Beastie Boys – Def & Dumb Interview Disc (Remastered) (CD 1996)

I’ve been rediscovering the Beastie Boys recently in anticipation of reading Beastie Boys Book, the memoir written by the two surviving members, Ad-Rock and Mike D. I noticed that the unofficial interview disc Def & Dumb (1996) was not available online so thought I’d upload it. After giving it a quick listen, however, I found that the sound quality was laughably poor; there’s a lot of tape hiss and at times the conversation is barely audible. Thank goodness for Audacity; I opened the .wav, removed most of the tape hiss and applied compression to the track in order to balance it out. The result is that you should be able to listen to it without having to adjust the volume every 30 seconds.

Not that you probably will want to listen, unless you’re a hardcore B-Boys fan. Recorded on their 1987 tour of the UK, it’s not a particularly interesting interview. They mostly talk about things unrelated to their seminal debut, License To Ill, and there’s some pretty unfortunate homophobic slurs thrown around (something the group would apologise for in later years). That said, there are a few amusing stories to be heard and the 30 minute running time goes by pretty fast.

Download (320 kbs mp3)

Yeah God! – So Far Down E.P. (Vinyl rip – 1988)

So here’s the last of the Yeah God! vinyl I own, which ironically according to the catalog number was actually their first single on Chapter 22. There’s an air of optimism on this E.P. which I definitely wouldn’t associate with the band, with tracks  titled ‘Love Is Like The Sun’ and choruses singing “Lift up your head and say that tomorrow will be a better day”. OK, so one of the tracks (the best one) is called ‘Eat Plutonium Death’, but the other tracks sound like Blink-182-ish uplifting skate-punk. So yeah, not my favourite release by the band but it’s not terrible either. Just a bit too conventional (verse, chorus, verse, chorus, solo, chorus) and optimistic to be the same band who would frequently use samples and pitched-down vocals and went on to record “Everything’s Not Fucking Irie, Man“.

Track list

01-So Far Down
02-Look Better Gone
03-Eat Plutonium Death
04-Love Is Like The Sun

Download

Yeah God! – Sumo E.P. (Vinyl rip – 1988)

Yeah God!’s debut release on Chapter 22 records. Title track Sumo On My Back is a storming tune, mixing rap with thrash and some chanting thrown in for good measure! Used To Even Care brings the death growwwwwls found on their excellent debut LP. The E.P. finishes with Beast In The Box – a ludicrously fun satire of rock cliches.

01-Sumo On My Back
02-Used To Even Care
03-Halitosis Girl
04-Hypocrite Carnage
05-Big Bad Noise
06-Beast In The Box

Download Here!

Gaye Bykers On Acid – Live @ Indie Daze 3, O2 Forum, Kentish Town (2016-10-01)

Gaye Bykers On Acid made their triumphant return after 25 years apart last month on their Electric Banana tour which concluded with a gig at Indie Daze 3 this past Saturday. The band were absolutely on fire delivering arguably the best set of the day. Although I never got a chance to see them during their original run (because I was like 5 years old), I’ve listened to many, many bootlegs and this weekend they played tighter than I’ve ever heard them. The set included songs from their earliest EP right through to their final work as PFX. Much thanks to Stef Cunningham for this excellent recording. Newcastle and Leicester recordings to follow!

1. Intro
2. TV Cabbage
3. Delirium
4. After Suck There’s Blow
5. What Happened To Malcolm?
6. Git Down
7. All Hung Up
8. It Is Are You?
9. Shoulders
10. Better Off Dedd
11. Disinformation Rise and Shine
12. Hot Thing
13. Rad Dude
14. Face At The Window
15. Everythang’s Groovy
16. Nosedive Karma

MP3 Download

Update – 03/01/17 – Download removed, please purchase from the GBOA Bandcamp page.

