Posts Tagged ‘Cassette’

Homunculus Equinox

datePosted on 14:46, August 24th, 2007 by Strangely

Code: FOETUS 0001

Homunculus Equinox expanded cassette cover A Foetus Cover Up! - original cassette format (somewhat worn!) Homunculus Equinox C60 casstte - Side 1 Homunculus Equinox C60 casstte - Side 2

What’s Your Noise


Fuel For The Blonde Ethiopian


Taste Of Honey

A fairly straight rendition of a classic. Loads of 7th’s.


Mummy’s Tummy

Doomage creation with Mackie vocals. I don’t think we ever did it live.
Fast flanged vocals, fuzz bass, large depth VCA’d keyboards. Pretty daft. More a vehicle for Mackie to relieve himself of some bizarre fantasy.


Valium B

School hymn reworked - why not?

Paul sung. The rest is normal Crawling Chaos fiddling. We did have plans to do a few more as a package to upset the “Songs of Praise” mob.


Ashen

Ashen fay-ace!

Basic structure was a Doomage invention, worked up by the other band members.. Single note keyboards on top with bass & drums. Unusual musical phrasing. Haircut words. The words in Ashen are based on Haircut and Holly’s observation of the bartender in a pub in Backworth called “The Deuchars“. The barman had really greasy, lank straight hair that clacked when he bent over to collect empty glasses. The Deuchars pops up in a few places. We never did get the Dyke Neuk fitted in anywhere. Anyway, it’s too posh now.

Ashen was in the set for quite a few years.


Tom’s Bum (There’s)


Stinging Gnats

Doomage inspired. The essence was to have each instrument do a closely related, simple and repeating phrase, each on a different time signature but in the same key. Every so often the music is in phase and true harmony. This is broken up with a standard block chord middle eight prompted by Gazza on drums so each “verse” is of indeterminate length, done on the nod.

This was in the set for years.


Heavy Lovin’

E.F.S. -which nobody can deny, which nobody can deny.

Heavy metal piss-take. Includes all the usual crap like riffs, solos, namings. A key part of the sound was Strangely’s use of a long hallway at “The Pits” with a cheap guitar amp at one end and a mike at the other. This was the Echo Chamber. Strangely gave it a go after reading how studios did echo in the old days.

The live feed was fed through the amp and re-injected into the mix from the mike. Then this was continuously varied to get a live feel of the audience moving around and the PA mixer guy constantly battling against feedback. It is exactly what gigs sounded like at the “Mayfair”, Newcastle in the 70’s. They’re still doing it now in the pubs round here. Anth played on this and thought it was real.


The Mongolian Steak Bar

Strangely created. Comes from the verse intro of the Rod Stewart song, “If You Think I’m Sexy” mated to a few key Rachmaninov key changes. Fizz guitar works but Holly’s bass doesn’t. I just don’t think it should be a bass guitar, that’s all. Will redo bass part with a breathy bass saxophone and low bass keyboard rumbles.

When this tune was named, the name seemed pretty wacky. Since then there has been a Mongolian Restaurant down on the quayside in Newcastle for some years. However, at the time of recording, you went down “The Side” to the Quayside at night in pairs at least and there were only the “Crown Posada” and my auntie’s pub, the “Newcastle Arms” right under the Tyne Bridge. The back alleys were really dodgy. Now they are trendy housing developments. You should see it…


Voedoux

Joint creation of Doomage and Strangely. Each had virtually the same effects. Importantly, a VCA/VCF with separate input and output for the internal LFO VCO. Also, a VCA fuzz box so that an input voltage would modulate the degree and tonality of fuzz.Each persons VCO LFO output was connected to the other’s VCA/ VCA-fuzz input.
Then the VCO speeds were set to be close but not exact so that long period beat frequencies were initiated. The input sensitivities were turned right up to amplify internal noise. Then the outputs were sent through the mix with lots of cross-echo for each heavily panned source and a bit of extra bass to get a better thump noise…It is a helluva good rythmn. The plan was to do loads more like this. Percussion and screeches/shrieks were added on top to add a bit more atmosphere. The name is a pseudy rendition of Voodoo, pronounced the same.


