THE HUMBLEBEES - "The Face Of My Heart" - Tape - 2006

   THE HUMBLEBEES were a very short-lived band from Worcester, MA. They probably weren't the most short-lived band from that magical town, but I'm sure there aren't many more who wrote, rehearsed AND recorded their demo in three hours. Does it sound like a demo that was written, rehearsed and recorded in three hours? Well, yes...but there is also something about it that makes it sound like a long lost demo from 1984, rather than a long lost demo from 2006. They kept it short and so will I. I like this. You might like it too. Get some mold on the face of your heart.

Download THE HUMBLEBEES

   Band members: Mike Leslie from the almighty TERRIBLES played guitar and sang. Erick Lyle from ONION FLAVORED RINGS (and much more) played bass and sang. Jim, who I may not know but I'm sure has much to offer, played drums. This tape is from the collection of Erick Lyle.

YOUNG LIONS - Demography - CD-R - 2006

   I remember reading about SUPERCHUNK in some mainstream bullshit rock magazine when I was 14 or 15 and thinking that they sounded like a really fuckin' cool band. The article described them as being this group of college kids that ran their own label, booked their own tours, kept it real and played loose, desperate, manic, jangly, sorta-punk music. I had this exact idea in my head of what they sounded like and I couldn't wait to hear them. I went out and bought the cassette of "No Pocky For Kitty" and threw it in the tape deck of my mom's minivan. It was good, but not really what I expected at all. It grew on me over time (I love it now), but I always expected them to be more punk than they were.
    I never saw YOUNG LIONS during their time as a band. Hell, I never even heard of them until Erick Lyle sent me a big box of music to put on my blog. This CD was kicking around in the bottom of the box, kind of neglected in the shadows of the heavy hitters in the Region-Rock or early Bay Area punk genres. I put it on a few days ago and got really into it. To me, they sound like what I wanted SUPERCHUNK to sound like all those years ago....loose, jangly, punk, kinda desperate and noodly in all the right ways. To be clear, I don't think they sound like SUPERCHUNK, but they sound like what my young teenage mind thought that band should sound like, if that makes any sense.
   "Demography" collects the band's demos from 2005 and 2006...16 songs in all. That's about all I know about this band. Oh, they're from Reno and they're great. That's it.

DOWNLOAD

Link updated Feb 2017

RVIVR - Demo - Tape - 2008

  In 2008, I went to see RVIVR, not knowing anything about them besides that Matt from LATTERMAN was in the band. I never liked LATTERMAN at all (sorry Matt) so I didn't really have high hopes for this new band. I was pleasantly surprised to hear energetic "crust-pop" with female and male vocals sharing the microphone. I feel pretty lucky to have seen them at that time, when they were still in the formative stages and figuring out what they wanted to do. I mean, I still go to see them now too, but I usually don't have the energy to wrestle with 200 other people to catch a glimpse of my friends playing music in a basement or a warehouse. Often, I feel like I'm running after a train that just left the station, if that makes any sense.

     This demo is the first thing they ever put out and was only available for a West Coast tour in an edition of 50, or something like that. It only has three songs that were all re-recorded later for their first 7"s. For a demo, it's pretty fuckin' great and shows the band's early confidence in songwriting that has only gotten stronger over time....and here comes the weirdest comparison I've had in quite a while. "Can't Stand It" really reminds me of KISS in the weirdest way (If you want a glimpse into my mind, synch up the chorus of the RVIVR song with video [no sound] of KISS at 1:50). None of this makes sense. You're just here to download the demo anyway, so get on with it and get out of here. Get out of my house!!

