Saturday, September 06, 2008

THE MINCE MEDALLIONS

Hi folks, can't be arsed writing a big pre-amble tonight, just wanna get this stuff upped and kick back on the couch. So, without further ado...
Following on from their debut 1984 "Valhalla" 7" which was posted last time, here's the Desolation Angels album. Let's pick up their tale after the 7"'s release : Desolation Angels self financed numerous club dates and scores of adverts in the Metal press before eventually signing an album deal with Bulleon Records in late '84. However, the record company went bust prior to the self titled album's release and as a consequence the band had to fight long and hard to retrieve the master tapes. The album eventually surfaced on Thameside Records in 1986, although DESOLATION ANGELS parted company with drummer Adam Palfrey late in the year before deciding upon trying their luck in Los Angeles. A later incarnation of the band included OVERDRIVE drummer Richard Parish, and he completed the line up in time to record the five song "Fury" demo in 1987. More from Desolation Angels next time, for now, bask in the awesome power of this LP, it's a 24 karat keeper.

DESOLATION ANGELS - Desolation Angels (1986) UK

http://rapidshare.com/files/141134931/DESOLATION_ANGELS_-_Desolation_Angels__UK-1986_.rar

To Scandinavia for our next item, a very heavy, yet melodic, band from Horsen in Denmark, PRETTY MAIDS was formed in 1981 by guitarist Ken Hammer (a.k.a. Kenneth Hansen) and originally started off as a THIN LIZZY and RAINBOW covers band, but soon progressed to their own material. The opening formation saw Hammer joined by ATTICA bassist John Darrow (a.k.a. Johnny Møller) and drummer Phil Moorheed (Henrik Andersen). The following year the group was brought up to full strength with the recruitment of frontman Ronnie Atkins (Paul Christensen), second guitarist Pete Collins (Jan Piete) and keyboard player Alan 'Stevie' Owen (Allan Nielsen). PRETTY MAIDS' first demo, recorded in late 1982, featured 'Shelley The Maid' and 'City Lights'. A few months later a second demo was cut, with the tracks 'Children Of Tomorrow', 'Fantasy' and 'Warchild'. Other demos included the 'Heavy Metal' session and 'Rave On', the latter comprising of 'Cold Killer' and 'Bad Boys'. These demo tracks were released by the Stoke-On-Trent based Bullet Records as this six song self-titled Mini LP in Britain, during October 1983. P.A.R. Records in North America and Fingerprint in Denmark released the record in early 1984 with different cover artwork. Not long after the 'Pretty Maids' mini-album appeared, PRETTY MAIDS secured initial dates in Britain supporting fellow Bullett act LE GRIFFE on a club tour in 1983. Much championed by 'Metal Forces' magazine supremo Bernard Doe, the act quickly gained a major deal with Epic in Denmark.

PRETTY MAIDS - Pretty Maids Mini LP (1983) Denmark

http://rapidshare.com/files/141144895/PRETTY_MAIDS_-_Pretty_Maids_Mini_LP__Den-1983_.rar

To the US of A next, Flynn was a sextet from California that should have achieved a lot more than it did. They played amazing heavy/power metal with AOR keyboards in the vain of RAZORMAID, RUFFKUT, LIXX & DIRECT TOUCH. Their only release was this incredibly rare self titled EP on Shontod Records released in 1985. The vocals of Mike Jensen and guitars of Evan Todd are just perfect both for fans of power metal & AOR and you won't find a weak song on this EP.