Tell Me Why


East Of West Allotment


Suck


One More Peso


People

datePosted on 00:04, August 5th, 2007 by Strangely

Crawling Chaos & Foetus Products Personnel, Helpers & Liggers, including those on Parallel Projects and Others Mentioned in the Text.

Nom de Son Common Name Instruments Other Info Key Phrase, Act or other noteworthy thing
Strangely Perfect Martin Rees Keyboards, vox, sax, washboard, engineering, composition, electronics,
construction, producer
Beer and mushrooms. Produced home-brew which was “quite drinkable” Chose the name “Crawling Chaos”. On the green tape.
Doomage Khult
(Vex Drongo in Thee Earnest Kakas)
Jeff Crowe guitars, keyboards, vox, sax, cellophane, engineering, composition, electronics,
construction, producer
Beer and mushrooms

TEK

Drank 1 litre of warm, stale chip fat. Agreed “Crawling Chaos” was a good thing and we should do it. On the green tape.
Davenport Haltonberry or Holly David Halton guitars, composition, mixage, vox, additional sounds Beer and stuff. Arrived from “Nothin’”

TEK

Hairy mole on neck (still!). Famously berated “A Certain Ratio” as “A Certain Pair of Tights” to shut them up.
Mister Excess Clinka, or Gazza Garry Clennell drums, composition Beer and cider. Clinked a lot due to habit of staggering fully loaded up stairs with cider bottles. His mother had their dead pet dog in restaurant freezer for a time (Alice’s Restaurant in Whitley Bay). Under the frozen chips.
Gordon Douglas Smith TEK TEK In Thee Earnest Kakas
Macky Robert Macdonald vox on Mummy’s Tummy Argumentative nazi type designed cover for “The Big C” and early artworks and photography and cover for Homunculus Equinox cassette
Straight Dave (Cookie) Dave Cook Bass Left before output to public domain got one neat riff right off that I taught him.
Too straight for words
Steve Smooth Steve Smith Bass Left before output to public domain Knew when to leave.
Too smooth for words
***** Anth Chester Vox, guitar,synth and jamming gets annoyed when he’s not called “Anth” or if you mention plasterering. Lent out house for second major studio location. Is “suck” voice
Ligger (Curly) John John Smith Is the self immoliator on the Homunculus Equinox cassette sleeve (Foetus
cover up sticker censors area)
More Beer! nae scran! Sucked in by key phrase “I feel, like a suicide’s death-bed” on Urbane Encounter at first gig at Bridge Hotel. Famously berated Joy Division calling them Joyce repetitively till Curtis cracked. Fan and devilled kidneys supplier
Errol Dynamic Eddie Fenn Drums, composition beer and pile ointment Shagged my sister. Enabled flat for first studio (”Sex Machine” recorded there.) Said “are you tonkin’ Caroline now?”. Pretty obvious really.
Billy Connolly Howard Titchmarsh Accidental drinker of piss. Narrator of “The Baseball Bat Battle of North Tyneside”
George George Linton Drums, composition came from Freak Electrik to help out
Bingo Gareth Kingsley Marshall bass and finger snips Bingo’s dad, Alec Bedlington Marshall, did the Waqqaz artwork cracked his head falling off his bike
Macho Johnson Mark Johnson Hung around a bit in the early days. Keeps appearing on photos.
Hippy Mick Mick Paterson Driver and dope fiend. Still probably hasn’t had his sacks emptied by
Chrissie.
Haircut Paul Shields vox, scrumpled cellophane on “One More Peso” Sniffed a lot. Immaculate powers of observation. When asked why he was puking, he replied “I thought everyone was doing it”.
Sally Sally Wilson occasional vox. Performance.
Trube Susan Truby occasional backing vox
Keef Keith Wear drums on early efforts. Drums used by Errol Dynamic until they were “nicked” Left before output to public domain (basically not a very good drummer) Cycles. On the green tape.
Hippy Jeff Geoff Kennedy Drove van quite a bit, usually smashed. Set up infamous all-night biker gig at deserted abbey on banks of River Wear. Ended up nicking all our mushrooms and then getting locked up in Durham Jail for a long time for dealing, man.
Bryan Sowerby Bryan Sowerby Drums,composition Even bigger nose than Holly (says Holly) ex “The Noise Toys” & The Hostages.  Drums on Waqqaz.
Dave (Weirdbeard/Pipsqueak) Dave Pipkin Drums,composition Supported Brian May as part of STAN at Newcastle City Hall
Rob Pybus Rob Joiner Guest Sax Solicitor for Inglejew, Bottrel, Roache and Pybus. Sax addict.  Called to the bar.
Spug Andy Douglass bass Played bass at last gig (Belgium).  Talented fucker who could play anything. Last heard of driving at 50mph in a lorry
Yeti Darren Yates drums TEK He’s a great artist. In Thee Earnest Kakas

