| Author | Message | ||
     Greg Adams Member Username: Greg_adams Post Number: 7 Registered: 06-2005 |
Instead of continuing to hijack the "Other Criminally Ignored Aussie Bands" thread, I started this thread for a discussion of all things Crabstick. First, regarding the suspicious Feel Good All Over catalog I mentioned previously... At some point, the "indie community" became aware that lots of people were sending money to FGAO and getting nothing in return. IIRC, Option Magazine published some letters on the subject. Soon after the crush of bad publicity, FGAO sent out a new catalog that blamed their order fulfillment problems on the post office. A phone number was provided so that people who sent money but didn't receive their stuff could call and get it resolved. At the same time, buyers were invited to send yet more money for items that did not actually exist, including Crabstick's Discoverooster CD. I called the phone number several times but there was never an answer, so I left voice mail messages that were never returned. A cynical person might say that the catalog was merely a ruse to solicit more free money, but who knows? Years later, Discoverooster appeared (vinyl only) on 555 Records. I'd like to know how that came about. The back cover of the 1997 Crabstick LP From Measles to Seagulls says that Varispeed Records in Australia was going to release Discoverooster on CD in 1998, but that fell through. What happened? Another mystery raised in the previous thread is: Why did Henderson destroy a Crabstick 7" that had already been pressed? And what was on it? | ||
| david nichols Member Username: David Post Number: 55 Registered: 09-2004 |
Greg, We should probably discuss these things privately, since I am sure no-one else cares, unless they like a funny/bizarre independent record industry story, which I guess is often worthwhile for itself. To clue you all in, two of my bands in the early 90s were involved with an independent record label based in Chicago, first called Time to Develop and then Feel Good All Over. It was run by a guy called John Henderson. FGAO did put out a lot of good records - I think the last release was Sally Timms' album - the full catalogue would be a difficult one to figure out, since as Greg says there were a lot of things 'released' that were never really released. The Cannanes originally got involved with FGAO via K records, who came close to releasing our second album but then entered into an agreement with FGAO and then let FGAO have us entirely. We were quite happy with this because John was such an engaging and interesting guy with a lot of contacts and imagination. A lovely guy, really. The Cannanes went to the US to tour, our first international tour, we went on the road with the marvellous group Scrawl (who John was managing at this time I believe). John was full of great stories, obviously a huge music fan, obsessive almost, he was very generous (early on in The Cannanes/FGAO's relationship he sent me a big box of amazing records, including some rare Alternative TV singles, a great Fish and Roses record, etc - just things he had lying around!). By the time we got to the states he had released our second album and paid for us to record a third in Sydney which was always days from coming out. This was the beginning of the weirdness, because even though he was always saying 'oh, the CDs will be in Boston when we get there' they never did show up, and in fact the CD didn't come out at all for another year or so, clearly demonstrating that the whole story that they were on the verge of being pressed was a lie. Very strange. As far as C'stick was concerned, we paid for the first album to be recorded, and John offered to release it as a vinyl LP. This must have been about 1991. He then said he would issue a 7" (songs were 'Prunes' and 'Pumpkin', for what it's worth!) and we duly sent him tapes, cover art etc. This was in production when he sent us some money (I can't remember how much but it was enough to go into a real studio) to record a second album, which we did. Sent him a DAT. Never heard from him again. Subsequent information on JH is scanty, but the following are facts as I remember them: 1. Stephen and Fran from the Cannanes once forced him - through a kind of sit-in - to return master tapes of one of the albums 2. He pressed the Crabstick single and then threw them all in a dumpster, according to my informant, he sat around laughing about the fact that the band would never know the singles had existed 3. I later heard from a friend of his that John was set to inherit an enormous sum of money when he was 30 (or some similar age) which explained a few things - that he was kind of biding his time and slumming it en route to the good life being plopped in his lap, that he didn't really have to make a go of anything in the meantime... you know. Anyway, I'm sure most of the GoBs fans here aren't that hungry for more information on this topic Greg but I will email you off-site in case you want to know more. DN | ||
| Jeff Whiteaker Member Username: Jeff_whiteaker Post Number: 81 Registered: 10-2004 |
i obviously can't speak for everyone else here, but i certainly find this all pretty interesting. and to think the go-betweens often got the short end of the stick with labels... this is pretty appalling. | ||