FLYNN - Flynn EP (1985) USA

http://rapidshare.com/files/141148349/FLYNN_-_Flynn_EP__USA-1985_.rar

If you download nothing else from tonight's selection, make it this next one, regardless of your musical taste, this one'll scratch your itch. The guiding fire behind the latter-day PINK FAIRIES, a founding member of MOTöRHEAD, and a house producer during Stiff Records' first flash of maverick brilliance, Larry Wallis is one of the legends of the British rock underground, an astonishing guitarist, and author of one of the classic singles of the era, "Police Car." He blazed across MICK FARREN AND THE DEVIANTS seminal "Screwed Up" EP in an age when Angry Young Man-style guitar was valued above any other musical attribute. Larry played angrier (and younger) than virtually anyone you could name. Wallis' pedigree reaches back to the early '70s, and a roll call of his bands includes the ENTIRE SIOUX NATION, SHAGRAT, BLODWYN PIG and Hard Rock heroes UFO, before he joined the PINK FAIRIES in time for their third (and finest) album, "Kings Of Oblivion". The band broke up following its release and, in 1975, Wallis reappeared in MOTöRHEAD, a move that the guitarist unhesitatingly describes as preordained: "It was just as if the serendipity fairy had arrived, Lemmy had been imprisoned in HAWKWIND and was now flexing his leathern wings.... It just had to be." Together, Wallis and Lemmy alchemized one of the hardest-hitting bands of the entire pre-punk era, and the handful of shows that the group played during this period was nothing short of the absolute revision of all that had taken place before. Certainly their label of the time, UA, was absolutely baffled by the band, sending them into the studio, before deciding that nothing the band did was actually marketable. The band was dropped from the label and the tapes were buried in a lead-lined box, figuratively if not literally. And they remained there until MOTöRHEAD became late-'70s superstars, and suddenly anything with their name attached seemed eminently saleable indeed. "On Parole", titled after one of Wallis' compositions, was finally released in 1978 and has been available ever since. Wallis departed MOTöRHEAD around the same time as they were dropped and, through early 1976, he led a revitalized PINK FAIRIES lineup around the London club scene as it lurched from pub rock to punk. By late summer, the FAIRIES had signed with Stiff Records and released the single "Between The Lines," the label's second-ever release, but with a sense of timing that they had long since perfected, the group announced that this moment of triumph was the ideal time to break up. Wallis remained with Stiff, recording this record, the "Police Car" 7"with HOT RODS/future UFO bassist Paul Gray and drummer Steve Nicol for release in spring 1977. He also produced the first two singles by THE ADVERTS, including the Top 20 hit "Gary Gilmore's Eyes," and became a star turn on the autumn 1977 LIVE STIFFS tour of Britain. Billed alongside IAN DURY, NICK LOWE, ELVIS COSTELLO, and WRECKLESS ERIC, he took the stage with an all-star band dubbed the PSYCHEDELIC ROWDIES, the "Live Stiffs" album includes an absolutely incendiary "Police Car", which i've included here as a bonus track, bumping the running time up to EP length. Wallis began work on a solo album in early 1978, recording with Deke Leonard, Big George Webley, and Pete Thomas, but record company politics saw the record shelved (it remains unreleased) and Wallis moved on. Further stints alongside MICK FARREN were interspersed by gigs with the MC5's Wayne Kramer. A mid-'80s PINK FAIRIES reunion was bookended by Wallis' own bands, THE DEATH COMMANDOS OF LOVE and THE REDBYRDS, while Wallis finally released a solo album, "Death In The Guitarafternoon" in 2001.

LARRY WALLIS - Police Car EP (1977) UK

http://rapidshare.com/files/141136888/LARRY_WALLIS_-_Police_Car_7____UK-1977_.rar

We go Down Under now for this 45, "Television Addict", from 1977 was the first & most entertaining offering by Perth Australia's short-lived The Victims, the earliest recorded project of the youthful Dave Faulkner, later of HOODOO GURUS. The playful and poptastic old-school garagey-punky songs here are very enjoyable if you're not averse to such things. A-Side "Television Addict" is a furiously classic stomp along about the perils of the goggle box, and was later covered by THE HELLACOPTERS. The other side, "(I'm) Flipped Out Over You", is more frantic again, but retains the bands knack for spitting out ridiculously catchy choruses. Nowadays you're lucky if a whole album has anything half as essential as these two songs. You need this in your life. Remember, if you enjoy this one, you'll also find it's follow up, the 5 song "No Thanks To The Human Turd" EP was posted here a while back too.

THE VICTIMS - Television Addict 7" (1977) Australia

http://rapidshare.com/files/142901936/THE_VICTIMS_-_Television_Addict_7____AUS-1977_.rar

For the next one, i'm quoting the band's mainstay, he tells it better than i ever could. "RITUAL were formed in 1972 by myself, Gypsy Re Beth, as a three piece rock outfit with Phil Mason and John Gaster, all pros with track records. We were all from London and knew each other from school. In the early 1980's we released the album "Widow" and the single "Into The Night/Burning" which was frequently played by DJ Alan "Fluff" Freeman. I did lots of radio stuff including interviews with Tommy Vance who played the whole album to six million listeners on the BBC world service. Further albums, "Gypsy" [1983] "Never Look Back"[1984] "Cry In The Night"[1986] "Lady Night" [1987} and "Daughter Of Joy"[unreleased], and finally "Valley Of the Kings" [1993] with the single "Naisha" and an accompanying video. Unfortunately John Gaster died in 2001 so I decided to wrap it up, although I had already been working under my name for some years. All this material, which was written by me, will be coming out repackaged under the name Gypsy Re Bethe. I have now released 3 singles and we still work as a three piece and its going fine." One of the finest NWOBHM 7"'s, here's "Into The Night".