Download RVIVR
Re-uploaded Jan 2016

AIRFIX KITS - Demo - CDR - 2008

   Years ago, I went on a totally failed trip to New Orleans that was supposed to be this fun, get-out-of-town-for-my-birthday-and-forget-everything kind of deal. Instead, I blacked out in a bar, hanging out with a lot of crusty kids that I barely knew while a couple of bands played. I passed out before anything truly fun happened. Things could have been worse. I could have gotten shot again. The highlights of that trip were seeing the MELVINS and getting to go to my all-time favorite record store, Domino Sound. While at the store, I bought a 7" by NO HOPE FOR THE KIDS and the "Blunt Instrument" LP by a band I had heard of called GIANT HAYSTACKS. I knew that I would like the NHFTK record, but the GIANT HAYSTACKS LP totally took me by surprise. I just kept flipping it over and over on my turntable for days, letting the bleak, sparse, MISSION OF BURMA and GANG OF FOUR-inspired songs seep into my subconscious. Their song "Catatonic State" is so good that I found myself wanting to listen to it again before it had even finished playing through the first time. That LP just has a perfect flow to it and sounds so wonderful to my jaded ears.

   A couple of years later, I was planning to move back to the Bay Area and I had a lot of things on my mind. One of those things that lurked around the forefront of my mind (and I'm not shitting you here) was that I would finally get to see GIANT HAYSTACKS play a show and I could sing along to the genius song "Young Shavers" live! Well, imagine my disappointment when I showed up in SF and was informed that GIANT HAYSTACKS had been broken up for almost a year already. Lucky for me, the guitarist and bass player (both named Allan, but one of them has one less "L" in his name) had wasted no time in starting a new band called AIRFIX KITS that, from all accounts, seemed to pick up where GIANT HAYSTACKS left off. I was wondering how I could find out about this band and then I found out that they were playing at the record store just down the street from my house. Boom! I was surprised that none of my friends showed up to see them. In fact, hardly anyone was there at all, but AIRFIX KITS tore through a flawless set that still had elements of their former, bleak, stark sound that I loved and mixed that with a little touch of the mod sound. I was sold. After their set, I told Allan about how much I liked GIANT HAYSTACKS and how stoked I was on their new band. From the look on his face, I could tell that he appreciated the compliments but I was slowly and steadily treading into fanboy territory, so I backed off, unlocked my bike and coasted towards home. Halfway there, I realized that I forgot to get their demo.  Oops! Just in case you also forgot to pick it up at the show, here it is for you.

Download AIRFIX KITS

   Once again, I am in the same boat. AIRFIX KITS has broken up and for some insanely stupid reason, I missed their last show. Let's hope that an Allan or two is working on something new. The Bay Area needs it.

This CD-R is from the collection of Erick Lyle.

JARVIS - 2nd Demo - Tape - 1999

   Remember last October when I talked about how my favorite JARVIS tape was the one with the worst sound quality (no, I don't expect you to remember that, but here is the link to it)? Well, here is that tape. There is something buried beneath the shitty sound quality and the wild mix that makes me believe (in some crevasse of my brain) that this is the very best thing that this band ever did. Many will disagree with me and that's fine, but i have listened to this recording at least one billion times. I fucking love it.
   I'll just go ahead and tell you that I'm not gonna talk specifics about the band much at all because I already did that in the link above and here..
    This tape contains my favorite version of (well, everything) "I Wanna Go" and I think the band is totally "feelin' it" super hard on this recording. On "Changes", you may think "Hey, when did a woman join this band?", but that's just Ryan doing both vocal tracks. It kinda blows my mind still. "Self Effacement" never appeared on anything else and wasn't played live too much, but it's one of my all-time favorites. If you wanna see me get overly fuckin' nerdy about a poorly recorded demo tape that only a handful of people might care about, check this shit out: About 10 seconds into "Changes Pt 2", it sounds like Bob (the drummer) fucks up by trying to change tempos for a split second. He didn't fuck up. (Bear with me here for a moment) There is a really early POTENTIAL JOHNS song that has the exact same fuck up in it (a real one, I assume) and Bob was emulating that exact same flub but doing it intentionally in his own bands' song. What the fuck? At the time, I thought it was genius. Okay, I still do.
   Whatever....you might hate this and the sound quality. I don't care. Some people listen to Fifteen Counts of Arson. Others listen to In On The Kill Taker. I don't. I listen to this tape.