| Jeff Whiteaker Member Username: Jeff_whiteaker Post Number: 82 Registered: 10-2004 |
ack, i accidentally posted that before finishing. i cannot multi-task. i meant, this is so bad it makes what the go-betweens experienced with labels seem like a fun time. | ||
| Greg Adams Member Username: Greg_adams Post Number: 8 Registered: 06-2005 |
David Nichols wrote: "Stephen and Fran from the Cannanes once forced him - through a kind of sit-in - to return master tapes of one of the albums." Those would be the Love Affair with Nature tapes, I assume. I was privy to some of the cloak-and-dagger behind that exchange. Then the tapes went to Tim Adams (no relation) for reissue on Ajax. I also remember waiting and waiting for Caveat Emptor to come out, and what a bizarre situation it created for the band when it finally appeared and the "new" album had been recorded so long ago. Of course, that was nothing compared to the wait for Discoverooster. FGAO was a pretty influential little label in its day. Ajax, in particular, took a number of cues from it, and it had a reciprocal relationship with K. At one time or another, FGAO was home to the Cannanes and Crabstick, obviously, but also to the Magnetic Fields, Alternative TV, Stuart Moxham, Fish and Roses, DQE, Scrawl, the Mekons, and Barbara Manning. It was an early proponent of New Zealand music with records by Alastair Galbraith and the Terminals, but didn't pursue that niche very aggressively. So, if don't object to continuing in this forum... What happened to the anticipated Verispeed CD release of Discoverooster? | ||
| david nichols Member Username: David Post Number: 56 Registered: 09-2004 |
I barely remember the Varispeed thing. A guy in Brisbane who had a lot of big ideas about putting out records - he said he would put out the Prunes/Pumpkin single (this was, of course, five or so years after the band had broken up) and then he disappeared off the face of the earth, as well. I don't recall him ever talking about releasing the album but he may have. Of course, by this stage, and inasmuch as 'we' were a 'we' (Danny and James were living in New Zealand by this stage) we were happy for anyone to put these things out as it would only be a footnote to our existence really. While I appreciate Jeff's encouragement of this thread, and while I am sure that as a self-contained story this does make for interesting reading (actually a few years ago I wrote a 60 000 word memoir of my times in indie music/mainstream music journalism, which all occurred at the same time - late 80s-early 90s), this was a whole different ballgame to the GoBs' careers - this was happening at the level of 'indie' where some guy can say one afternoon 'Hey, I'm going to start an indie label!' and by the end of the day muster an empire of forthcoming classic releases through his friends and groups he loves... it's all part of the fantasy... there is a great degree of mutual backscratching in that kind of indie scene and people tend not to respect any boundaries (I guess a lot of people think the point of 'indie' is there should BE no boundaries). What it often boils down to though is people wanting to get in with a certain crowd and seeing the way as being 'I run a record label' but either not really appreciating the work involved (particularly I'm guessing the social and interpersonal negotiations) or the way indiedom generally is a license to flush your money down the toilet. The GoBs never had to deal with this stuff because although they may have been at the top end of 'indie' some of the time they at least since Rough Trade days were always dealing with people who expected and intended the relationship to bear some kind of financial fruit, however much it might be talked about as a labour of love. That said, at the level of existence Crabstick had (bunch of guys on the dole or in low-pressure jobs, played around Sydney for about 18 months, had a lot of fun, wrote some good songs, in-jokes, created good content for future anecdotes etc etc) it was hardly a situation of anyone putting their life on the line for the good of art. No-one starved in a squat for 5 years, at least, not for the sake of a music career. | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 43 Registered: 03-2005 |
What an interesting thread! Losing the master is what would kill me. If somebody ran off with a master I'd done, I'd have a hard time getting over it. | ||
| Greg Adams Member Username: Greg_adams Post Number: 9 Registered: 06-2005 |
