Friday, October 08, 2004


It Makes You Want To Spit by Sean O'Neill and Guy Trelford (Reekus).
A to Z guide to the early (77-82) punk scene in Northern Ireland. Excellently researched and put together, no two ways about it, but the ongoing parade of pug ugly people w/ spiky hair and Exploited t-shirts is a bit "too much" for me. That said, there's still enough focus on, for instance, the Good Vibrations label and all the bands who called it home (Undertones, Protex, Victim, Rudi etc.) to make this a worthwhile purchase. Best of all tho' is that fact that I get a mention in the "thank you" list and get mistaken for a representative from Chiswick Records!. All I ever did was be too lazy to answer an e-mail from the authors about a Count Bishops show in Belfast!. Who ever said fame doesn't come easy?.
Robert at the Kiss 'n Run agency, who's setting up the Leg Hounds tour (mentioned below), has plenty more on offer in the upcoming weeks/months: check here for more info.

The Dutch Poster Museum in Hoorn is currently hosting an exhibition of work by Martin Kaye, who was the in-house designer for the Paradiso club in Amsterdam from 1972 to 1983.

Nervous Eaters - Eaterville #1 (Penniman LP).
Beantown alsorans get the redcarpet treatment w/ this solid set of mostly unreleased mid 70s recordings. I hope you're all familiar w/ the Nervous Eaters two late 70s 45s (Loretta and Just Head, both included here), 'cause they easily rank alongside the best work of fellow Bostonians DMZ and the Real Kids. And even tho' there's nothing here that equals those efforts, this set offers a surprisingly good peek into the band's formative years (73-75). You've Heard These Chords Before sounds like a long lost Raw Power outtake while She's Gonna Be My Baby would've fitted nicely on the Groovies' Grease EP and their take on Beautiful Delilah is a parallel universe cousin' to the Count Bishops equally ferocious version from the same year. Housed in a gatefold sleeve with four more pages of liners inside that traces the band's history back to 60s garage combo the Cobbwebs, this comes highly recommended.