Wednesday 5 December 2012

Cold Water - K. Stebner's Cold Water (2011)


For those who follow us over on the facebook, you may have seen a distressing post last week. It seems the folks over at mediafire don't like to spend too much time thinking or reviewing facts when the RIAA knocks on our door, and so our account with said file sharing service has been unjustly (unjustly! we swear!) suspended. This means that, as of this writing, the 500+ recordings that we've been collecting here are in limbo. Thankfully, we have copies of our own - but we're hoping we can get things sorted out soon and get back to our usual hijinx.

In the meantime, we'd like to present this lovely tape, which we slept on until recently. Kevin Stebner is, of course, the moustachioed head of Bart Records and Stalwart Sons (as well as a pile of other projects we can't keep up with).  For this tape, he's gone country - which is a mighty fine thing indeed.

This really lives up to its name. It feels like it was recorded in the winter in the depths of a cold basement. Which is pretty much where we'll be holed up this Christmas break, re-uploading all of the gems we've been collecting for the past five and a half years.

Good thing you can get this one on bandcamp.

Tuesday 20 November 2012

Browns - Gettin' Jiggy with the Browns!!! (1998)


A flood of questions started hitting us this morning, after being pointed to this tape by the a post on ye olde facebook. Like, why didn't we know there was a tape by the Browns? Why didn't Jeff Caissie give us a copy of this a few years back when we lent us a huge bin of other tapes? Why the ski masks? Why do we get a page not found error when we try to get to their Geocities page? How long until we get the same error when trying to access their myspace page?

Anyways, the Browns, or, more commonly, the Motherfucking Browns. Despite the balaclavas, we believe the band is essentially Jeff Caissie and a revolving cast of ne'er-do-wells, bringing to the stage a level of asshole-ery seldom seen since the Mants. This six-song tape looks like it came out shortly after the band formed, and just ahead of their Greatest Hits Volume One CD, and contains the two songs we love them best for, "American Werewolf in Calgary" and "Ghoulita." Heck, that puts in the mood for a little video action:



BIG, big thanks to the Museum of Canadian Music for posting this. You can read more about the Browns and listen to the tape at their amazing site.

Friday 16 November 2012

CCPS Miscellany: Pryor - Pryor


Here's another Edmonton tape, courtesy of Chris Millar. We don't have a year for this, but Pryor do get a quick mention on the list of Edmonton bands over at fifteen.ca.

Grab the tape here.

Thursday 15 November 2012

CCPS Miscellany: Blindside - A Step Forward (1992)


We got an email a few weeks ago from an Edmonton reader who noted our inclusion of a few Edmonton tapes, and asked if we wanted more. Never ones to say no, we took Chris Millar up on his offer, and have a few little gems of early 90s Edmonton punk for you, starting with this tape from Blindside.



We don't know that much about what went down in Edmonton in 1992, other than it standing on record as the year with the earliest snow. This download is probably more interesting than that meteorological oddity.

Friday 12 October 2012

Huevos Rancheros - Endsville (1993)



It's been a pretty disappointing year for us on eBay. We've managed to be outbid at the last second on pretty much everything we've been interested in. So, we were all set for heartbreak when we saw this come up for auction last month. Thankfully, the snipers stayed away, and we're able to present one of our favourite early 90's releases.

Endsville was the first sign that something great might happen in Calgary. Why did a label out of Seattle want to put out Huevos' first full-length? It was unfathomable to our tiny minds at the time. Even if it was mostly just a re-recording of the tracks from their first two cassettes and 7" single.

One of the things that made Huevos one of our favourites was that they never took themselves too seriously, as evidence by their interview with James Muretich:


Anyways, we're super stoked to have this in the CCPS collection. Suffice to say, it's replaced our well-played CD.


Wednesday 10 October 2012

CCPS Miscellany: Wheat Chiefs - Demos (1991, ?)


We went up to Edmonton last weekend for their semi-annual record sale, and came back mostly empty-handed. One of the things we did come back with was, appropriately, the new-ish Chris Walter book about SNFU. That, combined with a request over the weekend from an Edmonton reader have us digging into the CCPS hard drive for these two tapes, which we think we originally borrowed from Jeff Caissie. We're actually not sure where they came from.

