Weir - Detached (2017)

Unless something miraculous happens in the next couple of days, this is likely our last post for the year. And given how much of a crushing disappointment the year has been, it's fitting that we go out with this crushing new EP from sludge metal dudes the Weir.

The good news with this tape is that the Weir are still mining the same doomy sound that we've come to enjoy. The better news is that they're getting closer to capturing the sonic onslaught of their live shows. This tape sounds big and meaty - sadly, the stereo in the CCPS offices can't quite match the volume they usually play at.

Get this tape from the Weir's bandcamp.

Funeral Factory - Cold War Isolation Daisies (1989)

We were very sorry to hear of the passing of the Funeral Factory's Greg Kucheran earlier this month. We dug out this CD for a listen, and realized that we had never posted it (we posted the cassette version in our early days).

We're glad we gave this a listen again - we'd forgotten how great Kucheran's voice was. This is a sprawling, majestic work, and we're a bit ashamed that we didn't post the CD until now. Our apologies for making you live with our crummy tape rip for so many years.

Rest in peace, Greg.

Pill Crusher - The First Two Years: Space Brains Cosmonauts (2017)

Ever since Empty Heads called it quits this summer, we've been looking for something to fill that 90's-shaped, grunge pop hole in our hearts, and we think we've finally found just the thing. Pill Crusher play loud and melodic, and we quite like it. There's nothing quite like brutally loud guitars to drive away the self-doubt and loathing. Except bourbon. But that's for another time.

For now, you can grab Pill Crusher's tape via their bandcamp.

Pankbend - Danke Freundlicher Zuhörer! (2017)

While we're not overly-excited about the way that Craig Storm is consistently challenging our cassette storage capacity, we do appreciate the way in which he challenges our earballs. His latest project, Pankbend, is a collaboration with Janitor Scum's Arielle McCuaig, and it's a pretty good thing that kind of defies categorization. Electro pop punk? Maybe? These four songs bounce around from from noise to pop, swathed in synthy pads and bloops.

Highly recommended - and, at the time of writing, cassettes are still available from the Pankbend bandcamp.

Buzzard - Buzzard (1997)

Sometimes things show up in our email inbox with little/no explanation. This is one of those cases. We received an email with a j-card scan, six mp3s and the cryptic text: "Buzzard was a Disciple of Chaos whom after a Chaotic Death emerged from Under the Stares to a wild chorus of Negative Feedback."

So, as we sit here puzzling over what it all means and listening to this blend of skate rock and hard core, we'll direct to you the download.

CCPS Miscellany: Age Of Electric - The Latest Plague (1990)

Thanks to Robert McGregor, we're kicking things back into gear with a release that takes us across our province's eastern border. Sure, Age of Electric were a Regina-based band, but they have some pretty serious ties to Calgary - parts of this tape were recorded here with Shane Connelly/Frank Slide and had a pretty big following here. Especially at the Live Wire.



Plus, in recent years Age of Electric frontman Todd Kerns has been playing with Ian Grant and Reed Shimozawa.

So, instead of over-thinking this, we'll just point you to the download.

Waterbody - Waterbody (1993)

From Body-Body to Waterbody. And, yes, the styles are as jarring as that segue. This tape was passed to us up at Revival Records, and we've been struggling to find any real info about the band. We know Kevin Labcuk was part of the Rip Chords, and this band certainly follows in that band's stylistic footprints, but that's it.

Maybe you can help surface something here?

Body-Body - Body-Body (2017)

While we're talking bodies, let's grab this one!

Over the ten years that we've been running this strange project, one significant thing has changed: we've come not just to appreciate Kamil Krulis, but truly like what he does. Maybe it's over-compensating for 25 years ago when we clearly did not get the El Caminos... but we're really, truly enjoying Body-Body.

If you're looking to draw a line musically from Kamil's other projects, you're in for a bit of a leap. Backwards, even. This is nothing like the short-lived Plastick - it's a direct reaction to the darkwave/goth elements of that band (and so many others right now). Forget the brooding and moodiness of the 80's - there's no room for your skinny jeans and black t-shirt here. Kamil wants you on his 90's dance floor in your pastels and baggy pants. We like to think this is like going up to the Tasmanian Ballroom for a night of dancing, instead of going to a show at the Night Gallery. Uh, not that we ever did that. Often.