David, regarding the motivations behind indie labels: I think they are often well-meaning attempts at building communities (or what cultural studies types might describe as consumption communities) around the solitary activity of listening to recorded music. There's practically never any money or glory in running a tiny label, but small label operators get the opportunity to promote something they like and participate to a small degree in the music culture. Some labels, such as Blackbean & Placenta with its ridiculously low prices, are clearly hobbies and/or labors of love. I work on mainstream music reissues now, but I sometimes miss the world of "deep indie" music. The enjoyment of it was on the level of making mix tapes for friends, or visiting a message board and finding the handful of people who share some of your offbeat interests. Crabstick was one of the ultimate "collector scum" bands in that all of its albums were released only on vinyl during the CD era, in what I assume were small quantities, and sold mainly through mailorder on the strength of reviews in obscure magazines and catalogs. And yet, several labels at one time or another were willing to release Crabstick's music. Was that because of grandiose fantasies or because the music was good and indie labels provided an intimate alternative to mass culture? I'd prefer to believe the latter. Speaking of excellence in music, David's drumming in Crabstick and the Cannanes was responsible for creating the musical sub-genre known as "shambling." (Was Michael Nichols' Shambling Mounds a reference to that?) The "Nichols beat"--as distinctive as the Bo Diddley beat--turned up on a lot of indie records thereafter. | ||
| david nichols Member Username: David Post Number: 57 Registered: 09-2004 |
Last night my wife Mia and I had dinner with Randall and Carla of Ashtray Boy. We talked a bit about Henderson, inspired by this discussion. They said that entering JH's apartment was a minefield as you never knew what you were going to step on - an envelope full of cash, a cheque for some order that was never going to be filled, original record cover art, etc. As far as Carla's concerned (and this fits with what I know of him) JH was not exactly a crook, except by default - he was just unbelievably disorganised - to the level, I suppose, of being virtually dysfunctional. This reality is very difficult to reconcile with a warm, funny, interesting person. Re: Shambling - Greg is too kind and I am not going to accept responsibility for creating a sub-genre of anything, good or bad. On a related topic The Shambling Mounds was not my brother's band but a trio led by my now sadly dead friend Sean Keogh. I believe they took their name from a role-playing game and may not ever have considered the connection to a 'shambling' sub-genre. Re: collector scum - it might have turned out that way in a sense but Crabstick were never wilfully obscure in any way - we produced a lot of material in a short time and tried hard to get it heard in many different ways - in essence if there's any obscurity there it started with JH and FGAO; the second album was recorded by the time the first came out, and our progress was somewhat impeded by this state of affairs, but it was always going to be a short-term proposition anyway. We had no adherence to a pro-vinyl position - this was just what we were offered. In '91 or whenever the first album came out, vinyl did not seem an obscurist option. The later releases were vinyl-only because that's what the people who released them insisted on, and by that stage it hardly mattered, the band didn't exist anymore. Re: indie fantasists. I don't wish to tar every indie label with the same brush. I had some bad experiences with people I took on their word. That's common in every field and to almost every one, and (however it might have appeared) I am not bitter or sad about it, anymore. I like to think I have a realistic attitude to my own music career, such as it was/is. It's funny that Blackbean and Placenta are brought up as an example of 'labor of love' because, as much as I have a great regard for Mike, he's a really lovely guy, I and others close to me have had some very strange interactions with him! Not so much with the Crabstick record but some others I was involved in. But whatever. He is a great guy. I like the community building idea, I'd never thought of it like that before. I think it's going to be really interesting to see how all this translates into internet delivery of music over the next few years. | ||
| Donat Member Username: Donat Post Number: 50 Registered: 11-2004 |
Crabstick were a great band, true- Ugly at Six is a fun tape to play in the car. I wish I knew where my LP of 'Stud or Houseboy' was. If anyone can direct me to a copy of that record, please pop me an email. How about Blairmailer? 'Home of the Falcon' which is almost like a rock opera about Danny Butt is a great little album. | ||
| Greg Adams Member Username: Greg_adams Post Number: 10 Registered: 06-2005 |
David wrote: It's funny that Blackbean and Placenta are brought up as an example of 'labor of love' I don't know Mike Landucci--I was referring to the fact that he sells B&P releases for as little as a dollar. He can't be making much money at those prices, which would make the label either a hobby or a labor of love...or an egomaniacal fantasy, I suppose. As for the "Nichols beat," you can hear an antecedent to it on the drum intro of Tommy Roe's "Sweet Pea" from 1965, but David's contribution was to ratchet up the twitchy energy and clatter. I forgot about Home of the Falcon I remember that as being a languorous sort of album, but I haven't heard it in years. | ||
| david nichols Member Username: David Post Number: 58 Registered: 09-2004 |
