Post-Punk Monk

Yet More Band Shirts That This Monk May Need…

Posted on July 30, 2025 by postpunkmonk

Every 80s album era of Spandau Ballet is represented here

Just when we were poring over the tour shirts that we had sold off many years ago, we got a missive from the Spandau Ballet mothership alerting us to a set of t-shirts from every album they released in the 80s. Their classic canon as rendered in cotton and silkscreen. This is significant, because I never got the chance to see Spandau Ballet live.

Oh, we had tickets in our hand, once! Their “Parade” tour was touching down in Tampa as the opening act for the [unfit to launder their shirts] Robert Palmer-free Power Station [featuring this guy singing!], in the spring of 1985. My friend Jayne was deep into her Spandau Ballet phase. We’d loved “True” and while I felt that “Parade” was more [yet paradoxically, less] of the same sauce followign three radically different albums, I was still all-in on seeing them live. The “Live Over Britain” viddy was the artifact that turned me around on their merit. And besides, they would have to perform “Chant No. 1 [I Don’t Need This Pressure On]!” Surely the best song ever written, yes?

But someone forgot to tell Steve Norman, their sax player and utility infielder deluxe, and when he broke his leg, that was it for the big US tour. Embittered, we plotted grandiose plans of vengeance yet retreated to our Record Cell to mutter imprecations beneath our breath while awaiting the next big thing instead. Besides, in 1985, I surely would not have bought whatever t-shirts were on sale at their merch table. As I was deep into my “no-t-shirt” phase that lasted from 1980-1990.

But that was then and this is now! In the ensuing 40 years I’ve only seen my awe and wonder at the “I-still-can’t-believe-they-released-that” “Diamond” album of 1982 grow beyond my wildest imaginings. In 1985, I owned one copy of it. A cheap, used US LP I probably paid $3.00 for at Murmur Records! Fast forward 40 years and I own:

US LP
UK LP [w/hype sticker + posh textured sleeve]
UK 4×12″ Boxed Set
JPN LP [w/obi] [Yes, I am the person who entered that one into the Discogs database!]
US CD
UK 2xCD DLX RM [2010]

…And I’d own more if I could! When Spandau Ballet dangle a “Diamond” t-shirt in front of my widened eyes, of course I’m going to want one very badly! My love for this album is in reverse geometric proportion to the millions more who [foolishly] turn their noses up at this not terribly successful album. And then there’s the other five albums as well.

So the facts are that these shirts will be shipped on August 18th, and are currently in pre-order status on the band’s webstore. Does that mean that they are printing to order [fiscally a smart thing to do] and once they ship we are all out of luck? Possibly. I don’t have the answers, but better safe than sorry, I say. The shirts are priced more kindly than if we were to buy them at the merch table, I think. And given that Spandau is on ice right now [and for the foreseeable future] there probably won’t be any merch table to buy them at. So, how much per shirt, you ask?

£22.99
€26.99
$29.99

Truth be told, I might pay a lot more for that fine, grey “Diamond” shirt if it was down to me! The shirts also have a feature that I’ve never seen before but it seems pretty classy to me. The “True” dove logo by David Band [r.i.p.] is silkscreened on the inside of the shirt under the “tag” printing. And you’d better believe that I put one in a shopping cart to see that the shipping to America was a decent enough $14.00. Not a deal breaker. But I’ve got lots of musical travels and adventures coming my way like a freight train that begin next weekend and keep me busy through Rocktober! I need to cull many shirts that I already have, as mentioned in the epic “Lost T-Shirt” thread of recent weeks. Still, I hope that I can find a spare $43.99 in some seat cushions. If you agree, then DJ hit that button!

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Posted in T-shirt, Want List | Tagged 2025, merchandise, Spandau Ballet | Leave a comment

POST 3000: 15 Years And Counting

Posted on July 29, 2025 by postpunkmonk

The background tile to this blog for 3000 posts…and probably *more*

I noticed a few months ago that a momentous occasion was coming in a few months. Today marks the 3000th post here at Post-Punk Monk. Sure, sure. We’re bending the rules a little bit as I’ve had a handful of guess postings, mainly from dear friend chasinvictoria and the WareWolf; youthful scion of another dear friend, Mr. Ware. And it must be said that this entire enchilada was down to a friend no longer with us.