* Nothin’ - Nothin’

** TEK - Thee Earnest Kakas

Music

datePosted on 00:04, August 5th, 2007 by Strangely

Content not on Normal Releases, so far.

Major releases are on the main menu system.Other Works, not part of the major releases will appear below as Strangely gets round to them..

All works will appear here soon enough. This is a variable mix-down blog so different mixes may appear periodically. (Strangely Perfect)

Title
Description
Full-Length Sample and Information
Gygno Final article appears on The Big C. This pulled from a test tape. More or less the final cut except with Paul Shield’s original vocals. They weren’t right so Strangely Perfect did vocals for the vinyl release which can be heard here. Compare and contrast!
Yoni Suchon Live version from same set as Sex Machine (below) This is pretty close to the original way the track was played. The later version on Waqqaz has several (obvious) structural differences to this. It’s a quite powerful piece of stuff.
Sex Machine Live version recorded without bass & drums This is part of an hour long live cassette tape that is almost worthy of being issued as an LP in it’s entirety despite the quality and despite the odd mistake and despite the gaps and despite the odd error in mixing and despite the odd tape drop-out. Remocarpet with Jeff singing his lyrics is astounding…
- I’d forgotten how good we were and we could be.This version is straight from tape without any processing and “features” the irregular breaks in the chorus appearance that were an original feature but had to be dropped to make it easier for the drummer.It’s the best explosion I ever made at the end. You can hear the inner anger on that day.
Doo-Hoo Original called “Sue” in bootleg form or Belgium cassette tapes releases. This is
it’s correct title.
Pits recording featuring Strangely and Clinka. Unfinished as is. Little boy lost vocals. Needs different bass fill and some blanket keyboards.
The “sound” of the piece is deliberate. Strangely wanted really spaced out backings with a voice really right in the middle of your face, too close for comfort. A bit like walking alone on cliff-tops in a fog, singing a tune so that it’s hard to place distances and perspectives correctly and then coming upon someone so that their voice is out of synch with the surroundings. Much like the tenor of the HP Lovecraft tale “The Crawling Chaos”, or something.
Spit Not standard issue Recorded in The Pits. The usual suspects are performing. Standard Strangely clean-up.
Zombie Dance Found on Homunculus Equinox as strange short tune before
East of West Allotment.
This track was played many times in live situations. It was probably one of the tunes that upset Adam Sweeting so much. Twat. Er..live at the Golden Eagle in Blyth. The Zombie Dance bit was used on Homunculus Equinox but speeded up 4x, and it’s part of a longer continuous sequence finishing with “Mary Whitehouse” (see below).Performers are Fatso, Doomage, Strangely and Holly - who got paid as he was just starting and had a kind of contract. We soon sorted that out and he was taken on full time so didn’t need paying. Wahay!
Zombie Dance Part of Zyclon B Zombies onstage performance accompaniment Zyclon B Zombie performance at Newcastle University containing blood, guts,shouting,Bacchus and several specially recorded tracks by Doomage and Strangely. This is one.
Zombie Dance => Mary Whitehouse Recorded live on cassette at The Golden Eagle, Blyth, Northumberland This is the above bit more or less complete. Shame about the quality. The tapes are starting to disintegrate and this is the best clean-up I can manage for now. It’s basically a trade-off between heaps of hiss and heaps of extra audio artifacts.The second version (added 18/12/7) uses HarBal (Harmonic Balancing) mastering software to hack in at the eq. I’ll come back in a couple of days after my ears are rested and delete the duffest version.Mary Whitehouse was a standard punk-ish tune that was never released but was part of the set at this time which went something like this: slow track - fast track- slow track- fast track etc sometimes with big gaps and sometimes rolled into a continuous melange.

