstream record store that I go to pretty frequently. The box was mind blowing, to put it mildly. In it was the legendary Austin soul 7" 'Trace of Smoke', and also the Alabama modern soul legend Sonic Explosion. I picked both of those out along with a few others and was verging on the point of crapping my pants, but at the very end of the box I noticed a beat up looking 7" by Sugar Bear, and saw on the side of the label "with the TSU Toronadoes" and I thought, oh my, a 45 with the Toronadoes that i've never heard of? On the Archie bell and the drells label? that is a DJ promo? Produced by Skipper Lee Frazier? I knew I was on to something big but the other 2 records which I knew already took precedence in my mind. When I got home I looked on the net, in the books, and asked around, and I couldn't get one sliver of information on it, aside from info about Skipper Lee, the producer, and Ovide the label, and even who Sugar Bear himself was, a local Houston soul cat that occasionally opened for Archie Bell around town. He recorded two 45s to my knowledge, both very small houston affairs, one of which is this promotional 45 cut in a tiny tiny amount to give to radio stations to get airplay in order to get money for more presses and more studio time, obviously it didnt work out, and thats a really sad thing, because this guy had massive talent and combined with he TSU Toronadoes, I enjoy just as much as Archie Bell, who had enormous success in Texas and nationally to some extent as well. Also, there is another Sugar Bear soul artist, who released a collectible 12" named Sugar Bear Johnson, but I don't think these are the same people. This 45 still hasn't popped up anywhere since I sold it off a couple years ago, its a true ghost status 45. Anyway, it was a 892.00 auction for a vg--/G+ copy, though it sounded much better than it looked thankfully. In fact the pressing was so deep that it sounded quite good even, which helped the price quite a bit. No doubt a NM copy would sell for major, major money. Anyway, it is a very rare chance to hear this gem, and no further copies have been surfaced, no comps, nothing. So enjoy.


SIDE A: I Love You So


Side B: I Got What You Been Looking For


*Feel free to click on the divshare links in the sample players to download the songs after listening.

Da Alliance - Maintain / Spanish Fly 12" +++ Baby X Da God-Sun - Game Recognize Game 12"

Here are the other 2 indie rap 12"s I found in my box of sealed beyonce records, how 3 obscenely rare indie rap 12"s were stuck in this box of 50 identical sealed beyonce records is beyond me, but I'm glad my intuition told me to have a look at the colors that didnt match, because I found Hustlers By Choice, a gem of a Texas indie rap record, and believe me, there are very few progressive early 90s Texas indie rap 12"s, 90% sound like a bad Ghetto Boys ripoff, the other 10% are electro raps about not doing crack cocaine, a handful of love jams, and then you have your remaining chosen few, now don't get me wrong, once you pass 1992-93 there are a number of good Texas indie 12"s coming out, but anyway, beside the HBC record I also found a New York 12" by Da Alliance, and another by the zero-google-results 'Baby X Da God-Sun', I don't know if thats a really great mc name or one of the worst i've ever heard, but anyway, these other 2 12"s, though not of the glorious heights of HBC in price, are still very good and post worthy. So here they are. Btw, 'maintain' is the track you want on this 12, the flip side is pretty frightening female cholo rap.

Da Alliance - Maintain / Spanish Fly 12" with instrumentals (no label 1997)

Baby X Da God-Sun - Game Recognize Game / Instrumental 12" (1997 no label)

Hustlers By Choice - Can I Swing To This EP 12"

Here we have the mega find of the month for me, and with it came a couple other hiphop 12"s of note, I havent found a good random rap cache in a very very long time...

This is a very sought after Texas hip-hop 12" from Houston around 1992. Produced by DJ Pryme and MCed by Tee Money. I don't know how many copies were pressed but I know its very few, I'd guess 500, of which a lot were probably given to radio stations and subsequently lost forever. There was only one instance of this record being found and sold before, and it was a guy in Germany and he made a cool 820 dollars on a NM copy. This copy I found in a crate of Beyonce records in Temple, Texas was sadly a VG+ copy with some cosmetic problems but it sounds really great, especially for being a rather quiet recording/pressing to begin with. I wish I knew more about these guys, there is a discogs entry now, zero 'have it', if youre familiar with discogs. The music consists of 3 tracks, the third being the 'obligatory love jam' that I never quite understand why or how it fits on such a record but I do enjoy them unlike most people. The two tracks are very well produced, nice beats with a lot of layer and detail, crusty sound production that gives it a very bronx new york vibe to me, but the vocals are a real surprise, espeiclaly coming from Texas, it has a kind of Bay Area back pack rap sound, at first its kind of jarring but I got to enjoy it actually, very unique. The first track is about a crooked record executive that acts like he is your best bud while trying to sign away your life to the company, thus the title Mr. Buddy. The next track is just kind of a 1992 anthem style track with a scratched vocal chorus of "can iii swing to this, etc." Overall a very enjoyable EP, not the strongest lyricism I admit, but that 1992 vibe is in full effect.