SECRET ORIGINS OF PPM

All of the people in the paragraph above were also friend with Ron Kane. He was a record collecting force to be reckoned with. He both showed me what was possible and also served as a warning of sorts. The one time I visited his home it was filed with so many records [they were in every room] that there was only a small path to walk through some of the living room. But Ron had stared blogging by the new millennium. I thought “that might be interesting.” After all, in the early 90s a friend and I published a music fanzine called R Magazine and that was a brief year or two of fitful self-published issues. But it was fun, and we connected with people, believe it or not.

Even so, I never imagined that I would have the time to do this. I’m a working guy. I spend eight hours, plus a lunch hour at work, Monday to Friday. I’m also married and a homeowner. And I sort of had a hobby of digitizing/remastering my records and making as near as I could to full-fledged CD-Rs out of them. Any and all of these things were probably the best uses of any [hah!] free time I might have. So no thank you. I was content to read Ron’s blog at my desk during lunch. Sometimes I would leave comments if he was writing about something that stirred me up.

It was a few years into this when I realized that many times, my comments were two to three times the length of his posts. And then the light bulb went off. I had an hour at my desk every day that was mine alone and there was nothing better that I could be doing with it. I recognized the obvious: I was sort of de facto blogging on Ron’s post every few days with my long winded commentary.

Given that I could generate long-winded commentary on many topics, I made the leap to conclude that this blogging thing could work! At my desk at lunch every weekday. And it could be a passion project that gave my life some lift in ways that my job certainly didn’t [at the time]. The thought then came…what would I call it? Thanks to a comment from chasinvictoria regarding one of my BSOG’s [boxed sets of god] that I had sent him which showed me the way fairly quickly in my reflection. Yes, manually declicking and denoising audio files from records was grueling, tedious work. Just like making an illuminated manuscript… and then the phrase “Post-Punk Monk” came to me in an instant. And that shoe certainly fit.

DOWN GOOGLE! UP WORDPRESS!

I quickly hacked together the site graphics and opened my doors on the Blogger platform from Google on June 24th, 2010. And within a month, Google was throwing its weight around on the wrong side of the net neutrality issue so nuts to them! I switched to WordPress and haven’t looked back. At first using their free platform, but after a few years the ads that were apparently being served to visitors irritated me [once I became aware of them – in Admin you do not see these ads] so I immediately switched to a commercial domain and viola – Postpunkmonk.com became a thing. Sure, sure. It costs a little bit each year, but it’s a small price to pay to keep the place free from obnoxious advertising for any visitors.

And the site hasn’t changed much since it began. About five years in I thought of changing the theme and graphics, but thought the better of it. Some of the hand-coded HTML features on certain pages seemed to break when testing new themes and I also felt that the security of visitors coming and finding everything right where they thought they should be was worth more than the price of “improving” for the sake of it. Post-Punk Monk… the comfortable sweat shirt of Post-Punk music blogs.

With 3000 posts in 15 years and one month, that balances out to about 200 posts a year. The word count here shows that we’ve got 2,789,000 words filling the thousands of pages. Averaging out to 930 words per post. Very close to the average I’ve seen it at over the years. The first year was a little scanty, it’s true, but by year two, I knew how I was going to accomplish this blog. And then I just stuck with it.

Since the blog is written at my desk at lunch hour, there are times when for one reason or another, this does not happen. I can get very busy some times, and lunch hours fall by the wayside. Personal appointments eat into the work week and I have to shift hours around to compensate. I enjoy vacations! After 20 years of service, I get four weeks of paid vacation…I’m practically European on that score! [though it took me at least 15 years go get there] These mean no blogging. If I have the time to remember to do it, I may run old blogs in those times, but time is usually too tight to graze over the past and pick some re-runs.

CONNECTING WITH OTHER FANS…AND MORE

While my love and enthusiasm for music is boundless, that’s not where the biggest joy in this blog comes from. That joy comes from meeting other music fans and in many cases, fostering actual bonds of friendship with people who may be hundreds to thousands of miles away from the mountain hamlet I call my home. The list of people I’ve “met” here grows annually, but in the best case scenarios, I have actually spent time with and have even broken bread with people who were once commenters here at PPM but are now something more. Actual friends.