Discography

datePosted on 00:04, August 5th, 2007 by Strangely
This includes the Foetus Products stuff. (the two thousand and oh’s CD releases by LTM are a melange of FAC17, FACBN6, FOETUS 0001 & FOETUS SR0001)
Major Release

Code

Format

Track Titles

Sex Machine

FAC 17

7″ Vinyl 45

Sex Machine

Berlin

Gas Chair Clown (released as The Gas Chair)

FACBN 6

12″ Vinyl 33

Macabre Royale

Creamo Coyl

Left Hand Path

Guinness

Arabesque

Harry

Disierta Membra

Canadian Pacific

Breaking Down

Homunculus Equinox

FOETUS 0001

Cassette

What’s Your Noise

Fuel For The Blonde Ethiopian

Taste Of Honey

Mummy’s Tummy

Valium B

Ashen

Tom’s Bum (There’s)

Stinging Gnats

Heavy Lovin’

The Mongolian Steak Bar

Voedoux

Tell Me Why

East Of West Allotment

Suck

One More Peso

Sinews Are A Girls Best Friend (The Blonde Etheopian)

FOETUS 0002

7″ Vinyl 45

Neep Heeds

Throwing Pins

Reel 1

Nothin’

Horse Bath

I Got Loofahs

Not Transferable

The Last Pose (Danger In Paradise)

composed by A Chester (all)

Foetus SR0001

Cassette

The Last Pose

Shadow

A Moment Of Sanity

Death Is…

That’s Life

Danger In Paradise

Block Numbers

The Ritual

The Hymm

Laughing Jam - Smoke Rings

The Big C

Foetus 3

12″ Vinyl 33

Gygno

Urbane Encounter

Wee Jimmy (Part II)

Worms

The Katrina Syndrome

Friends

Jhonn’s Angel

The Vulva Boatman

Fraüline Le Moîne

D.S.S.

Skaill

WAQQAZ

Foetus 4

12″ Vinyl 33

Remocarpet

1078-1082

Oh Blasé

Fatso Died And Likes It

Trouty Hobin

Comrade Dolphin

Reg Vase

The White Sybil

Yoni Suchon

Curling Sandwiches

Netwilf

Bosumptwi

I Must Be Ambidextrous (I Can Smoke With Both Hands)

Comrade Dolphin (Reprise)

Me

Running Order

TBA

Sex Machine

Arabesque

Harry

Fuel For The Blonde Ethiopian

The Mongolian Steak Bar

Neep Heeds

Throwing Pins

Urbane Encounter

Worms

The Katrina Syndrome

Like a Hurricane

Friends

Oh Blasé

The Prick

Merry Christmas, Prince Charles

All I Need is a Love that Burns

Hurt

The Outsider

Newspapers

Tsunami

The Minehead Song

Under the Sea

I Feel a bit Frightened

I Should Have Known Better

Riding on a Cloud

Paralized Paradise

Doo-Hoo

Mary Whitehouse

The Pied Piper of Seghill

Wobbly Jellies

Zombie Dance


Order From Chaos