RITUAL - Into The Night 7" (1981) UK

http://rapidshare.com/files/139843004/RITUAL_-_Into_The_Night_7____UK-1981_.rar

For our last item tonight, we remain in Blighty, but the year this time is 1984. After the eventual demise of Surrey's popular STATIC in the early months of 1983, mainman Noel Jones decided that he wasn't quite finished in the music business. While his erstwhile colleagues from the last STATIC line-up proceeded to form the AOR-friendly SNOWBLIND, Jones envisaged a rather more ambitious project. Within a year or so, he had teamed up with a new set of accomplices to form WHITE LIGHTNING, a band with a slightly more progressive edge to their music. After finding their feet and recording a couple of early demos, the quartet decided to release their own single. Issued on their own Wild Party label in 1984, the record featured "This Poison Fountain" and "Hypocrite", two numbers which showed the venture to be following the path of earlier acts such as SHIVA, CANIS MAJOR or BIG DAISY, carving a technical, semi-progressive niche for themselves, this being at a time when RUSH-influenced music was finding little favour amongst those in the music industry.This single was a fairly remarkable debut, with confident arrangements and original lyrics and the outfit were delighted with the favourable reaction from the rock fraternity.

WHITE LIGHTNING - This Poison Fountain 7" (1984) UK

http://rapidshare.com/files/141138544/WHITE_LIGHTNING_-_This_Poison_Fountain_7____UK-1984_.rar

Wrap your ears 'round this little lot and let me know what you think, i'm off to park ma arse in front of the telly and have a cuppa. More soon. Over and oot!

17 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I went over to Denmark with Bernard Doe to see Pretty Maids seem to remember 220 Volts supporting . We where friends with their manager Ken Antony.At the time Bernard had just started Metal Forces, running it from his living room in Stevenage.

Sunday, September 07, 2008 12:30:00 AM  
Blogger sleyja said...

This comment has been removed by the author.

Sunday, September 07, 2008 12:40:00 AM  
Blogger sleyja said...

Thanks for the Larry Wallis and the Victims. Great stuff!!!

Sunday, September 07, 2008 12:41:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hey dude,Larry Wallis solo lp was released as Pink Fairies Previously Unreleased lp by big beat in the early 80's.
Nice to see someone appreiciate mr wallis.
You dont by chance have the impossible to find Leather Forever single do you.
cheers
Stu
http://mrstu616.blogspot.com/

Sunday, September 07, 2008 4:53:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Pretty Maids and Desolation Angels are 2 old favorites. One of the best Xmas presents I ever got was a copy of the DA LP.
A single by Ritual...sweet chicken biscuit! Spank my cheeks and call me Rosy! I had no idea this existed, let alone that it contained 2 killer tracks not on the 'Widow' LP. 'Into the Night' is an instant classic; a catchy tune with wailing guitars and a great backbeat. The instrumental version of 'Burning' (my fave tune on 'Widow') is a great rendition that's different enough from the LP version to make it really interesting. Forget the live Heavy Load material- THIS is your coup de grace find!
FYI, both 'Widow' and 'Valley of Kings' have just been reissued on Shadow Kingdom Records (very nice label). My copies are in the mail; the cover artwork is very nice. They are under the RITUAL name, not GYPSY RE BETH. Don't know if the rest of their catalog is being released as well or not. It's always been tough getting accurate info on this band, and tougher still finding someone that's seen copies of those albums, much less owns them.
Does anyone have info about the review of 'Widow' that supposedly appeared in Kerrang? Such a review is mentioned in Malc's nwobhm encyclopedia, but I've never found anyone that can provide an issue number or what was stated. It would make an interesting read; I'm guessing the band was mistakenly identified as WIDOW in the review since that's how they are cited in Malc's book. Thanks for any more info (or posts!) about this enigmatic band.

Tuesday, September 09, 2008 12:19:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Belated thanks for posting the Heavy Load in the last post. Wasn't too familiar with these guys, but really enjoyed what I heard...a good slice of nwobhm-styled sounds (from Sweden, albeit). I've since tracked down their other releases on the blogosphere and I'm really digging it...maybe they're release these lost gems officially someday. But thanks for exposing me to these guys...certainly a worthy add to my classic metal collection.

Friday, September 12, 2008 5:05:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Thanks as always. The Police Car single is awesome. Ritual-- very cool, never even heard of those later 80s LPs the guy mentions. The Flynn is nice, and the simple logo cover and AOR leanings remind me of a band called "Hyts". They had an album out in 1983. I owned the cassette, but it is long gone, leaving me with 4 tracks I had put on a "party tape" years ago. Anyone heard of these guys? Lighter than the heavier Flynn songs, they were like a non southern Duke Jupiter, especially the singer. I can post the 4 songs I still own, if anyone is interested.