Anyways, one tape bears the year of 1991 and full artwork. The other is free of both. So, we'll quickly fill you in on the Wheat Chiefs story, even though you probably know more about it than us. The band was mainly brothers Marc and Brent Belke from SNFU... aw, hell, just go read the wikipedia page. Notably, the band also included former NiCon/future Pal Joey alumnus Trent Buhler at one point.

You can grab the band's 1996 CD, Redeemer, at Making Time For Thoughcrime. Or grab the demos here.

Sunday 23 September 2012

Various - Permanent Distress: A Permanent Records Compilation (1995)


This is something we should have posted way, way back. Duncan MacKenzie got in touch with us, uh, almost three years ago and shared this with us. We're obviously a bit slow sometimes, so now we're sharing it with you.

This is a great little compilation, with three tracks each from Also Known As, Big Daddy Ritter, Chapter 16, Non Prophet, Showdown '76 and Wrong Floor.

It's a nice, early fall day. We suggest you download this and hit the skatepark.

Friday 21 September 2012

Various - Modern Miracles in Science and Medicine (1998)


Shortly after posting our series of Catch and Release compilations, we found out that there was apparently another compilation that we didn't have. This isn't it. There's another one out there somewhere, which means we actually missed two. Which is better than we normally do, quite frankly.

Still, we're quite happy to have this, not just because it's a very nicely assembled package (thanks to Ian Russell) but also because it gives us three more tracks from the quite amazing indie-noise quartet Rayovaq. Too bad one of them is a re-recording of a song off their first tape. There's also a band called Dissembler who we have no idea who they are. And early Clinton St. John vehicle Trikl Act. And Ellipses, an electronica project which may or may not include Garrett McClure from (*sigh*) the Primrods.

Have you figured this game out yet? Any time we mention the Primrods, you have to finish your drink. If you don't want to finish your drink, give us a call, we'll be happy to finish it for you.

Wednesday 19 September 2012

CCPS Miscellany: Various - Edmonton Produce


Well, since we're in Edmonton (figuratively speaking), we may as well put this up. One of the guys/gals from Depeche Ode passed this to us over the summer. We can't find a year on this, but we're going to guess it's circa 1995. Maybe?


Anyways, while this CD compilation boasts some truly horrible cover art, it does give us an excuse to post yet more Pal Joey, some All Woman Brothers' Band and a couple of other Edmonton faves (Greyhound Tragedy and, uh, Minstrels on Speed? We might be reaching on that last one).

And, as you know, we're all about excuses.

Sunday 16 September 2012

CCPS Miscellany: Blindside - We Stand As One (1993)


We're weren't really sure about this one. Glenn Bickham tells us that Blindside were an Edmonton band, but the liner notes indicate this was released on a Vancouver label. However, the amazing list over at fifteen.ca confirms that Blindside were a bunch of young punks from Edmonton.

So, uh, there you go.

Friday 14 September 2012

CCPS Miscellany: Unsound - Seizure at Your Leisure (1992)


Whew!  Another Unsound tape from Glenn Bickham.

Remember that magical moment when it actually got cheap enough to do full-colour j-cards?

Wednesday 12 September 2012

CCPS Miscellany: Unsound - Flora (1992)



Glenn Bickham noted our diversion into Edmonton bands, and has sent us north again by filling in a few blanks in the Unsound collection.

We're not sure what to say about this, other than we're glad that people don't wear baseball caps in band photos anymore.

Monday 10 September 2012

Road Crew Orange - Cement Wall (1994)


So, carrying on with the Black Lounge theme we seem to have going here, we've got another tape from Glenn Bickham's collection.

This is a tape that Road Crew Orange recorded for a tour of the States, and it didn't get wide distribution here. Or any distribution, from what we can tell.

So, we suspect that a few of you might be interested in heading straight to the download.

Saturday 8 September 2012

SOB - Demo


Glenn Bickham got in touch with in August about a few tapes he dug out of his basement, and among them was this little beauty. This stands as THE best re-use of a tape that we've ever seen. A Canadian Tire Vic-20 tape? Heck, yes!

That said, the great idea doesn't mean that the tape has held up well over the years (we put this tape at 1993 or 1994). But the low quality tape and questionable housing mechanism gave the CCPS engineers nothing but grief when we went to play it, it was full of wow and flutter and started emitting the most amazing mechanical squealing. So, we turned to a hint we read on the interweb and threw the tape in the CCPS beer fridge overnight. And, lo and behold, it worked! Thanks to the magic of thermodynamics (or something? we're not big on physics), we managed to get this to play, worry-free.