BB&P might be a labour of love, actually I'm sure it is, but it has also on occasion been the conduit for appallingly mastered releases, including one I was involved in that featured the same track twice for no discernible reason. Having met Mike since that time I'd pretty much forgive him most things. So, there's nothing wrong with egomaniacal fantasies OR labours of love - I don't really care what people's motivations are - except when the artists end up with a crappy product, or no product at all - surely you'd agree Greg? The ideal label as far as I was concerned was Ajax. Tim would only put out stuff he was committed to and liked, he was efficient, he had contracts, he was fun to be around and he had integrity. And the other bands on the label were fantastic - I felt really at home on Ajax along great bands like Furtips, the Mountain Goats, the Renderers, and many more. | ||
| Greg Adams Member Username: Greg_adams Post Number: 12 Registered: 06-2005 |
I agree wholeheartedly. Shoddy product is bad. I'm sure you know, but Tim's still plugging away (albeit in a reduced capacity) with Three Beads of Sweat. He seems to be picking up speed again, though. I don't know what the indie mailorder market is like anymore. The number of indie labels exploded in the '90s, creating a tremendous glut of product. There are still plenty of indie labels, but--now that we have file sharing and CD-Rs--there may never again be so many different labels at one time producing factory-pressed discs and vinyl. | ||
| Jeff Whiteaker Member Username: Jeff_whiteaker Post Number: 86 Registered: 10-2004 |
David Nichlols said, "While I appreciate Jeff's encouragement of this thread, and while I am sure that as a self-contained story this does make for interesting reading, this was a whole different ballgame to the GoBs' careers....." Oh, believe me, I know! For some odd reason I felt compelled to draw some sort of comparison, however loose and desperate it was. But yeah, I've been very much in the thick of exactly the kind of scene-y indie label stuff we're talking about here. From my experience, almost all of the people who ran these indie labels were trust-fund kids. So, they had money to burn, which they did with wild abandon. And it seemed to me that the primary motives for starting a label were, A. to get an "in" with a particular niche indie-scene and gain some sort of hipster cred, and B. to score with chicks. And from what I saw, it usually worked. And from there they would release singles, LPs and CDs of their friends' bands, and if they could fluff up their roster enough with side projects and one-offs, then they'd roll out the obligatory comp, which always seemed really low-budget. The level of orangization varied wildly. Some were horribly disorganized and maybe only focused (and blew all their money) on one band, others clearly bit off more than they could chew (one label, which my band Sushi was on, was rumored to have filed bankruptcy after putting out way too many records that they couldn't sell). But yeah, all you had to do was look the part, say you were gonna start a label, and in a matter of time, you were king of the scene. It was as if in this scene, you created your own little world, and nothing else outside mattered. It didn't matter that outside of a few hundred people tops, no one knew or cared who the hell you were. All that did matter was that you were on a hip label, and your cds were being distributed in Japan (another strange pre-occupatoin of the particular scene we found ourselves in). In the end, it was way too cliquey, fashion conscious, and vacuous to want to keep hanging out with these people, but it was definitely interesting from a sociological perspective. Many of the bands consisted of trust-fund kids too. I don't know why this kind of indie-pop attracted so many rich kids, but their socially awkward demeanor and general vapidity tended to be off-putting. It was also annoying how every label was bent on using Sarah records as its model. | ||
| david nichols Member Username: David Post Number: 63 Registered: 09-2004 |
Jeff, I see I have found a fellow sufferer in you. I have never heard the term 'trust fund kids' before but I can imagine what this means. I didn't know too many of the label people I dealt with that well so I wouldn't want to generalise about their financial position but certainly there's a particular kind of attitude of entitlement that often went with the people I was dealing with. As has been pointed out, of course there are a lot of hard workers in the field as well and people with an unusual degree of commitment. Look at Guy Blackman, who runs Chapter Music here in Melbourne - someone with tons of integrity. Tim Adams who I've mentioned. K - I've always had masses of respect for Calvin. I suppose there is also an element of hypocrisy of me being so critical of labels as I've created and killed two in the past. I had a label called Distant Violins in the mid-80s as an offshoot of my fanzine; five singles released, three of them Cannanes singles. And then about 5 years later the Frock label - two albums and a single, four cassettes then a single and an album planned that never happened because I ran out of money. Funnily enough Mia and I are presently running a little operation called Jacana Records with two releases to date - but this is a different thing really - just an outlet for work by us and our friends, created after both the US record companies we recorded for died, and running on a very low-key basis. |