So, Kamil has worked his contrarian magic and made electronic music that's fun. And also impossible to find online - the Body-Body bandcamp exists in URL only.

Bog Bodies - Beyond the Blonde Climax (2017)

We keep buying Bog Bodies tapes in the hope that one day we'll get used to their roller coaster of drum machines, processed vocals, guitars that sound like anything else, and random samples. But we haven't.

Still, "Fishnet Gusset Protuberance" reads like a band name that Mark Igglesden would come up with. So that means we're either getting closer or... something.

Looks like the physical tape is sold out, but you can get the download from the Bog Bodies bandcamp.

Chad VanGaalen - Light Information (2017)

Well, here's a thing. When Gene Poole saw that the new Chad VanGaalen album was getting a cassette release, he was pretty quick to pull the trigger and pre-purchase it. That said, we've having a tough time getting him to hand it over to our lead reviewer - Gene's decided that Chad's not from Calgary, but rather living on a completely different plane of existence than the rest of us.

There are a crap tonne of real reviews of this album out there. so we won't waste valuable drinking time re-hashing the obvious. Instead, here's our favourite track.



We will note, however, that VanGaalen's touring band effectively knocks out two of our favourite bands for a chunk of the fall. We can't blame him for taking Ryan Bourne and Chris Dadge with him, but - dammit, it feels like a long time since we've seen Sleepkit or Lab Coast.

Looks like the cassette version of Light Information is still available in the Flemish Eye webstore.

Hugh Man - How Did You Find That Goo? (2017)

Ever go to a show at Tubby Dog, and realize that pretty much all the bands on the bill share one or two members? That was the night we got this tape. Hugh Man has two members in common with Tiny Baby - and they also share a similar aesthetic. Yup, this is another batch of loose and fun songs, most of which you could polka to. Which we suppose makes them fairly distinct from a lot of other bands right now.

Get the download from the Hugh Man bandcamp, while we rearrange our tape shelves to fit all these new cassettes.

Tiny Baby - Tiny Baby (2017)

Tiny Baby is made up of people from a bunch of bands we like - Lunatique, Blu Shorts, and, uh, Singing Lawn Chair. So, of course we like this tape. These are sloppy, loose, fun songs that don't take themselves seriously - we don't think. Hey, we've been wrong before - it's better to pad these posts with a bit of uncertainty.

Get this baby from bandcamp.

Singing Lawn Chair - Never Mind the Buckets (2017)

Finally! Something we've actually seen in the live!

Singing Lawn Chair is (at least live) one person with a keyboard and a drum machine. And a whole lot of introversion. We're trying to find a way to describe this tape that makes sense, and we're struggling - this tape bounces from low-fi guitar-based stuff, to low-fi atmospheric synth pads, to... uh, stuff.

We wish that Singing Lawn Chair had a bandcamp we could point you to, so you could help us figure this out. But they don't. They're playing tomorrow night at Tubby Dog - maybe we'll see you there, and we can talk afterwards to figure this out?

Torture Team - Torture Team (2017)

Here's another impulse purchase from that trip to Blackbyrd - and again a band that we haven't yet seen live. Sheesh, it's like we never leave our office/pit of despair.

Torture Team sits well alongside CCPS faves Aiwass - gothy synths, drum machines, minimalist guitars, and yelping vocals. We've been listening to a lot of CanCon new wave over the past year, and we hear a lot of that influence here (in a good way, 'natch).

Get tortured at their bandcamp.

Erector Set - 2017 Demos (2017)

We picked up this tape as an impulse purchase at Blackbyrd a few weeks ago (pro tip to all you record stores: putting tapes at the counter is a sure way to part the CCPS from its paycheque), and haven't yet managed to catch Erector Set in action. We're pretty sure the band is fronted by PMMA's Ryan Kostel, and we're definitely sure that this is a more straight-up hardcore affair than PMMA. Which means we REALLY want to catch these guys in action.

Get it from the Erector Set bandcamp, if you're too lazy to go record shopping.

Vanta - S/T (2016)

We don't know how this 2016 release by Vanta snuck past us until now. We've seen this trio a couple of times, and recognize their guitarist from Racket. So, imagine Racket was given a whole bunch of amphetamines? That's pretty much what Vanta sounds like - ramshackle bursts of snotty punk.