Hustlers By Choice - Can I Swing To This EP (Houston, TX 1992) Full EP .rar

Jonathan Hutchison - Love is Pouring Down (Cassette 1983)

Here we have an unknown cassette of 80s Lo-fi Christian folk/pop from California that has some nice moments on it, I really like the production of the tape, very basement 4 track earnestness, admittedly the lyrics could be a lot darker and more personal, and I wish there were more songs with the guitar-rhodes-bongos setup, but there's still more than enough to hold my attention, and the lyrics are pretty catchy actually they're just not my preferred style. But the fact that this tape is obscenely rare and that I think the Xian fans of my blog will enjoy it, is reason enough for me to post it. Also, for once, the cover artwork of the tape looks exactly like it sounds.

Have a listen to a sampling of the better tracks featured in this clip, there are 5 tracks here and each is about a minute long:



LINK TO THE FULL ALBUM

Jim Tucker, David Dale, and The Jim Schmidt Enigma (Revised...)

So there is an LP by Jim Schmidt that is certainly one of the most desirable items in the christian soft rock modern soul smooth pop crossover genre, and I have inexplicably found it not once but twice, and it isn't something you should find often at 250 dollars a pop, so I became pretty familiar with it of course, and with the song "Serious" which Jim wrote, then one day I'm looking through the dollar bins and I see a sealed record by David Dale, Lubbock Texas christian soft rock stuff, I buy it not thinking much of it, then I put it on, and I see that he has covered the very obscure Jim Schmidt song 'serious,' weird I think, but it does have that Michael Mcdonald sound so I know it's gonna be big. This is an unknown record previously mind you, so then a couple months pass and I'm diggin through the dollar bins again and I see Jim Tucker, hmmm, looks like christian soft rock to me I think, so i buy it. I then put it on at home and what do you know, ANOTHER cover of 'serious' by Jim Schmidt! A third unknown christian pop obscurity covering an already obscenely rare record. So now I'm wondering, how many more of these instant gold unknown christian pop LPs that cover 'serious' are out there? Is reality somehow manifesting itself in a loop? popping out these records for me to find like some endless LP forever skipping on a bad groove? a cosmic joke? a sign from God? okay, a little overboard, I know, but it really is strange, finding any of these is like a needle in a hay stack, I'm not saying I'm doing some off the charts digging here, if that were the case i'd be finding a box of sealed butcher cover beatles or some shit, this is just utterly bizarre to me. well anyway, I don't have the Jim schmidt recorded in full, I have 4 of the tracks but I think it is available on Itunes so I will throw Jim a bone and not put it up for free, I'm sure he could use the dough, but I will give you some Jim Tucker and David Dale action... (I know I know I only have the sample for David Dale, again, I'm very sorry I don't know how I didnt record it all but thats what I have) I will be posting the full track of the newest find by Jim Tucker, and then maybe the clip of David Dale just to remind you (I posted it before in a splurge about 80s Christian pop... damn I wished I recorded that entire LP.) Have fun, and poo on anyone that doesn't like my TIMOTHY 7"... yacht rock forever. By the way there is a christian boogie group called Omega Sunrise with a track called Destiny that Jim Schmidt covers on this album, another link in the chain of obscure covers doing covers doing covers.....

David Dale:

Jim Tucker:

Memphis State University Jazz Band - On Tour 1970-71 LP

Here we have a return to the older style of posts I normally put up, this is an obscure and really fantastic College jazz band album that I haven't seen any other copies of anywhere, there is a few from the later years around but they aren't nearly as good. I was actually kind of shocked by how low the price was for this when I auctioned it, 30 bucks pretty much, but the breaks/beats college high school band market is pretty weak at the moment. There was a time around 2004-6 when you could sell golden era hiphop LPs that werent even that rare for mad money, houston rap was making waves in JApan, and any record that was unknown and had a break or sample on it was GOLD, especially college and highschool band stuff, my friend sold the lesser Kashmere stage band album for two thousand dollars in 04, friggin unbelievable, but the Euro/Japanese markets were clamoring for anything funky to sample, now all of those aforementioned items have cooled quite a bit, but they remain a staple record collecting genre regardless, in fact the ultra-obscurist 90s hiphop market is doing fantastically well. If you can find a 12" by a group that no one has heard and it sounds even remotely like Wutang, you are in the money. So anyway, back to this record, its really solid all the way through but especially the 2 long tracks on A and B side, I can't remember the names, there are some moments where frenetic fender rhodes keys are dancing over some heavy drum patterns and the horns are just going off, I really was impressed by this for there being very little attention or info toward it. Have a listen to the samples and see what you think, the entirety is linked below.