Oh, yeah - the music. SOB was an early incarnation of Wrong Floor, and this was recorded in their basement.

So, file this formerly squeaky tape under all ages punk.

Sunday 2 September 2012

Beyond Possession - Live at the Black Lounge (1996)


Well, summer here at the CCPS has been a bit slow. We've been lazy, we admit it. But we've got a few things in the queue, as a sort of back-to-school present for the kids. We're going to start with this, a combination DVD and CD that Eraz Cohen passed to us a couple of weeks ago (it pays to go to the record shoppes, kids!).

This is a fairly legendary show - when Melodiya released the Repossessed compilation CD in 1996, Beyond Possession also played a show at the Black Lounge (one of four they did at the time, according to the Encylopaedia Metallum) We're pretty thrilled to see this, because it's a pretty crazy show. You get to see Ron Hadley losing his shit because of sound problems as the band is trying to get started. You get to see Ron Hadley losing his shit because the stage divers are taking over the stage. And you get to see Ron Hadley losing his shit because... well, because he's Ron Hadley.


So, while you get to see all of that, we're not sure what's up with the CD. The recording starts about two tracks in (compared to the video), and then goes to crap after track 6. Still, we're providing it as a separate download, since the first six tracks sound great - and also in case you need some white noise to put you to sleep at night.

Friday 24 August 2012

Chris Reimer - The Chad Tape (2012)


We'd be remiss (more so than normal) if we neglected to post this collection of posthumous recordings by former Women guitarist Chris Reimer. It's kind of old news by now, but this is a collection of ambient guitar sketches that Reimer had been working on for Chad VanGaalen to release. They've now been released as a fundraiser for the Chris Reimer Legacy Fund Society

Honestly, it's a bit hard not to listen to this without hearing equal parts beauty and sadness.

Get the tape (or the download) from bandcamp.

Friday 17 August 2012

Hot Little Rocket - This Decade (2008)


Being the suckers for nostalgia that we are, we're understandably excited about tonight's Hot Little Rocket reunion show. So, what better time to dig through the CCPS library to pull out this CDR!

We think we snagged this at the band's release party for their final, self-titled CD. We think. We have a lot of things in the archives that we're not 100% sure where they came from. Anyways, this compilation spans the band's first ten years, including tracks from their first (and only) tape (previously featured here). Hot Little Rocket are one of those bands we think should had been huge. In appeal, not girth. Although it is funny to think of a 300-pound Andrew Wedderburn.

So, maybe we'll see you at Broken City tonight for the show? We'll be the ones up front in a Rayovaq t-shirt.

Monday 16 July 2012

You Are Minez - Having Your Heart Broken Means Once Having Had Somebody To Love (2012)


The new tape onslaught continues! Much has been said about boy genius Jean Sebastien Audet and his many projects, and we've finally managed to get our mitts on a tape of his. This is a really nicely packaged - and nicely executed - affair. Audet has followed the "if it sucks, tape over it" philosophy and recycled old tapes for this (ours has been dubbed onto a copy of Stompin' Tom Connors' "A Proud Canadian," which we would argue was not worthy of this fate) and carefully reconstructed tape art from the early days of the format, when the cover would be a horribly-shrunked version of the LP.

But the standout here is the music. Audet is pretty darn talented, and this tape is full of sludgy, low-fi pop goodness. We hate it when kids are so talented - we realize that we've wasted any potential we may have ever had.

Crap. What have we done with our life? Just go to the You Are Minez bandcamp and leave us alone, okay?

Saturday 14 July 2012

No River - Swamp Days (2012)


We're a bit ashamed to admit that f-word beat us to the punch on this new tape. What can we say? The recent barrage of cassettes in this city is invigorating, but it's also a bit hard to keep up with... we're used to trawling through Recordland and thrift stores for tapes, not Sloth and Hot Wax.

Anyways, this No River tape is a nice little treat with its rambling and shambling country rock... goddam it, Josiah Hughes' mighty penmanship kind of makes whatever we might have said redundant. So we'll make sure we sucker-punch him next time we see him.

Blah blah blah bandcamp blah blah wordcount.

Thursday 12 July 2012

Gold - Gold (2012)


Like the last tape we posted, this one is another study in contrasts. When she's not playing bass in the noisy Shematomas, Rena Kozak is playing more subtle guitar pop with Gold, alongside Kaelen Ohm, Extra Happy Ghost!!! Matt Swann and the ever-present boy genius, Chris Dadge.

