C86 Show - Indie Pop

Danny B Harvey in conversation with David Eastaugh

DANNY B. HARVEY was born in Killeen, Texas and at the age of 6 moved to Catlettsburg, KY. where he first picked up and started playing the guitar. At the age of 15 after moving to Canyon Country, CA. he was fortunate enough to receive his first formal lessons with the great JOE PASS.

Feeling out of place (after all he had only moved away for rural KY. two years earlier) and anxious to make a name for himself he moved to England with LEVI DEXTER after only years of study. Danny soon developed a finger picking guitar style that is very unique and based on his idol MERLE TRAVIS, CHET ATKINS, JOE PASS and his classical-technic he learned at USC.

As a guitarist, producer and composer Danny has played and recorded with such great artists as Levi Dexter, Tim Polecat, Johnny Ramone, Nancy Sinatra, Lemmy Kilmister, Lee Rocker, Slim Jim Phantom and Wanda Jackson

Lenny Kaye - Patti Smith, Suzanne Vega & author of Lightning Striking in conversation with David Eastaugh

As musician, writer, and record producer, Kaye was intimately involved with an array of artists and bands. He was a guitarist for poet/rocker Patti Smith from her band's inception in 1974, and co-authored Waylon, The Life Story of Waylon Jennings. He worked in the studio with such artists as R.E.M., James, Suzanne Vega, Jim Carroll, Soul Asylum, Kristin Hersh, and Allen Ginsberg. His seminal anthology of sixties' garage-rock, Nuggets, is widely regarded as defining the genre.You Call It Madness: The Sensuous Song of the Croon, an impressionistic study of the romantic singers of the 1930s, was published by Villard/Random House in 2014

Simon Fisher Turner in conversation with David Eastaugh

Simon Fisher Turner is an English musician, songwriter, composer, producer and actor.

After portraying Ned East in the 1971 BBC TV adaptation of Tom Brown's Schooldaysand roles in films such as The Big Sleep (1978), Turner rose to fame as a teenage star in Britain when his mentor, Jonathan King, released Turner's eponymous first album on UK Records in 1973. For a period of two years Turner was a member of The Gadget and also joined The The. He has used several names as a recording artist, including Simon Fisher Turner, The King of Luxembourg, Deux Filles and Simon Turner. He continues to record albums for Mute Records as Simon Fisher Turner.

The Crazies with Bi Marshall in conversation with David Eastaugh

The Crazies - A Simple Vision LP

The legendary session from members of The Outsiders, The Sound and Honolulu Mountain Daffodils. released for the very first time Overseen by Adrian Janes and remastered by Nick Robbins with sleeve design and artwork by Bi Marshall

In December 1978 Pete Williams, later to achieve cult infamy as Lord Sulaco of the Honolulu Mountain Daffodils, decided to realise a notion which he’d long kicked around with some of his musician friends.  This was to record some original songs for which he - who had never been in a studio in his life – would provide the lyrics and sing.  These friends were the Outsiders, at that time consisting of Adrian Borland (guitar, vocals), Graham Bailey (bass) and Adrian Janes (drums), plus an increasingly regular guest player in Bi Marshall (clarinet).  (A year later, Janes having left, the Outsiders became the Sound.)

Faust with Jean-Hervé Péron in conversation with David Eastaugh

Faust formed in 1971 in the rural setting of Wümme. They secured a recording contract with Polydor and soon began recording their debut, Faust, which sold poorly but received critical acclaim for its innovative approach and established a devoted fan base. Meifert was sacked shortly afterwards because, as Peron wrote in 2004, "he discussed things, because he had flat buttocks and an absolutely beautiful girlfriend, because he practised every day, because he always kept his room neat and woke up every morning to first wet a cloth he'd put in front of his room to keep the dirt out, because he played such a hard 4/4th that we had to travel into the tongue, ready to drop, ding dong is handsome top."

In 1972 the band recorded its second, slightly more accessible album So Far. Faust became one of the premier bands in the international appreciation of the genre that would eventually be known as krautrock.

Zal Cleminson - The Sensational Alex Harvey Band & Orphans of Ash - in conversation with David Eastaugh

A self-taught guitarist, at the start of the 1970s he played and recorded with the Glasgow-based band Tear Gas. The musicians in that band then provided the backing for Alex Harvey in The Sensational Alex Harvey Band (SAHB). Cleminson was an extremely distinctive stage presence with SAHB owing to his white-face mimemakeup. He started wearing the mime makeup when the band started playing larger venues, so they could see what he was doing on stage easier. Cleminson has said "The mime face came about with bigger gigs - more people could see what I was up to".