SAMPLE 1:

SAMPLE 2:

MEMPHIS STATE UNIVERSITY JAZZ BAND LP LINK

Timothy, Bondar and Wise and... Yacht Rock? The next big obscurist scene?

*** Revised comment 10/8/11
Okay, first let me add something to what I splurged out yesterday, the only truely Yacht Rock release here is the first 7" by Timothy, that is pure unknown yacht rockness, and pretty awesome I might add, the Bondar and Wise is too uptempo but otherwise is pretty yachty, the others kinda straddle the new wave/boogie/poprock line so I included it in this post for the hell of it. And one last quip, there is no Yacht Rock collector scene at the moment, it is all a an early 80s smooth Christian pop rock scene, so I'm guessing that Yacht Rock will eventually emerge as a desirable 'hip' collector genre, and records like Timothy will sell for good money, as opposed to being utterly valueless like it is right now... so with that being said I will take you back to the original post...
******
So we all know that christian soft rock/aor/pop/modernsoul/crossover stuff from the late 70s to mid 80s is really hot and the market is very strong, IE Jim schmidt, David Dale, Omega Sunrise, Brown and Jackson, and all the other LPs I've posted about, in fact I just found another one which I'll be posting up soon, but what about all the stuff that is exactly like those aforementioned things but isn't about christian themes and lyrics, what of the smooth poppy 80s rock brilliance of something akin to Toto, Michael Mcdonald, Kenny Loggins, and Hall and Oates but buried and forgotten under decades of obscurity, the lost 7" singles by all the boat shoe wearing, razor cut sporting John Oates that never were. Enter Yacht Rock... At the moment even the most awesome and obscure yacht rock 7"s sell for only ten to 20 dollars, and LPs might go up to the 50 dollar range if truly awesome and obscure, everyone thought the idea of a resurgence in late 90s backpack rap was a ludicrous notion, but there it is, so anyway, I'm just pondering the possibilities here and trying to pry a bit into the future because I recently came across a few unknown yacht rockers that I really enjoyed but a market simply does not exist for them, a sad notion indeed. So here are a couple little diddies I found, theyre utterly obscure but still pretty much worthless in terms of monetary value, but I treasure them nonetheless, I also think an obscure underground 90s lofi tape/lp scene will gain some strength eventually, the kinda leftover synthpop/lofi/experimentalist leftovers, sort of in the vein of the Lizard Water release I posted.
Anyway, here's the stuffs, and it's kinda in order of purity to the genre. The first two items are completely unknown and I think fit nicely, especially Timothy, its just so yacht rocky!




Timothy - Your Love Rolled All Over Me



Bondar and Wise - You and Me




Mark Thompson - Bad One





Peter Hostage - Samples from LP





(I'm not entirely sure this is Yacht Rock, but it kinda straddles that line and era, so it fits with the theme here...)
Roy and Roe - Just Don't Come Back





(Maybe too new wavey I dunno but again it's close, it's in that no man's land...)
Extreme Heat - Lonely (previously of the incredible funk band Steam Heat, I'll post this album soon if you want)

Triffid - Uncovered (extremely sought after 80's hair metal cassette))

Breaking new ground on the blog today with yet another tape for you, this is Triffid - Uncovered, my first Hair Metal post, this actually happens to be one of the most sought after late 80s hair metal tapes out there, and it sells for upwards of $200 easily. I was astonished by how many cassette collectors there are out there, and its a very strong market because there isn't a huge amount of tape dealers and tape diggers out there really, so the occasional collectable tape really comes at a premium. I recently found a cache of rare metal demos, some of which I sold on Ebay recently, including this guy, and overall the auction did very well, I was pretty blown away actually. But back to Triffid... all I know is that they are from New Jersey and they pressed about 500 of these. So anyway, I know it's not exactly of the genre's I normally post up but I definitely think it is deserving of a post. I probably wont keep this link up forever so if you are interested grab it now, and the file is just an MP3 of the entire A and B side uncut, I'm sorry about the format but I got lazy, use Audacity to chop it up if needed.