There's been a bit of (justified) hype around this band, as it was the project that Women's Chris Reimer was involved with when he passed away earlier this year. This is great summertime music - it reminds us in places of the Smiths and New Zealand's the Bats.



We highly recommend downloading "Losing Your Hair" from the band's bandcamp.

Tuesday 10 July 2012

Shematomas - Shematomas (2012)


It wasn't until the second time that we saw the Shematomas that someone clued us in to the fact that the angsty blonde gal in the band used to be the awkward brown-haired gal in Jane Vain and the Dark Matter. The bands couldn't be more unalike, both in terms of sound and Jamie Fooks' hair colour. This tape is three quick blasts of the noisy, angry energy that the Shematomas deal in.

Oh, look! A video!



You can also hear the songs from this tape on the Shematomas' bandcamp.

Sunday 8 July 2012

Open Channels - Open Channels (2012)


We kind of like it when people slip us tapes at shows, but only kind of because then we feel a bit self-conscious and have one of those moments where we're worried that the person giving us the tape used to play in Brass and is going to kick us in the ol' raisins. Thankfully, that didn't happen this time.

However, we're still a bit cautious about posting this, as we're not clear if this is a legit Calgary release. While their Sled Island bio lists them as a Calgary band, it also calls them "Lethbridge's newest powerhouse" (which is pure hyperbole - we've been watching the Lethbridge scene and there's hasn't been much happening there in recent years. Except for Endangered Ape, the Moby Dicks, the Radians, the Ketamines, Stressed Out, Fist City, Myelin Sheaths, the Square Waves... uh.... wait, what were we saying?). Anyways, Open Channels appear to be primarily based in Calgary, so we'll let this slide. We can say, with some degree of certainty, that the band channels (ha! get it? that was a pun! man, we're on a roll today!) the synth pop sensibilities of Jeff King's Square Waves into a slightly more lo-fi direction.

Most of these tracks are available for download from the Open Channels bandcamp.

Friday 6 July 2012

Buicks - Thanks Coach (1995)


Here's another tape that Chris found at Recordland. Again, we don't know a thing about this band or this recording. Other than the fact that it was, apparently, recorded during a bunch of midnight sessions at Sundae Sound. We could tell you a story about another band that used one of those painful 8-hour sessions to record a song that was a minute and a half, but we won't.

Partly because you likely don't care, but mostly because we're feeling lazy.

Wednesday 4 July 2012

Bug Wicked - Bug Wicked (1997)


During Sled Island, our favourite (somewhat nutty) Edmontonian, Chris Zuk, somehow got lost in Inglewood and ended up in the tape section of Recordland (which, oddly, happens to us as well on an increasingly infrequent basis). He emerged victorious with a handful of tapes and not a trace of hantavirus.

The problem is, the tapes that are left squirreled away on the shelves of Recordland are pretty obscure. Who is this band? What is that bug on the cover doing? Should we care?

We don't know. Does anyone?

Tuesday 26 June 2012

Polestar - Demo (1997)


Happy Birthday to us! The CCPS miraculously survived another Sled Island and are marking our fifth anniversary today! That's five years, over 500 posts and an amazing amount of made-up junk about bands we only barely remember seeing/hearing about.

Well, our commitment to high-quality posts continues with this demo from what we think might be a band involving Big Bang Theory's Case Caulfield. Actually, we know absolutely nothing about these guys. Craig Evans gave us this tape and no context. We'd like to thank Craig, regardless of the lack of info.

So, we're going to use this as an opportunity to put a call out to anyone out there with tapes they want to lend us. We're still looking for stuff from Dixie's Death Pool, Fire Engine Red, the Li-150s, and... well, anything else interesting. Get in touch with us!

But for now, grab this and let us know if you know what we don't know.

Monday 25 June 2012

Knucklehead - Live 98 (1998)


So, one more piece of vinyl for you, and then we're lapsing into a post-Sled Island coma. A sly Melodiya employee suggested we buy this a few years ago - we're not sure what this is or where it came from. There's no mention of this on the band's website or their wikipedia entry. We assume this is really Knucklehead from Calgary, and not another of the bajillion other bands out there with the same name.



Apologies for the rip on this - the vinyl on this thing wasn't in great shape. But maybe you don't really care because you've got Sled head.