Just next weekend I’ll be seeing a show with old friend The RAHB [who I’ve known since 1980] and new friend Todd, who releases music with his band Fluid Japan. And I treasure that I can have that happen. If I had more money and time I’d like to see great shows or to shop at great stores with scads of people on this blog who were first commenters, and then presences in the email inbox. Believe it or not, we talk offline about more than music.

The Antipodeans - hey little girl press pic

And then there are the times, of late, where we have gotten to interview musicians who fall into the purview of PPM and I try my very best to make it worth the artists’ while. I was initially cool to interviewing since it represents a lot of work on the hidden back end. But when the first opportunity manifested, just four years ago with David Kendrick of Gleaming Spires/Sparks/DEVO [who could turn that offer down, right?] it opened a door that I felt was well worth the effort. Since then I’ve gotten to have quality time and discussion with artists who are even deeply represented in Ye Olde Record Cell such as Robert Howard of Blow Monkeys and Barry Andrews of Shriekback. One hopes that I didn’t collapse into a mewling fanboy puddle and embarrass myself on these or any other occasions.

So fifteen years and 3000 posts is a lot of time spent writing. In spite of a life in the graphic arts, I now think of myself as primarily a writer. Egads! What other changes await us in the coming years? Will I be able to stick around for another fifteen years? I certainly hope so! There’s too much fascinating and excellent music being released in this period, and of course, there are always older records that deserve to be kept in the public spotlight lest they be forgotten entirely in the turmoil. We’ll try to keep abreast of both the forward and backward looking threads here at PPM as we press on with diligence.

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Posted in metablogging | 27 Comments

Tour Shirts No Longer With Us [part 7]

Posted on July 28, 2025 by postpunkmonk

Today we finally put the seemingly endless thread of tour shirts we used to own to bed. And just in time, as we’ll see tomorrow [?]. There are a few surprises in this last batch. As in “I can’t believe that The Monk sold off that one!”

BRYAN FERRY: Mamouna [Orlando] 1995

I’d first heard Roxy Music in 1975. I was hooked from the first time I heard “Love Is The Drug.” I started buying their albums with “Flesh + Blood” and quickly burned through the entire oeuvre. Then moved to the Ferrysphere. I had begun to think that I would never see The Maestro. But that changed in 1994/1995 as his Mamouna tour first came to Atlanta in November of 1994, and later, after a world tour jaunt in early 1995 throughout Asia/Australasia, he came to touch down in Central Florida for three dates!

As I’d just met my loved one, and we bonded over a mutual admiration for Bryan Ferry [among other things] we mad sure to hit the Tampa gig [along with longtime friends The RAHB and chasinvictoria] as well as the Orlando show with Mr. Ware and his loved one. A rare triple header for an artist’s tour with three dates attended. I think I only ever did that for Double Duran. I already had this design [but with the dates from the leg with Atlanta the year earlier] but my future wife got this shirt. Now she just roots through my cabinet O’shirts if she want’s to wear anything, so we flipped this one!

It does look a little strange seeing those three Florida dates after locales halfway around the world predominated. As in “Bryan Ferry, you just completed your Mamouna World Tour…what are you going to do next?”

Bryan Ferry – “What else? I’m going to Disney World.”

ROXY MUSIC: Pirate US Tour 2001 [New Jersey]

We eventually got to see Roxy Music when the band surprisingly reformed for a valedictory world tour in 2001. This was especially surprising in that Ferry had not yet divorced his wife, but maybe he was banking on the need for upcoming alimony? He usually rallies the troops when his love life hits the rocky shores. And I’m here to say, “yes, please!”

The Tweeter Center in New Jersey was the first date in America and we were visiting the family in Akron so driving to New Jersey was six hours and worth it to the max! Of course I bought the requisite sumptuous tour book and the official shirt, with Susie Bick [soon-to-be Susie Cave] on the artwork, from the 2001 greatest hits compilation put together to capitalize on the tour. But we were in such an expansive mood, that when confronted by street youths selling pirate shirts on the walk back to the car, we said, “suuuure!” In the cold light of day, we probably didn’t need this one.