Download JARVIS
Updated June 2015

PINHEAD GUNPOWDER - Live on KALX 3/9/96 - Tape - 1996

   I've been carrying this tape around for years and I've probably listened to it more than any of their albums. Therefore, it is thrashed and the sound quality is shit...but never fear!! I just found it elsewhere online ( at Rad Party, to be exact) and I am sharing that higher quality recording here.
    (It feels impossible to write about this band without mentioning GREEN DAY, so here you go) Many of you already know the drill with this band: four friends got together in 1991 or so and formed this band. There was a lineup change sometime in the mid-90's and this band still exists, more or less, to this day. One guy named Billie (singer/guitarist) was already playing in a band called GREEN DAY, who are a pop-punk band out of Berkeley. I think they're still around, but I haven't seen them play any shows in a number of years, so I can't confirm it right now. Their other singer/guitarist Jason White also started playing in GREEN DAY, even though no one outside of the band ever wanted to believe it. Their bass player, Bill Schneider used to play in MONSULA and went on to be GREEN DAY'S tour manager (why anyone would need a tour manager to play house shows in the Midwest is beyond me). Their drummer, Aaron Cometbus has been writing a zine since 1981 and playing drums pretty consistently as well. He was also GREEN DAY's roadie.
    I first heard PINHEAD GUNPOWDER in 1994 on the "Very Small World" double LP comp with the song "Losers of the Year" and I was instantly enamored with it. I probably put that song on every mix tape I made for the next 5 years. I followed their albums pretty loosely and somehow stumbled across this tape...I think Aaron might've given it to me or I dubbed it off of him...I can't remember anymore. It's not important. It's a good live performance though.
   Say what you will about GREEN DAY, their excess, their Broadway musicals, all the trappings of stardom, or how it is weird that a huge rockstar is still allowed to be in this fairly DIY band that plays warehouses  but I don't hold anything against them...and here is why: A few years ago, my dear partner, Anandi was diagnosed with breast cancer. It was a terrible time, to say the very least. As punks, I wondered what could possibly be done to help out financially. As usual, we (myself, Gaybob, Anandi and Eggplant) decided to set up a benefit show to help out with medical bills and the cost of living, but how the hell could we get hundreds of people to come see our dumb bands? We couldn't. We needed a headliner..a band that would sell out Gilman. One of our early, funny ideas was to get LUDICRA and GRASS WIDOW on the same show, but we soon dropped it in favor of getting PINHEAD GUNPOWDER (GRASS WIDOW still played...we never got around to asking LUDICRA). We joked that PINHEAD GUNPOWDER owed it to Anandi by singing about her without her consent. So, we called them up (actually, I think Anandi did) and asked them to play the show. They couldn't do it when we had scheduled because the whole band was going to be in China on tour with GREEN DAY. We set the benefit show up for a month later and the band did it, no questions asked. They didn't want any money and they didn't pull any rock star weirdness. It felt like we were pulling off some crazy bullshit, getting some people who had just been on the fucking Grammys a week earlier to play Gilman. Also, they were great and we made a fuck-ton of money for the benefit. I could have done without the psycho-#1-GREEN DAY fans who showed up, claimed their spots in front of the stage for the entire show and wouldn't move or dance until Billie Joe hit the stage, but what can you do? It was a great show and every band ruled it. Unlike every other Internet outlet that covered this show, I will tell you the other bands that played. The lineup was DIRTY MARQUEE, FLEABAG, MUTOID MEN and the aforementioned GRASS WIDOW. All of the bands were great and did their best to make it a memorable night. I can't thank every person enough. Gilman sold out that night and gave Anandi a huge cut of the money for expenses. The sad thing was is that all of that money was used pretty quickly on medications, but they were needed and appreciated.  Thanks everyone for your help and enjoy this tape that has nothing to do with that show.

Download Pinhead Gunpowder on KALX
Link updated Dec 2017

Funny side story: I was told to run to the Gilman office as soon as PG finished their set that night to get the money. As soon as they hit the last note, I started running across the room. I ran full speed into someone else running towards the front door to leave. We both caught each other from falling and we both started apologizing at the same time. I looked up and it was Mike Dirnt from GREEN DAY. Then we both continued running towards our respective doors.