Saturday 23 June 2012

Field Day - Enough For Two (1994)



Chances are that if you, like us, have a couple of key Calgary compilations from the mid-90's, you have "Enough for Two" in your collection already. At least a few times.

So maybe you want to see the video for it?



And then maybe you want to indulge your OCD and download this single?

Thursday 21 June 2012

Field Day - Hot Wax 7" (1993)


So, today's post is another exercise in excessive collecting. Four years ago, we posted a Field Day tape called Hot Wax, and in the comments someone noted that the tape was a compilation of songs off their 7". We're sure that, since reading that four years ago, you've been waiting with baited breath for us to post the single. Well, friends, that glorious day has come.

Uh, we don't really have much else to say about this. Except that we saw Jonas Smith's Yukon-based metal band last year (or was it the year before? Honestly, time doesn't make much sense to us at the CCPS). It was, uh, metallic.

But you can get one step closer to curing your OCD by grabbing this single here.

Tuesday 19 June 2012

Joker - Not Playing With a Full Deck 7" (1990)



Here's another single that's been sitting in the CCPS archives since ubiquitous bass master Steve Elaschuk donated it to us. Folks really like Joker (especially folks in Europe?), so here's another pack of songs from these guys.

What's news to us is that, according to the Encyclopedia Metallum (which we wish had been on the shelves of our jr. high school library), guitarist Ken Wall also spent time in White Noise/Beyond Possession.

Which certainly would explain these guys' sound.

Sunday 17 June 2012

Wedge - One Too Many (1992)




The CCPS vinyl curiosities continue with this single from Wedge. We had hoped to find a tape by these guys, but never were able to put our fingers on one. So, we're pleased to have this as a more-than-ample substitute. It's a great slab of noisy alt-rock from one of our favourite times - back when Sloth was a record label waiting to become a store.

Get it here.

Saturday 16 June 2012

S.P. Cerra - Sit Tease/Essence 7"



We're rousing ourselves out of our mandatory pre-Sled Island nap to get back to some posts. It's been quiet here at the CCPS - we've managed to return most of the tapes that we've recently borrowed, so we're going to turn to our vinyl collection for a few oddities.

And what better place than this? There's no year on this record, and we're not 100% sure, but we've mostly convinced ourselves that this is a pre-Funeral Factory project - not just because of Mary-Lynn White's presence, but also because of the vocals. Greg Kushner sent us this record a couple of years ago without any explanation.

So, of course, we make up our own.

Sunday 10 June 2012

Lab Coast - Editioned Houses (2012)


Phew! Back to Calgary, just in time for POST #500!!! WOOHOO!!! In your face, other blogs!

Okay, now that we have that out of our system, we want to celebrate one of our current local faces, the low-fi pop masters that are Lab Coast. We truly appreciate Chris Dadge's commitment to the cassette format, one that he's continued with the help of Iowa's Night-People Records. This pinkalicious tape is what Dadge and Laing excel at - understated pop masterpieces in the vein of Sebadoh. Hmm. We're now picturing Laing as Lou Barlow. And somehow it's working.

Anyways, side two of this tape is a bit of a surprise - an experimental, 12-minute track that's more in keeping with Dadge's Bug Incision projects. And, yes, we know we have failed to catalog Dadge's prolific cassette output on here - but that's a rabbit hole that we know we'll never get out of if we start down it. We'll be at post #600 and just have scratched the surface of his recorded output.

You can get this tape at Hot Wax or (presumably) Night-People.

Saturday 9 June 2012

CCPS Miscellany: Pal Joey - Last Chance for Food and Drink (1994)


Okay, one last Edmonton tape, and then back to Calgary. We're going to go with something we actually can pretend we know something about. Kind of.

Pal Joey were a super-talented bunch of folks; their CD, Tennessee Angels, is one of the few Edmonton CDs in the CCPS archives (along with the Slow Fresh Oil and Twin Fangs discs). And we're always happy to have another tape in the collection - so thanks to Natalie from Depeche Ode for passing us this tape. More of the great roots rock we expect from the band on here.

Actually, this post officially makes Pal Joey the Edmonton band with the most coverage on the CCPS. Go figure.

Thursday 7 June 2012

CCPS Miscellany: Unsound - Helen Gone (1993)


So, this trip to Edmonton is growing increasingly random. What is this? Who is this? Why does this matter? We can't even remember how this ended up in the CCPS archive.

We can't wait to get back to Calgary.