FRANK SINATRA: Diamond Jubilee Tour 1991

This was my third Sinatra gig and it was spectacular! I went with my parents again and a couple of friends who were celebrating their anniversary as my gift to them. Frank delivered another top form show a year since the last one in the same venue. He was 75 and compiled a set list for this one that just gave me chills when I looked at it a moment ago. This was Peak Frank, to be sure. Belting the upbeat songs with verve and giving equal spotlight to the “saloon songs” that cement his reputation as an interpreter without peer. I liked the “Three Faces Of Frank” design. Notice the ad for Chivas Regal, the sponsor!

NITZER EBB: Showtime 1990

The second time I saw Nitzer Ebb, I was into the t-shirt lifestyle, so I made sure to grab one of these beauties with “Showtime” branding and colors. I loved how the design was reversed on the back! Looking at this shirt now, I regret my decision to sell this off. In 2025, I don’t have much enthusiasm for…let’s say, Cocteau Twins but I still treasure [pun intended!] the Nitzer Ebb canon. And this shirt did look sharp.

They were in Orlando Arena [18,000 cap.] for this show as Depeche Mode’s opening act. Good thing too, as they were far more interesting. And I say that while agreeing that “Violator” was a great album. But Depeche Mode were never live firebrands. The same can’t be said for The Ebb. Douglas McCarthy [r.i.p.] was never anything but riveting onstage.

I do see that the Ebb webstore has a riff on this original shirt design still available. Hmmmmmm. I’ll never have tats, though!

THE COCTAILS: Mid 90ss Tour?

I remember everyone being up in arms over Chicago indie band The Coctails coming to the Sapphire Supper [suffer] Club in Orlando. Our local heavies The Hate Bombs were thrilled to be opening, and good thing! As it turned out, The Coctails were a fairly bloodless Jazz Band, in spite of the canny, indierok branding. I bought their 1993 CD, “The Long Sound,” and it didn’t last too long in the Record Cell. The T-shirt fared a little better. Looking backk now, it’s indie-by-rote and no wonder it failed to move me musically.

THE CRAMPS: Look Mom, No Head Tour

Where did I get this long-sleeved Cramps shirt sporting “Look Mom, No Head!” graphics? The Back of the shirt had Poison Ivy giving her tribute to The Girl In Gold Boots, I guess! The Cramps! Long sleeved shirt! Why did I get rid of this? The bigger question was, I never saw that tour so how did I get a shirt from it? I’ll guess that it was extra stock that made its way into a record store t-shirt rack. But I usually never look at anything but music. Hmmmmm.

COCTEAU TWINS: Some Early 90s show?

This one is blurrier than my memories! I remember thinking at the time “was the screen printing that off-register or was it a deliberate part of the 4AD aesthetic?” It’s hard to remember all of my Cocteau Twins shows. There was 1990/Heaven Or Las Vegas in Atlanta . That’s highly memorable. The second was a slippery show in Tampa/St. Pete where Liz Frazier was ill and they stopped the performance partially through as the audience was beseeching her not to sing. That might have been the St. Pete show at the Mahaffey Theater and I swear that chasinvictoria was at such a show with me. And for some reason, I think of the show as being during daylight hours? This may be a shirt from that show. The third show was in Tampa at The Ritz on the “Four Calendar Cafe” tour and we’ve already seen those shirts in earlier parts of this thread.

From not wearing t-shirts for a decade to owning too many of them, it seems that I’m a creature of extremes. I need to perform another cull as the cabinet is filled to bursting again. And I’ve probably gotten seven OMD shirts [off the top of my head] since they’ve been back together for a little more excess. And since every t-shirt has a story, maybe covering the ones that I’ve kept might be just as interesting. Or maybe not. But if I do another cull, I’ll make sure to mention it here and possibly revise this thread for another time.

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Posted in Core Collection, T-shirt, Uncategorized | Tagged 2025, Bryan Ferry, Cocteau Twins, Frank Sinatra, Nitzer Ebb, Roxy Music, The Cramps, tour shirt | 2 Comments

Tour Shirts No Longer With Us [part 6]

Posted on July 25, 2025 by postpunkmonk

Just when you thought it was safe to venture back to Post-Punk Monk came The Thread That Would Not Die®…more tour shirts that I used to own from a cull nearly 20 years ago in advance of the next shirt cull.