Friday, September 12, 2008 6:25:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

ATTN BIGFOOTKIT I have a few obscure things that might be of interest for this blog. They are mostly of the Mystik Krewe Of Clearlight vintage and style, not sure if that fits what you want. Please let me know how to contact you without posting in the comments section, so I can give you more info. I don't want to step on anyone's toes. best wishes, Ron

Friday, September 12, 2008 6:41:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hi man, greetings from Brazil; congratulations for wonderful blog and i immensely thank for the amazing work of distribution of music of quality made for its blog. Please i'm looking for ultra-rare 1977 hard rock album BADGE & CO - BADGE AND COMPANY; help me. Cheers

Sunday, September 14, 2008 10:24:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hi
Can you please please re- up the PERSIAN RISK single " CALLING FOR YOU ""
Chers
Fantastic site !!

Sunday, September 14, 2008 2:29:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Many thanks for the great mini album
by Pretty Maids.

Nils

Sunday, September 14, 2008 4:18:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

These links contain links to multiple rapidshare files containing the complete collection of albums from the artists. Enjoy!!

The British acts:
The Who - http://rapidshare.com/files/137992752/TheRealMe.rar
Led Zeppelin - http://rapidshare.com/files/138343704/Taurus.rar
Rolling Stones - http://rapidshare.com/files/145864413/PaintItBlack.rar
The Beatles - http://rapidshare.com/files/146155098/Yesterday.rar
Eric Clapton - http://rapidshare.com/files/143678773/BellbottomBlues.rar
Elton John - http://rapidshare.com/files/147412012/SomeoneSavedMyLifeTonight.rar
Pink Floyd - http://rapidshare.com/files/145439666/PigsOnTheWing.rar
Yes - http://rapidshare.com/files/146556487/Roundabout.rar
Rod Stewart - http://rapidshare.com/files/147123280/ManchesterUnited.rar
Faces - http://rapidshare.com/files/147123280/ManchesterUnited.rar
The Alarm - http://rapidshare.com/files/137766976/BlazeOfGlory.rar
Cream - http://rapidshare.com/files/143220447/SunshineOfYouLove.rar
Paul Kossoff and Free - http://rapidshare.com/files/136314044/WhatCouldThisBe.rar

And more:
Aerosmith - http://rapidshare.com/files/139492222/JudgesConstipation.rar
Boston - http://rapidshare.com/files/139514080/JustAnotherBandOutOfBoston.rar
J. Geils - http://rapidshare.com/files/139794130/WoobaGooba.rar
The Cars - http://rapidshare.com/files/139889249/LetTheGoodTimesRoll.rar
Billy Squier - http://rapidshare.com/files/141577246/InTheDark.rar
Til Tuesday - http://rapidshare.com/files/143201216/VoicesCarry.rar
Aimee Mann - http://rapidshare.com/files/145497936/ImWithStupid.rar
Extreme - http://rapidshare.com/files/147161087/ExtremelyGood.rar
Pixies - http://rapidshare.com/files/147186100/PixieDust.rar
James Taylor - http://rapidshare.com/files/141576918/MudSlideSlim.rar
http://rapidshare.com/files/141693331/Taylor__James.part6.rar

Tuesday, September 23, 2008 11:46:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Love it!
Small prob- the More single's link (Nov 2007) doesn't work....
Requests from me:
Baby Tuckoo - First Born,
Quartz - Against All Odds,
Spider - Raise The Banner (For Rock & Roll),
The Grip - Be Yourself.
Cheers for anything and everything!

Sunday, September 28, 2008 8:15:00 AM  
Blogger slim tim slide said...

regarding the larry wallis post - great stuff BUT the solo stiff lp is NOT the same as the 'previously unreleased LP at all. I know because I have the unreleased stiff lp in its entirety and have released parts of it on three seperate CDs. name;y Son Of Ham and Hogwatch - for a few rashers more both put out to support the fairies magazine UHCK. for further info e-mail me at slimtimslide@hotmail.co.uk

there is a version of leather forever on the stiff lp different (though very similar) to the single release, one of larrys finest moments. i also urge you to buy 'death in the guitarfternoon through larry's own website, its brilliant! lazza isliving the life ofa hermit and needsa kikup the ass to get going again. I was supposed to be support act (along with the Brian Jam4s gang) at the roundhouse gig that never was about three years ago.

Sunday, August 23, 2009 5:19:00 AM  
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Wednesday, February 10, 2010 4:00:00 PM  
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Tuesday, August 17, 2010 1:57:00 AM  
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