Graham Bailey - The Sound, The Crazies, Outsiders & Second Layer - in conversation with David Eastaugh 

Note: THE CRAZIES - A SIMPLE VISION LP

The legendary session from members of The Outsiders, The Sound and Honolulu Mountain Daffodils. released for the very first time Overseen by Adrian Janes and remastered by Nick Robbins with sleeve design and artwork by Bi Marshall

In December 1978 Pete Williams, later to achieve cult infamy as Lord Sulaco of the Honolulu Mountain Daffodils, decided to realise a notion which he’d long kicked around with some of his musician friends.  This was to record some original songs for which he - who had never been in a studio in his life – would provide the lyrics and sing.  These friends were the Outsiders, at that time consisting of Adrian Borland (guitar, vocals), Graham Bailey (bass) and Adrian Janes (drums), plus an increasingly regular guest player in Bi Marshall (clarinet).  (A year later, Janes having left, the Outsiders became the Sound.)

The Sound were formed in South London in 1979 from the remnants of the punk band the Outsiders. The original lineup of the Sound consisted of Adrian Borland (vocals, guitar) and Graham Bailey (bass guitar), both ex-Outsiders, along with Mike Dudley (drums) and woodwinds player Bi Marshall (born Benita Biltoo). While not a member, ex-Outsider Adrian Janes would contribute ideas and co-write lyrics to the Sound's music.^[1] Borland and Bailey also made up the band Second Layer, formed around the same time as the Sound.

The Crazies with Adrian Janes in conversation with David Eastaugh

New album on Optic Nerve - A Simple Vision

The legendary session from members of The Outsiders, The Sound and Honolulu Mountain Daffodils. released for the very first time Overseen by Adrian Janes and remastered by Nick Robbins with sleeve design and artwork by Bi Marshall.

In December 1978 Pete Williams, later to achieve cult infamy as Lord Sulaco of the Honolulu Mountain Daffodils, decided to realise a notion which he’d long kicked around with some of his musician friends.  This was to record some original songs for which he - who had never been in a studio in his life – would provide the lyrics and sing.  These friends were the Outsiders, at that time consisting of Adrian Borland (guitar, vocals), Graham Bailey (bass) and Adrian Janes (drums), plus an increasingly regular guest player in Bi Marshall (clarinet).  (A year later, Janes having left, the Outsiders became the Sound.)

With no prior preparation other than Williams writing a set of lyrics (reputedly all based on newspaper stories), he then hired Elephant Studio in London for a day’s session.  This was engineered by Nick Robbins, later to produce the Sound among others, but at that point at the very start of his career.  This was no bad thing, since he was as open to the bizarre working methods of the Crazies (named after the George Romero sci-fi horror film) as they were innocent of their strangeness:  improvise a song during one run-through, record it, and then move on to the next one, each to be created in the same way.

This extremely efficient method left enough studio time after recording six songs for the rest to head off for something to eat, while Williams scribbled lyrics for a final composition, ‘When We’re Dead’, which was recorded upon their return.

The surviving members (Bailey, Marshall and Janes) all recall this as one of the most enjoyable and relaxed sessions they were ever part of.  The same experimental freedom and warped humour can also be heard in the albums Williams and Borland made as the Honolulu Mountain Daffodils a decade later.

 Cassette copies of the resulting album were produced for all concerned, and it seems that there was an idea of making it more widely available in this format, but this was never to occur.  It is only now that, with the original tape rediscovered, that the Crazies’ ‘A Simple Vision’, mastered by Nick Robbins, can at last be perceived by the wider world.

The Woodentops with  Rolo McGinty in conversation with David Eastaugh

The band formed in 1983 in South London with an initial line-up of Rolo McGinty (vocals, guitar, formerly of The Wild Swans and The Jazz Butcher), Simon Mawby (guitar), Alice Thompson(keyboards), Frank DeFreitas (bass guitar), and Benny Staples replacing Paul Hookham (drums).

After a debut single, "Plenty" on Food Records in 1984, which received a glowing review from Morrissey in Melody Maker, they signed to the independent label Rough Trade Records, releasing a series of singles in 1985 and their debut album, Giant, in 1986. Generally well received by critics, the album's sound was characterised by acoustic guitars, but also featured accordion, marimba, strings, and trumpet sounds. The album reached No. 35 on the UK Albums Chart. A single from the album, "Good Thing", reached No. 7 on the UK Indie Chart.

The band then became more experimental and frenetic when playing live, using more electronicsounds. This first became apparent as documented on the live album Live Hypno Beat (1987), which was recorded in Los Angeles in 1986. The band also started to become more 'raw' and unpredictable live, becoming one of the most exciting independent groups from the UK, while gaining an early hit on the burgeoning club scene in Ibiza with '"Why".

Mark Stewart in conversation with David Eastaugh

The Pop Group are an English band formed in Bristol in 1977 by vocalist Mark Stewart, guitarist John Waddington, bassist Simon Underwood, guitarist/saxophonist Gareth Sager, and drummer Bruce Smith. Their work in the late 1970s crossed diverse musical influences including dub, funk, and free jazz with radical politics, helping to pioneer post-punk music.

The group released two albums, Y (1979) and For How Much Longer Do We Tolerate Mass Murder?(1980), and the singles "She Is Beyond Good and Evil" (1979) and "We Are All Prostitutes" (1979), then split in 1981. Its members worked on a variety of subsequent projects, including New Age Steppers and Rip Rig + Panic. In 2010, the band reunited, touring and releasing new material.