COCTEAU TWINS: Heaven Or Las Vegas 1990

This was one of the three shirts I bought at that first “Heaven Or Las Vegas” Cocteau Twins show I saw in Atlanta in 1990. A little excessive, perhaps! But I was a huge fan back then. It looked like this was their first US date following a European tour leg days prior. But now that they were signed to Capitol in The States, there was support for touring like we hadn’t seen from these Scots prior. A classic black shirt with the bright album branding and a tiny logo on the back.

THE JUDYBATS: Pain Makes You Beautiful 1993

Strangely enough, we met Paul Noe at a Mission [UK] show in Atlanta where The Wonder Stuff were scheduled to open for the band, but actually didn’t. Once we had made the long road trip to Atlanta with my Wonder Stuff loving friend. Paul was a civilian just then, and my friend Jayne and I were publishing our fanzine then [the internet hadn’t been invented yet…] and Paul was someone who actually contributed to one of the issues, if memory serves.

It was a year or two later when Paul told us that he’d joined The Judybats as a bass player for their third Sire album, “Pain Makes You Beautiful.” The Judybats were a great alternative band out of Knoxville, Tennessee as guided by Jeff Heiskell, a writer of great merit. And if you ever wanted to hear Gary Numan’s “Cars” covered by a guy with a pronounced southern accent, Jeff’s your man! Since we knew Paul and The Judybats were touring through Orlando, Paul comped us on the guest list at big time club The Edge that time and provided a promo CD! Oh la la! We reciprocated where it counted by buying the t-shirt so that they could get some income where it counted.

CROWDED HOUSE: Woodface Tour 1991

I had seen Crowded House a few times since my good friend Mr. Ware was into all things Split Enz. So we accompanied him to see the band at Ratona Beach as part of MTV’s Spring Break coverage in 1987. And the resulting show was shown on MTV afterward! As it was raining badly that day, the director had to corral the hard core who would not leave into a small mass that made it look like an audience of some substance was still there in the coverage. Fair enough, under the circumstances. We also ventured to a Water Park in Busch Gardens in Tampa to see them two months later. But on both of those treks, I was still not in my t-shirt wearing years yet. That changed in 1990, when I turned a corner on casual wear and comfort in sweltering Orlando!

So by the third album tour with the band showing up in a city where we didn’t have to drive an hour or so to see them, a T-shirt was a given by that point! Ironically, Mr. Ware liked album #3 less than I did, but I had never heard the über-fan circulated demos as he had! As it was, I never moved past album number three in spite of liking it far more than he did.

THE WONDER STUFF: Never Loved Elvis 1992

In 1992, we saw The Wonder Stuff as they were opening up for Siouxsie +The Banshees on their divisive [to say the least] Superstition Tour at the International Ballroom in Doraville, near Atlanta. That album was not The Banshees finest hour. Nor was the third album for The Wonder Stuff, “Never Loved Elvis,” as I recall my fannish friend Jayne thinking that the production by Mick Glossop was all wrong for the band.

Nevertheless, we bought the tour shirt! We always loved a long-sleeved variety! And this one had the tour dates on the back. A classic touch. Alas, since Jayne was driving, she wanted to leave after the opening act and drive back home to Orlando, so I never got the chance to see Siouxsie + The Banshees twice. But on that album, I might not have missed much.

THE FLAT DUO JETS: 1990s Tour

My second Flat Duo Jets shirt was a simple, generic variety from the time they were signed to Norton Records, I believe. I think that same night as buying this shirt at the Go-Lounge Garage in Orlando, they might have just released their amazing “Safari” compilation of unreleased material spanning their career. [checks] Nope. That album came out in 1993, I think this short was purchased a few years later.

MAN…OR ASTROMAN?: Fan Club Shirt 1994

Here’s proof I’m a Music Geek. I actually joined the Man…Or ASTROman? Fan Club for two years in the mid-90s! Not only was I buying every one of their amazing 7″ singles and CDs, but I needed more. The year of membership brought you a special T-shirt, some tchotchkes, and most importantly, a discount at the merch table. An important consideration when I was buying all of those 7″ singles!

FRONT LINE ASSEMBLY: Tactical Neural Implant Tour 1993

Oh but I was all about the Industrial Music in the late 80s and early 90s! The one time I saw Front Line Assembly was at a 1993 gig at…Orlando überclub J.J. Whispers…I think. Or else it may have been at Visage, where most of their other dates that are in the setlist.fm database are listed at.