Triffid - Uncovered (uncut 192kbps MP3 of both sides.)

Sounds Ov Earth - Solstice LP (1986)

Unknown Spiritual Ethnic Folk/Jazz album from Alabama cira 1986. No info about this record whatsoever. Has some really nice moments and I thoroughly enjoy it overall too. Mostly instrumental music kinda similar to Wali and the Afro Caravan, but a little more Native American/Andean maybe, though not by much, its quite similar actually just more 1986 sounding. Crisper production and such. All acoustic percussive stuff with a piano or an occasional electric guitar and every track features one hell of a flute player, some have a kinda hippie folk flute jam feel, others are very ethnic minimal sounding, a couple have vocals and are jazzier, and then a few are kinda all its own, there's only one track with real lyrics and song structure, it is slow and morose but i still really like it. Very interesting record haven't heard much like it, especially not from 1986 and out of Alabama... I don't understand why it's so obscure. I didn't do any research on the label yet though which I need to. The cover was stuck to another LP in the Goodwill I bought it at, I was so pissed. Ruined a really awesome looking cover, but the record was near mint. Also, the record is indeed called Sounds Ov Earth, not "of", and I'm guessing the artist is Solstice, but I could have that backwards. Produced by Jim Wizniewski If you have any info please let me know.

SOUNDS OV EARTH - SOLSTICE (1986)

Felt Nun - 4 Track EP (San Antonio TX 1988)

Okay so you're probably thinking enough with the tapes already but seriously, the tape explosion has just begun, so please bare with me... I have a lot of tapes to go... but I will of course be uploading my standard vinyl stuffs too but I just recently got my bad ass tape player hookup so I've been catching up on all these demos. I felt like since I had already done a 90s bedroom indie and a neosoul joint I should get back to the meat of the tape collecting world and do a new wave/synthpop/minimalwave release, so I am going to unleash yet another utterly unknown and unheard gem from the TX demo tape collection on you with this one, presenting... FELT NUN. The San Antonio synthpop/newwave group from 1988. I actually really started to like the first track, 'oh boy' after a few listens and then the rest of the tape grew on my as well, lots of nice moments here, the first track is probably the most upbeat and poppy, theres a little bit darker moments if thats your thing. So I'm quite happy with this find, cause trust me, decently good synthpop tapes that are still unknown are not easy to come by at all. Enjoy.

Felt Nun - Oh Boy (1988 4track demo)

Katau - Demo 4 Track EP

Breaking new ground on the blog today, my first tape!, I have now added the art of tape digging to my repertoire and sold my first successful Ebay tape auction last week, 75 bucks for Jack Kevorkian and the Suicide Machines... and since then I have acquired a huge amount of weird demo tapes and I think some of them are definitely worth sharing, so that will be the theme of the blog for a little bit. Tapes are a completely different ball of wax from records, they go way deeper down the rabbit hole of obscurity first of all, because basically anyone with a 4 track and a mic can make a release, and the availability of weird tapes out there for 50 cents is still massive, unlike records, though the market for tapes is much smaller and more particular. Theres 4 strong tape genres in collecting, private metal tapes, private synthpop/minimal tapes, private hip hop tapes, and private boogie tapes. I think gangsta rap accounts for the largest share of money transactions on Ebay by far. There's a healthy Japanese and NY/LA rap tape scene going, and next behind that is probably the uber hip minimal wave tape collectors, because the majority of great releases in the genre are on tape.
Anyway, my first post of a tape was supposed to be this bedroom psych/folk-pop demo I found but I haven't finished recording it yet(now posted!), so instead we have KATAU, which is Hawaiian neo-soul/funk circa 1990 by way of Dallas TX. I know thats a lot to take in but you'll understand better when you hear it. It's not Hawaiian like traditional ethnic music, I mean the regional variety of jazzy soul/funk that became popular in Hawaii in the early 80s and sounds a lot like Cali modern soul stuff, so it's that kinda, but 'Neo' cause its 1990 and the tuning is really tight and crisp sounding, a little bluesy almost, but don't let that dissuade you, and the group is performing in Dallas TX for this demo. I absolutely love slap bass boogie jams and this track definitely makes the cut for bombastic slap bass shakedowns, just listen to that breakdown at the end where the guy goes off! Like some Conrad Benjamin up in this biznitch. Man, I need to make a best of rare slap bass boogie compilation. Anyway, Hope you like it as much as I do, here's my favorite track below and then a link to the .rar of the rest.

KATAU - 4 TRACK DEMO .rar

Katau - Dreaming You