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SPACE ROCKET: Hot Gadulka Suicide (7″, Boing Being BONG12, 2000)

I have no real recollection of how this record found its way onto my shelves. I know I didn’t buy it, so I presume that it was sent to me either as a gift* or as a review copy. If it was the latter – apologies, Boing Being and Space Rocket, as I don’t think […]

OUR LOVE WILL DESTROY THE WORLD: Yellow Nirvana (7″, Trensmat TR019, 2009)

When the randomly-generated number came up and pointed me in the direction of this record, I have to admit that at first I had no idea what it was and could not recollect even the slightest fact about it. But as I scrolled through my spreadsheet to reveal Trensmat as the label behind the record, […]

HULA HOOP/HOOD/BLAIRMAILER: 3 Band Flexi With… (7″ flexi, Tangled TANGLED 006, 1993)

Flexis are cool. People don’t make them that much any more, as far as I know. Maybe it’s difficult to make them these days. Maybe I should investigate, and if I can, just make a flexi for the hell of it. And hey, if I did, it might be like this one, as it’s a […]

SWELL MAPS: A Trip To Marineville (LP, Rough Trade/Rather ROUGH 2, 1979)

This album is an insight into a strange set of minds. I bought it in around ’92 or so after hearing Swell Maps’ name dropped in the context of a variety of indie-pop and fanzine mentions of – very vaguely and very possibly wrongly – music that prefigured the Pastels and was ‘shambolic’ before the […]

HAPSHASH AND THE COLOURED COAT: Featuring The Human Host And The Heavy Metal Kids (LP, Minit MLL 40001, 1967)

Wow, look at that cover design. Hapshash And The Coloured Coat were a fashion/graphic design house right in the centre of the late 1960s maelstrom of London psychedelia who, true to the spirit of ‘try anything’ released several albums, of which this is their first. The record within that glorious sleeve is on red vinyl, […]

THE OLIVIA TREMOR CONTROL: Black Foliage (2LP, Flydaddy BRRC1005781, 1999)

Some time ago, in the midst of my letter-writing exploits of the past, I regularly corresponded with a guy called Simon who was at university in, as I recall, Bristol. I’d first been in touch as he’d put out some weird and wonderful fanzines, and he in turn ordered some of mine, and we struck […]

CICCONE YOUTH: The Whitey Album (LP, Blast First BFFP 28, 1988)

I bought this album in around 1990 in, believe it or not, Birmingham’s HMV – this was back when record shops carried records and some of them carried records that went beyond the charts and into weirder territories. Back when living in Telford I would make many weekend trips to Birmingham, with one of two […]

VARIOUS: Pulley (7″, Simple Machines SMR 003, 1991)

A wee slab of indie rock history here, kind of… Simple Machines were an inspirational label in their early nineties heyday, pulling together underground music strands and sharing the love with unending positivity. And, at the same time, releasing countless brilliant discs featuring all kinds of bands that are now varying degrees of legendary. Pulley […]

EARTH: Extra-Capsular Extraction (LP, Sub Pop SP 123, 1991)

Well, what are the chances. Out of the huge range of random-number-generator-driven possibilities that were available for this post, it’s another Earth album. I’ve already written about Earth 2 on here in the past. I bought this at the same time as that. This is their first album, featuring some dude named Kurt Kobain (sic) […]