I wasn’t exactly enamored of the “TECHNOHEAD” printing on the back. As it was, I never could stand “Techno” but I did roll over like a puppy for long sleeved T-shirts; especially those with printing on the sleeves! But by 1995, I think I already got rid of that CD. Said to be one of their best. There was so much shady Canadian industrial stuff that was floating around back then; mostly on the Nettwerk Records label. This band were better than Skinny Puppy, but that’s not saying much.

Next: …One More For The Road

Posted in T-shirt, Uncategorized | Tagged 2025, Bonnie Raitt, Chris Isaak, Cocteau Twins, Duran Duran, Lush, Swing Out Sister, The Woggles, tour shirt | 5 Comments

Here’s Some Superb Archival 90s Goth From Sunshine Blind In Advance Of New Material

Posted on July 24, 2025 by postpunkmonk

sunshine blind @ NYC (c) 2024 Doug Dresher — Sunshine Blind – clockwise from upper left: Caroline Blind, CHWK, Geoff Bruce, William Faith [photos ©2024 Doug Dresher]

Here’s something fantastic that just came out on Monday…following a possible 30 years in the digital deep freeze of a 90s DAT tape. The band Sunshine Blind were part of the 90s Goth Scene that saw Goth and Darkwave churn up new bands like Switchblade Symphony, whom Ye Olde Monk once saw open up for…Gary Numan. The core of the original band were singer Caroline Blind and CHWK, who were a couple during the first phase of the band [1991-2004] before they split up and that was it for Phase One of the band.

In the ‘teens they mended fences and would occasionally reform in a new configuration as seen above from last years’ gig at The Red Party in NYC. Still with core duo of Caroline and CHWK, but abetted with the rhythm section from Faith + The Muse; William Faith and Geoff Bruce. We know William Faith from his production of the recent singles by the band Autumn, who had a superb singer in Ms. Julie Plante who I was very impressed with. Apparently, Mr. Faith knows great singers when he hears them, because Caroline Blind is another gifted vocalist working in the Goth genre with impressive results.

When the group began digging through the debris of the past in preparation for moving ahead, they came across DAT tapes recorded in the 90s, and thankfully, they were able to score a working deck to master them! They thought some of the fruits of their archaeology were worth hitting our ears in advance of new material, and having heard the results, I can only concur! This pair of demos were my first exposure to the band, but if this was what they had clogging the tape archive back then, I can only say that I’m waiting for the new material with the greatest of anticipation.

Sunshine Blind: Unreleased Vol. 1 – US – DL [2025]

Tomorrow 5:38
Hanging Lake Demo 4:57

“Tomorrow” began so subtly that one barely heard anything at first. But then the steady drumbeat moved the song along as languid guitar added gentle its gentle tones. Then Caroline Blind began singing the delicate song as the bass began building a mood. Caroline gave us plenty of reason to stick around with her immaculate delivery. When it comes to vocalists, I’ve always maintained that taste was more important than ability, but a handful of singers like her show us that it’s possible to have it all in this fallen world. On occasion.

At the halfway point the big guitars cut in with volume and distortion as the song kicked up the energy levels to quickly transition from a late-night intimate vibe to truly anthemic as Ms. Blind projected to match the guitars as the song flared out in a burst of white light. With the guitars feeding back slightly in a haze of reverb. Ending the song on a whole new plane from where it humbly began.

Steady beats and chugging sequencers vying for space with the guitars began the demo of “Hanging Lake” with none of the subdued energy levels that the first song brought to our ears. By the time of the first chorus Caroline’s fiery delivery she was delivering the fortissimo performance that she coyly held back on with “Tomorrow.” Usually it’s Italians who offer us this sort of vocal brio. This made the second classic in a row on “Unreleased Vol. 1.” Don’t just take my word on it.

Maybe now you can hear why I simply cannot wait for the new material the band are preparing. And since this single was entitled “Unreleased Vol. 1,” here’s hoping that there’s more material this rousing that they can pry from the ancient DAT tapes while they are readying the new songs. This will set your back $2.00 in their Bandcamp store, but the delight there is you can always top up for the band. DJ hit that button!

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Posted in Immaterial Music, Record Review | Tagged 2025, Bandcamp, Sunshine Blind | 3 Comments

Want To Hear Something New? Well So Do The Bass Kittens!