SWEET BABY JESUS - "Never Mind the Bassets, Here's..." - Tape - 1987

   I had no intention of uploading this tape to the internet because I have almost no interest in this band, but then my friend, Erin Yanke said that I HAVE to put it online. Generally, I trust Erin so here it is. SWEET BABY JESUS was arguably one of the first East Bay pop-punk bands (I say "arguably" because what the fuck do I know? I'm from Alabama....Anyhow, MR T EXPERIENCE was a band before them), starting way back in 1986, before GREEN DAY, before SAMIAM....hell, even before Gilman. They blasted out syrupy sweet songs about girls, girls and even more girls. Who were all these girls? How did they feel about these geeks singing all these songs about them? I can't answer any of these questions. All I can do is offer you this 20 song tape that they recorded with Kevin Army back in 1987. Because of this tape, they ended up putting out an LP on Ruby Records, a subsidiary of major label, Slash Records. They also changed their name to SWEET BABY and sold a pitiful amount of their LP's. The part that the punks want to hear is that they went on tour in 1989 in support of this record with Aaron Cometbus on drums and then broke up soon afterwards.
    Members of this band went on to be in SAMIAM, THE BOMB BASSETS, and many many more. One of them (Richie Bucher) went on to draw the album cover for GREEN DAY'S major label debut "Dookie".

Download SWEET BABY JESUS

Being that this is a tape from 1987, I want you to know that the sound quality is atrocious. It gets a little better around track 15, but not too much better. Also, as much as I would have you believe I don't like this band, "She's From Salinas" has been happily stuck in my head since the dawn of time and "Baby Baby Baby Baby Baby Baby Baby (I Love You)" is kind of unbelievable.
From the collection of Erick Lyle.

Here is a 48 minute (!!) live video of them playing in Florida in '89.

Tapes and more tapes!!

If you live in the Bay Area and have extra shelves for tapes, get in touch!!

Mostly unlabeled

Please stay tuned for more music...a lot more music...

Slowing It Down

   I'm gonna be slowing down the posts to around one a week for a while because I am trying to work on other creative projects. I'm currently trying to write two zines as well as work on two records while working full time and preparing for a long European tour. Doing this blog is fun. I like to write so much about all of these bands but sometimes I don't have the motivation to work on other writing projects as much. So, I'm taking a little break. In the future, I will be going through a fellow archivist's tapes (she has piles upon piles of treasures) as well as continuing on with my ever-growing mounds of cassettes (I am building a house out of them right now). In the meantime, check out Terminal Escape, Region Rock and More, Do Ya Hear We, Turned Word and Lighten Up Sounds for some downloadable and physical music. All are highly recommended.

ONION FLAVORED RINGS - "Live on KALX" - Tape - 2003

   San Francisco's ONION FLAVORED RINGS churned out extremely catchy, jangly pop-punk for the better part of 10 years before calling it quits...actually I don't know if they called it quits, but their bass player lives in LA, their drummer lives in Brooklyn and their guitarist is getting ready to move to Portland, so I'm making an educated guess. Back in 2003, Berkeley radio station KALX invited them on the air for this hour long set, which is funny because I have never seen them play longer than 20-30 minutes. They throw out all the stops by including their Leslie Gore cover, the alternate version of "I Kill Butterflies" (called "I Heart Butterflies") and lots of between song stories. Throughout the broadcast, you can hear more people joining them in the studio, including our friend Ivy, most of the band SEXY and even people working at the station. It's pretty funny and a good performance by the band.
   UPDATE 3/18/12: I realized that the tape is running too fast...so did Steve Funyun, the singer of OFR. Steve took the time to fix the recording and slow it down to the correct speed. He even added the lyrics to a lot of the songs because he's a great guy. The download is now the same recording at the correct speed. Thanks Steve!

Download OFR at the correct speed!!

If you want more info about the band (and hear their first demo), it is right here.
This tape is from the collection of Erick Lyle.