Saturday 28 March 2009

Newtown Grunts - Three Second Memory demo


Back in '94 we drove down to Kirkcaldy to see Bob Tilton and Fabric and the opening band were The Newtown Grunts from along the road in Glenrothes. We arrived just as the Grunts were about to play (after taking some bizarre meandering route through Fife) and I thought they were going to be awful based on the fact they were wearing bin liners and toy army helmets. I think it was the peely-waly skinny legs on show that really disturbed me. Anyway after a lot of talking pish and joking around they actually started to play and they were totally amazing. Fast, tuneful punk with a wee splash of ska. Two vocalists a big yin (Brian iirc) and a skinny yin (Roddy). Lots of swearing; last song Ballad of a Newtown Grunt was based around the line "ya cunt, ya cunt, ya cunt, i'm a newtown grunt!" repeat until stuck in your head for ever. They also had a song about drinking Buckfast and liberally doled the stuff out during the song. They were really energetic and totally infectous and I fell in love with them and immediately bought the demo off them when they finished. I got two covers as there was originally some kind of a fuck up with the colour cover so they had a temporary one with a starfish on the front. They blame the drummer. I wonder who they blame for missing the last song of the tape? Two Pint Boring Bastard is listed on the cover but fails to materealise on the tape. Was this just my copy? I don't know...
Some time after this point the big singer buggered off to America and was replaced with Norrie and Lynn to make it three singers, they released a couple of albums and some singles and were on numerous compilations. They were the best live band in Scotland (or anywhere else for that matter!) but sadly fizzled out around 2002 leaving memories of great gigs and a slight aftertaste of tonic wine.
The Newtown Grunts - Three Second Memory demo

Friday 27 March 2009

Baby Aspirin - Affynoweel demo

Another tape rescued from the loft.




Baby Aspirin were from Dundee, and started about '94-'95. Demo was released in '95, punk rock with tinges of metal and a general theme of alien contact and conspiracy theory. Saw them play a few times, put them on with Goober Patrol in Monroes as well. Great stuff, great guys.
Think they put out a single before splitting up.

Lee the singer went on to the Eddies and Andy the drummer went onto a few other bands; Beauty School Dropout, Barefoot, The Red Eyes, Resistance, Jackhammers and probably more...

Baby Aspirin - Affynoweel demo

Wednesday 25 March 2009

The John Merrick Experience

Was up in the loft the other day and came across a box of tapes so picked out a few old demos to revisit. Starting with this:


Back in the late 80s early 90s I used to correspond with Karl from Bolt Thrower and he would always recommend bands to check out, usually grindcore and death metal bands he'd played gigs with and I generally enjoyed them all. (Apart from Nocturnus) In 1990 Karl told me his mate's band had just recorded a demo and I would probably dig it as it was kinda punky and hardcore, so I wrote to his mate Paul who sent back this tape, The Amazing Mr No-legs. I was a bit cautious to tell the truth, full colour cover and a general air of wackiness abounded. I was more into cheap black and white photocopying and stark and serious shit.



Anyway, I pop the tape in and hit play and despite myself really enjoyed it, a mix of hardcore, punk, metal and acid rock.
Even got a few bonus live tracks on the other side of the tape, sweet.
So here it is dredged out of a box in the loft for the curious among you to try 19 years later enjoy...

The John Merrick Experience - The Amazing Mr No-legs demo

Sunday 8 March 2009

Off With Their Heads, Four Letter Word - Bannermans, Edinburgh, 05/March/09

Old blokes trip for this, Rodi, Johnny an Scott christening the inaugral intercity jaunt for the new silver machine. Much complaints about the no drinking rule in the new car.
Got to Bannermans later than expected while local punkers Down To Kill were on due to us thinking it was a different pub. Thanks to mobile technology we soon found where we were meant to be going. No thanks to half of Edinburgh being dug up though, it still took us about 20 minutes to go basically just round the corner a bit.
I was surprised Four Letter Word were still on the go actually, this Welsh lot have been around for a fair old while.Gutsy melodic punk rock with a politicized slant.








Four Letter Word - myspace

Off With Their Heads recorded output is a bit hit and miss for me, live however they were awesome, every song they played was a big grizzly power packed punky anthem. Would definetly go see them again.











Off With Their Heads - myspace
Camera was being a pain during this gig, didn't seem to want to focus properly, figured it was just having a problem with the lights especially the blue which was pretty bright, but when I got home the poor thing had died. Gutting as it is an old kodak dx4330 that has a view finder and all cameras these days apart from the big mock SLRs seem to have LCD screens only which I hate, and you can't stick an SLR in your pocket. Anyway the in-laws have nicely given me their old one which is exactly the same, yay!
Grabbed a pizza after the show as well, was pretty yummy, but forgot to pick up a copy of Artcore at the merch table. Damn it.