Get it via the Vanta bandcamp.

Blu Shorts - Blu Wave Music (2017)

Well, now that everything is mostly back up and running here at the CCPS, we're going to get to the big pile of tapes that's sitting in the office.

First up is this one from the recently departed Blu Shorts, a great testament to how good these gals (and guy) were. They pulled the punk of Hag Face into an arty corner of outer space - a mighty fine corner.



Get it from your local record store (maybe?) or the Blu Shorts bandcamp.

Kentucky Fried Chlidren - Unreleased

In our never-ending quest for excess, we have this gem today - which we forgot that we had tucked away. We honestly don't know why we never posted this - maybe because we're idiots?

Anyways, Pat Rae tells us this is the songs from the tape we posted the other day, plus a bunch of other things that were otherwise unreleased, apparently from a session with Brad Simm.

Thanks to Pat for the pictures with the track list for the first 14 tracks. We'll let you make up titles for the rest of this.

Kentucky Fried Children - Another Heavy Metal Massacre (1994)

Well, nothing like a new tape to drag you out of the painful loop that is relinking nearly 1000 posts.... Pat from Kentucky Fried Children got us this tape, something folks have asked for over the years, but we've never been able to get our hands on.

Good things come to those who spend their evenings relinking posts, we guess.

Interstellar Root Cellar - Interstellar Root Cellar (1997)

Almost six years ago, we posted a tape of alternate mixes of this, Interstellar Root Cellar's first CD. Good things come to those who wait - we've got the actual CD now!

And, as is becoming de rigueur, a VOX article from December 1997!

And, as (almost) always, a download link!

Curse of Horseflesh - Burning Up the Jade (1997)

We were listening to thee fantastic (yet, terrifying!) sounds of Baron Mark Von Frankenstine and his exceptional Radio Free Transylvania on CJSW a couple of weeks ago, and couldn't quite place a very familiar song. Was it Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet? The Ramblin' Ambassadors? The Sadies? Nope, it was the one and only Curse of Horseflesh.

In its lifetime, Roto-Flex put out two CDs. We already posted Nothing Beats a Royal Flush, and considering our love of all things Al Charlton, it's weird that we didn't post this as well.

Hey, would you believe we have a VOX article to go with this post? From March 1997, even!

Yeeha! Or something.

Forbidden Dimension - Widow's Walk (1997)

Today's narrative continuity is being provided by another band we've covered ad nauseum. So, off to the March 1997 issue of VOX!

Huh. Looks like VOX was all Forbidden Dimensioned out as well.

And like our last CD, we're going to point you elsewhere for the download. FD has joined the 21st century and got themselves a bandcamp!

Puritans - Marquee Themes (1997)

We might as well hop from a soundtrack to a band whose members have recently gone on to making soundtracks of their own. Yeah, we're grasping at straws for some sort of narrative continuity here, but earlier this year Bob Keelaghan put out a set of tracks from his score to the films Intersection and Inside the Ku Klux Klan.

We've talked about the Puritans (formerly Shoutin' Abner Pim and the Puritans) a lot here at the CCPS (most recently on what is probably the final installment of our Unspooled podcast), so we'll hand things over to the September 1997 issue of VOX:

We're skipping the usual download link for this one, since you can still get this via the Shoutin' Abner Pim website and CDBaby.

Various - Kitchen Party (1997)

We've been sitting on this CD for a while - it originally came to us via the former proprietor of Golden Rock. It's been years since we saw Kitchen Party - our memories of Gary Burns' second feature-length movie are super sketchy - and we barely remember the soundtrack.



The soundtrack is an interesting mix of bands - Calgarians like the Soft Tips, Bittermen and Knucklehead mix with some of our favourite non-Calgary bands from the 90s, including Sianspheric, Tristan Psionic and the Posies' Ken Stringfellow.

Get it here.

Earthquake Pills - Autodidactaphone (1997)

It kind of makes sense to follow up a post that invokes the Primrods with one that invokes Wagbeard. In our minds, anyways. Oh, yeah. We basically already posted this thing,albeit in cassette format. So what? Here we go - although this one takes us back to the days when VOX was its larger newsprint format.

Pop the pill!