Posted on July 22, 2025 by postpunkmonk

If you’ve been following PPM’s journey through space and time you may recall seeing comments from one jsd [a.k.a.. Jon Drukman] for most of that journey. He’s a Bay Area musician, and though he’s got enough similarity of taste to have been a heavy commenter here @PPM, his own music is a little outside the typical popsong oriented PPM purview. The one thing he sent me way back when was his band Bass Kittens cover version of my fave rave Human League B-side, “Marianne.” Of course, I enjoyed it! It’s “Marianne!” how could I not? But recently he sent along the latest Bass Kittens single since it was so far removed from the techno/dub/abstract sounds [not that there’s anything wrong with that…] that Bass Kittens were known for he felt like it might be something for Ye Olde Monk. So we checked it out!

Bass Kittens: Something New – US – DL [2025]

Something New 4:34

Against the bass drum the guitar rang out with a clean tone while the percussion widened the soundstage as the choral patches sighed like train whistles in the night; complete with doppler shift. Vocalist Emma Rodriguez and the bass of Alexsander Dolgy began building up the sultry, late night vibe of the song. The only chill on the track came from the synths that stayed in the periphery of the song.

Emma filled out the song with her sometimes doubled vocal and BVs while the percussion programming [it’s all Jon Drukman on drum machine] kept things frisky. It really has a feel that brought me back to INXS ca. “Listen Like Thieves” with a sexy, analog groove. And just when I was thinking, “yeah…INXS” in came Bob Drukman on saxophone to nail that thought to my skull. See if you can see where I’m coming from.

So, unexpected new growth is always a good thing in my book. I’ve been known to say “yes” to things that are not my thing and see if I can grow in the process of resisting a pat knee-jerk reaction. Other bands might have fractured over such a stylistic volte-face, but since I think Bass Kittens are Drukman’s catch-all project name [with a rotating cast of collaborators], I guess he can do anything he wants to. If you’re ready for a stab at an INXS groove thang with a woman in the spotlight† then Bass Kittens have your poison at only 8 bits for the pleasure. DJ hit that button!

† – No one asked me but I always thought that INXS should have enlisted Chrissy Amphlette as their lead vocalist after Michael Hutchence died. I think she would have rocked, rocked, rocked…like a mother, like a mother, like a mother.

Posted in Immaterial Music, Record Review | Tagged 2025, Bandcamp, Bass Kittens | 8 Comments

Scenius Offer Their Warm Inviting Synthpop On “Swift As Light”

Posted on July 21, 2025 by postpunkmonk

Scenius band — Scenius are Fabrice Nau [L] and Steve Whitfield [R]

I may be a bit thick, but it sure seems like Franco/Anglo synth duo Scenius are drip feeding us singles from an upcoming album. Possibly with a luminous vibe. There have been three in the last four months, and each of them have a very similar distinctive cover image, differing only in coloration. And if that’s not enough of a clue, two of the songs have “Light” in their titles. But don’t pay attention to me. I have been wrong before.

evidence…

Scenius: Swift As Light – EURO – DL [2025]

Swift As Light 3:26

But the pair have brought plenty of charm to the delivery of this one. The slow BPM of the intro made for a relaxed pace and was that a manipulated CR78 drumbox I heard ping-ponging between the channels in the intro? The synth pulsating in the music bed hinted at the joviality of a seaside boardwalk organ and it’s almost the soundtrack for a summer romance with Mr. Nau’s earnest vocal conveying the wonder with which love can arrive…”as swift as light.”

The classicism of the performance and arrangement puts me in a Sparks frame of mind this time out and that suits me just fine. The chorus soars in the manner that Sparks often bring to the game while Fabrice’s more relaxed delivery is a little more “poolside” than what we get from Russell Mael. And if the instrumental middle eight dares to explore the disquieting ambiguity of this new love affair while the singer ultimately succumbs to the inevitability of it all in the dry, abrupt climax of the song. Listen in below.

The single was released on Friday and it’s yours for €1.50 in their Bandcamp store. It’s funny that the band’s self-description on their Bandcamp page cites “dark-wave,” but if anything was the case, these latest singles on offer just might be the dawn of a new Synthpop subgenre… Lightwave! DJ hit that button!

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