 

Gaye Bykers On Acid – Live @ Reading Festival (1989.08.25)

Gaye Bykers on Acid were the opening band for the main stage of Reading Festival 1989. Relegated to a 30 minutes they manage to storm through a set of mostly ‘new’ songs from their 1990 album Cancer Planet Mission. Two interesting inclusions are slightly different versions of Face at the Window and Bleed the latter having an extended outro. Fairway To Heaven feels like it goes on forever – I assume there was miscommunication between the band! Sound quality is pretty good, especially for an outdoor show, but sadly there’s some chewed tape during one or two songs.

Set list

1. Shoulders (starts part way)
2. Face At The Window
3. Advertise
4. Welcome, Cancer Planet Mission
5. What Happened To Malcolm?
6. Bleed
7. In The Lyrics
8. Catalytic Converter
9. Fairway To Heaven

Download

 

Swamp Delta – Live @ The Dublin Castle, London (2016.04.30)

Here’s another Swamp Delta bootleg courtesy of Stef Cunningham. Fantastic, energetic live performance and great set list including tracks from their ace debut album ‘Sick Liver Blues‘ and songs by their former bands, Crazyhead and Gaye Bykers on Acid. Dig it!

Set list

01-Running From The Island Of The Dolls
02-Bitchin’
03-Out On A Limb
04-The Hanging Man
05-Heavy Water
06-(Here Comes) Johnny
07-Talking to the Girls (on St 51)
08-Hot Thing
09-Neon Flag
10-Sick Liver Blues
11-Ballad Of Baby Turpentine
12-Shoulders
13-What Gives You The Idea That You’re So Amazing Baby_
14-I Don’t Want That Kind Of Love
15-Everythang’s Groovy

Download here

 

Crazyhead Live @ Town and Country Club, London (1989-03-16)

First post in 4 months – life has been rather hectic lately!

Here’s a live recording sent to me by Stef Cunningham of Crazyhead at the Town and Country Club (currently the Forum). It was recorded after the release of their debut Desert Orchid, prior to the release of their second LP Some Kind of Fever. Very good set list of songs from both those albums and a few b-sides thrown in for good measure. The band are on fire, but there’s a lot of echo/reverb from the venue (which I’m told is very common for gigs recorded at the T&CC!).

Setlist

1. What Gives You The Idea That You’re So Amazing Baby?
2. I Can Do Anything
3. Buy A Gun
4. I Don’t Want That Kind Of Love
5. Tower Of Fire
6. Rags
7. Train
8. Jack The Scissor Man
9. Have Love, Will Travel
10. Fish
11. Here Comes Johnny
12. Cardinal Phink
13. Rub The Buddha
14. Rome
15. Dragon City
16. Time Has Taken Its Toll On You
17. Bang Bang
18. Baby Turpintine
19. Out On A Limb
20. Screaming Apple
21. Fortune Teller

Download link

Yeah God! – Noizgasm (Vinyl LP rip- 1989)

Released on Chapter 22 records in 1989, Noizgasm explodes with heavy metal riffs and raw growlllllllllls. It storms along at about 400 bpm with The Buzzard (who featured on PWEI albums and wrote the riff for The Prodigy’s track “Their Law” which also featured PWEI) shreading his guitar like a mad man. Expect lots of heavy riffing, dive bombs, samples (I spotted the beat from “She Drives Me Crazy” more than once!) and a tongue-in-cheek sense of humour. A great LP to bang your head to.

Edit (12/08/16) Paul from the band had this to say re: the recording of the album –

Some good (and bad) memories of the making of this album … The funniest (story) I remember is that we had traveled to the studio under the impression that it was a residential place that fed the band too. Why we thought that on our budget I’ll never know! So inevitably we arrived with no food or even much cash. Towards the end of the album when we were surviving one piece of toast and Marmite each per day Pete’s (the owners) wife took pity and us and fed us ‘proper food’ ! bless her! I’ve been good friends with Pete ever since – nice guy.

Download here.